Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The New North Section, Sunday, April 14th, 2002, Feature Story

Group closer to buying Strand, but funds for repairs still needed

By Scott Deacle
Post-Gazette Staff Writer

ZELIENOPLE – Maybe they should call it going to the moo-vies.

Thanks to an assist from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, a private group is close to having the money it needs to buy an old cinema on Main Street in Zelienople.

The Strand Theater Initiative should soon close on the purchase of the nearly 90-year-old Strand Theater, said Ron Carter, the Cranberry resident who started and heads the group.

The USDA isn’t giving the Initiative any money, but it will guarantee a $100,000 mortgage from Fidelity Bank.

The mortgage is the key to a financing package that should save the Strand from becoming a parking lot. The bank needed a party to guarantee the loan in case the group defaults, and the USDA’s Rural Development Program agreed to do it.

“We’re looking at it as a community-support loan,” Neal Jackson, a Fidelity assistant vice president and manager of the bank’s Zelienople branch.

The buildings owner, Gloria Nalevanko, waived an April 5 purchase deadline so Carter can take care of the remaining paperwork, Carter said.

Preservation Pennsylvania, a state-funded, historic preservation group, will help too, giving the group a grant and loan totaling $50,000. The initiative must repay two-thirds of that amount over eight years at a 4 percent interest rate. The remaining $16,667 comes in the form of a grant.

The loans and grant mark another step in Carter’s quest to restore the theater. He began his drive after he saw the old movie house decaying on his way home from one of his son’s flag football practices in May.

Opened in 1914, the Strand closed in the early 1980s after owner Michael Nalevanko died. Multiscreen suburban cineplexes had won over the public from one-screen downtown theaters, leaving few options for the building. Nalevanko’s widow, Gloria, put the building up for sale for $150,000, a price no one had been willing to pay until Carter came along.

Carter thinks there’s an untapped market for live professional theater in the northern suburbs. Downtown Pittsburgh theaters attract well-known plays and musicals, but another market exists for less-known productions, Carter said.

With 15 years experience in marketing for companies such as Foot Locker and American Eagle Outfitters, Carter embarked on a public relations and fund-raising campaign to save the Strand.

The campaign’s first stage culminated in a flurry of calls and applications to state agencies ranging from the Department of Environmental Protection to the Museum and Historical Commission. Carter needed approvals from the agencies to get the USDA to guarantee the loan from Fidelity.

But once the building is under the group’s control, Carter said, “the real work begins.” He estimated renovations will cost $2 million, though he said the final figure may be less.

So far, the group has raised $14,000 from the public. It used $6000 to put a deposit on the building and $2000 for expenses.

In addition to fixing the building’s heating, air conditioning, electrical wiring and plumbing, the group must add space in the rear of the building to make live stage performances possible. Under current plans, the theater’s back wall would be knocked out and an addition built that would allow for a larger stage, offices, dressing rooms and perhaps a rehearsal studio.

Carter must also make arrangements to get people to the Strand, which is in an area with few parking spaces. He says he wants to run shuttles from a nearby grocery store parking lot.

Zelienople council President Charles Underwood said council supports the Strand Theater Initiative, but he’s not sure if Carter’s parking plan is feasible.

“My only question has been, where are you going to park [customers]?” he said.

Carter seems determined to make the project work, traveling far and wide to rally support. The Initiative recently entered a partnership with the Midland School District in Beaver County, which wants to start its own performing arts center.

He also persuaded Preservation Pennsylvania to support the Strand renovation.

Preservation Pennsylvania Executive Director Patrick Foltz said the Strand project represents the best kind of historic preservation – taking an old building and making it useful to a community.

The Strand’s proximity to Pittsburgh was another key component in winning funding, Foltz said.

“This is that little nudge to get it started,” he said.

Small downtown theaters are becoming more common targets of revitalization efforts, Foltz said. Movie buffs and business people have used their own money to restore many as venues for art films or second-run films.

Carter is also seeking corporate donors and hunting for money from charitable foundations. He said he has asked the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic for $150,000.

Carter doesn’t know if he will first pay off the loans for the purchase or do some initial renovations. To date, the Initiative has done most of its fund-raising in the Seneca Valley Senior High School auditorium. Carter would like to show potential donors some improvements at the Strand.

Carter said he’s not sure when the theater will open. He initially hoped to open it by August, but the delays in finding a loan to buy the building have made that goal unreachable. He now says “maybe August of next year,” but that’s tentative.