FeedsPlanners stand pat on theater plan
Too little, too late.
That appears to be the phrase that relates to the Historic Wayne Theater.
Despite an impassioned plea from members of a subcommittee set up to formulate a recommendation to the city council, Planning Commission Chair Bob Boyles recommended that commissioners ignore a report put together by the subcommittee that stated it should be saved for redevelopment.
“My recommendation is we do nothing with this,” he said.
Commissioner Kurt Kuban, who chaired the subcommittee, said there was plenty of precedent for cities that took chances on historic theater restoration projects,. He pointed to the Michigan Theater in Ann Arbor.
“That has become a real beacon for their downtown,” he said.
Commissioners heard two reports on Tuesday night, one from Kuban’s group and another from the city administration. Peter McInerney, community development director for the city, said in his report that restoring the theater was not economically feasible and that the land was more valuable without the 80-year-old structure. City Attorney Dick Clark called the building ‘an accident waiting to collapse.’
“I think removing the building will not be a liability to downtown development,” McInerney said.Clark also mentioned that the city would be in violation of its own ordinance if council members decided to stave off the wrecking ball. The structure, listed as a dangerous building in the spring of 2006, has gone through the entire appeals process–and then some.
“Everyone has compassion but, in the end, the ordinance says we have to so something,” Clark said. “If you don’t, you’re violating the very ordinance you’re enacting.”
Commissioners voted 4-3 to not act on the report. Boyles, as chair, was the tie-breaker.
Pat Rice, who also serves on the dangerous building appeals board, was in favor of trying to save the building.
“We’ve taken a chance on a lot of other things,” she said. “Why can’t we take a chance on this and see if we can make it happen? I think we need something that can show that Wayne can turn it around.”
Clark said he is in possession of the deed to the property, one of the caveats the theater board agreed to in 2006 in order to gain another year from the city.
City council members will vote on whether to accept the deed at their meeting Tuesday.
“Obviously, only the city council can decide whether it can be accepted,” McInerney said.
