While many look at Zelienople’s Strand theater and see only an eyesore, Ron Carter sees a “cultural jewel.”

Or at least a cultural jewel in waiting.

Carter, a marketing consultant from Cranberry, is trying to find backers to purchase and transform the old Main Street movie theater into a place for live performances.

It’s an idea that Carter, who grew up in Shaler Township, came up with about a month ago.

“I was passing through town one day with my son, and I saw the Strand. It reminded me of an old theater in Beaver that was by my grandmother’s house,” Carter said. “(The Strand) had the same half-moon windows in the doors, and it just kind of struck me and inspired me, truly.”

The building that houses the Strand theater was built in 1914 and is said to have first been used as a grocery store, Carter said. It was then made into a theater during the silent movie heyday.

The theater showed its last movie in the early 1980s and since then has been vacant and for sale by its owner and former operator, Gloria Nalevanko.

Although closed for nearly two9 decades, the theater has remained a conversation piece in the borough throughout the years.

At one point, the Zelienople-Harmony Chamber of Commerce looked into renovating the structure, but it was deemed too costly of a project.

Then in 1999, the chamber made a push for the borough to buy it and tear it down to make way for a parking lot. Since parking is at a premium in Zelienople, business owners said the move would ease the borough’s parking woes.

But Zelienople Council nixed the idea. Council members said there were more pressing problems on which to spend tax money.

Carter said that although the 300-seat theater is structurally sound, it is in a “severe state of disrepair.”

Considering that he will need $150,000 to buy the theater and more that $500,000 to remodel it, Carter is hoping to raise about $1 million to get his nonprofit theater open.

The theater would play host to small professional touring acts, said Carter, who always has had an interest in the theater and has acted in small-scale productions in New York.

He said he plans to leave the theater’s outside marquee the same but “spruce it up” with fresh paint and new lights.

Inside, he hopes to extend the balcony to add about 100 seats, build out the stage to accommodate acts and create a “classic theater” with chandeliers and crushed velvet seats.

In order to provide some parking, Carter plans to tear down a dilapidated home that is behind the theater. To accommodate all visitors, he is looking into providing valet parking or working out an agreement to use nearby parking lots and shuttle people to the theater.

In order to operate as a nonprofit organization, Carter said, enough money initially will have to be raised to provide a first-year operating budget.

Carter estimates about $200,000 would be needed to cover the expenses of bringing in groups at first. Through ticket sales, the theater could replenish its budget on an annual basis and be self-sufficient, he said.

Carter said he has already been granted nonprofit status for the “Strand Theater Initiative” and has begun to seek contributions from foundations, corporations and organizations, such as the Pennsylvania Presenters and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Carter also would like to see support from local businesses and residents but said it likely will take a major donation from a foundation or corporation to make the theater a reality.

Marnie Repasky, executive director of the Zelienople-Harmony Chamber of Commerce, said she expects the chamber will help Carter in any way it can.

“I’m sure I can speak for everyone when I say we would be very appreciative if someone could do anything to upgrade the Strand,” Repasky said. “I’m glad (Carter) has the enthusiasm - and it sounds like the talent - to do it.”

Carter said he hopes that the theater’s first performance will be early next year. He admits there is a lot of work to be done before then.

“Maybe it will take longer, but that’s my goal,” Carter said. “I’m excited, and I want to make a living doing something that I love. This is on the fast track.”