Westminster council decides Rose Center Theater will change management, ceasing productions

The Rose Center Theater’s last production by the people who’ve run it for two decades will be a musical based on the legend of Robin Hood.

That program is “fitting for the occasion,” one of the musical’s creators Tim Nelson said. “It’s all about hope and the future and how Robin and his men turn a very distraught England into a very hopeful place.”

“And so that kind of speaks, I think, to where we are at,” said Nelson, who, as the resident theater company’s managing artistic director, dedicates long hours each week to roles such as composer, lyricist and program director.

Come Dec. 31, the Rose Center Theater in Westminster will undergo a change of management.

The theater was built in 2006 between 15th Street and All American Way to increase area residents’ access to art and theater. It has since hosted guests such as Arnold Schwarzenegger and Hilary Clinton and housed the Vietnamese American Philharmonic.

The Friends of the Rose Center, a nonprofit of about 20 volunteers organized in 1999, has managed the space since its inception. It’s been offering four musicals a year.

The theater also features an event space, an outdoor patio and a complete kitchen, which the nonprofit oversaw bookings for.

But in the new year, the city will assume responsibility for all of these amenities, and the Rose Center Theater will be closed to the public until further notice, or until it is reborn into what some Westminster City councilmembers hope will be a cultural center.

What does a change in management entail?

A name-change might be in the cards, but aside from that, the physical theater will probably remain the same, Mayor Chi Charlie Nguyen said.

The big difference, he said, will lie in the finances.

Since February, the Friends of the Rose Center and the city had been engaged in contract negotiations. In May, the city commissioned Los Angeles-based theater consulting firm TheaterDNA to conduct a study evaluating the center’s future.

That study recommended that the nonprofit remain as the theater’s managing entity.

But during a Nov. 12 meeting, Westminster councilmembers voted 3-1-1, with Councilmember Carlos Manzo opposed and Councilmember Amy Phan West abstaining, to forgo a staff recommendation for a one-year extension to the current management agreement, which would have taken it to June 30, with the option to add an additional three months.

Per the terms of that extension, the Friends of the Rose Center would have had to pay a monthly 5% venue fee to cover operational costs.

“For the nonprofit organization managing it, all they are responsible for is the cleanup after use. We have to pay for the electricity, the water — everything. I don’t think it’s fair,” said Nguyen, who instead supported not extending the leasing agreement and halting the nonprofit’s productions.

Estimates by city staff say Westminster currently pays around $50,000 annually to cover the theater’s expenses.

“This has been going on for the last 20 years,” Nguyen said. “We are not going to put out any more money.”

Manzo agreed that the city is “strapped for cash.” But aside from that assessment, he said he doesn’t understand his colleagues’ approach.

“My colleagues and I were told that this would take a long time,” Manzo said of the process for soliciting a new use for the space that he anticipates will take up the better part of a year. “So why have an empty theater?”

“The city does not own anything in there. We don’t own any of the props. So when they leave, they’re taking everything with them,” Manzo said. “Where are we going to get the funding to do anything? I don’t get the logic behind it.”

But Nguyen said it’s about giving community members an “equal pass” to use the theater.

“They can come in and apply to be a vendor or to operate this venue,” he said, adding that a cultural center would service the county’s diverse population. And in turn, he said, the city would see some revenue.

Nguyen said the city hasn’t begun the process of taking project proposals. And plans for a cultural center aren’t set in stone.

For now, Nelson said he’s focusing on delivering “Robin Hood and the White Arrow” to its final viewers — “really a tribute to everyone who worked hard to get it up and running to begin with.”

The theater company will also hold a “final goodbye,” a one-night concert on Dec. 30.

“I think the community has been very supportive,” Nelson said. “And it’s just been a nice time.”