New Haven Independent

Posted by: jeffreykerekes | March 26, 2008 9:00 AM

I think a few other useful sets of numbers are helpful when considering this subsidy - which we as a community may still want to support. There are a total of 93,000 people who go there each year (according to their 2005 Form 990) - 67,000 patrons at 85 performances and another 26,000 people who were there when the facility gets rented out. The $410,000 subsidy can be entirely eliminated if Shubert ticket going patrons added about $6 to the average $43 ticket price or only $4.40 per person. When you look at it this way, is this the best use of $410,000? Would ticket goers stop going for another $6.00? If you spread it to everyone, would people stop going for $4.40? During tough economic times, we need to look at places to cut with the least impact to avoid cutting in areas with a greater impact. From this vantage point, the Shubert will be fine with out their extra $4.00 per person -- its not like we are suggesting they close their doors.

Posted by: Walt | March 26, 2008 9:06 AM

No deficit?

Call it what you want, but obviously there is a $410,000 annual deficit made up by the taxpayers.

When the Shubert was rehabbed in 1989, its supporters, even then I believe, including Ms, Clark , proclaimed that it would become self-supporting afteer a couple of subsidy years, but of course, that never happened.

If the bars and restaurants around College Street are raking in the money because of the Shubert's existence, let them pay the subsidy through a special tax district instead of forcing it on the ordinary New Haven taxpayer, who probably can't afford to visit the Shubert?

Was Joe Taxpayer invited to share in the crabcakes too, or only the politicians and the artistes ?

According to the figures above, a 10% increase in ticket or other fees would raise well more than the $410,000 the taxpayers contribute yearly, but the arts groups and their elitists prefer to use Joe Taxpayer's money instead of their own, and not only want to continue the Shubert subsidy but increase it.

A greedy bunch, as I see it.

Posted by: Pedro | March 26, 2008 9:28 AM

I agree with Jeff, that I think that this number could be excised creatively.
What the Shubert should charge in it's ticket would be a "management/facilities" fee of approximately $6. On the ticket or in literature provided to ticketholders, it could be made clear that this is a fee that they are charging to administer the Shubert for the city.
I actually didn't know that the Shubert was OWNED by the city!

If this subsidy stands, then I most certainly
think that the city should get more "bang for the buck" out of this association and perhaps get a little more publicity for the city out of it (that the city owns a world-class theater, for example).

Posted by: on whalley | March 26, 2008 11:36 AM

What the hell? I don't care one way or the other about theater so I don't ever buy a ticket there but I supposed to give in when the tax men come with their guns and jails and demand I support it?

If it isn't surviving on its own then perhaps it should close up shop. Maybe relocate to a smaller less expensive place where it can balance it's revenue with it's expenses.

This is as ridiculous as expecting taxpayers to fund the Yankee Doodle.

And to give something taxpayer money just because it's old is absurd. There are some drunks walking around who have been drunk and unemployed for decades in New Haven. Lets all give them our stuff because they're staples of the city????

If there is any line to be crossed people are stomping and dancing right on top of it.

How come the NHI hasn't mentioned DeStefanos desire to jack up the sales tax within the city yet? Half the day has gone by and no mention of it.

Wait, the Shubert is owned by the city?

I'm going to go punch a brick wall for a while.

If it can't balance revenue with expenses then it obviously isn't something we want to keep. It's something we're being forced to keep like an annoying pig of a mother in law in the guest room.

Posted by: Webblog 1 | March 26, 2008 11:38 AM

Shubert Theater-$410K, Tweed New Haven Airport-$800K, grove street garage-$250K, Plot pen Tennis Center-$135K.

Don't single out the Shubert, cut all of these non profits, then they all will make a profit, or else.

Savings= $1.595M = .75 Mills.

Posted by: I hate taxes | March 26, 2008 12:25 PM

I hate taxes. I hate them in the morning, I hate them in the night.

I hate them whenever the New Haven Independent mentions them, cause they just ain't right.

I don't want no stinking arts,
I don't want no airport either.

And I must be right 'cause
everyone who comments on the NHI is an anti-tax believer.

If you just add $6 to the tickets,
sales will go through the roof.

Forget that I have no idea what I am talking about,
I said it in the comments so it must be the truth.

Posted by: cedarhillresident | March 26, 2008 12:32 PM

Does the Pilot Pen bring any money to New Haven??? What kind of return do we see on these payments??

Webblog 1 I loved the way you broke it down to the mills, It brings a better understand to us. I million here and a million there really can bring down the mill rate.

Posted by: Gary Doyens | March 26, 2008 3:04 PM

I hate taxes: Funny but hardly true and you seem to miss the point of citizens who clearly spend a lot of time reviewing the budget and trying to propose ways to save money and keep New Haven an affordable place to live.

There is nothing wrong with the concept of people getting the direct benefit of a facility, paying to make it profitable. It's a promise that was made, and has now been long overdue in being fulfilled.

The Shubert is not the anchor that holds downtown together - it's a contributor. Raising ticket prices is a good way to close the deficit and break even. The same is true with Tweed although the advocacy is based on demonstrable falsehoods, lack of facts and tainted koolaide.

Mike Piscatelli and the mayor didn't give two seconds worth of thought to layering on a THIRD level of tax on parking lots in New Haven in order to fund the fake trolley. The mayor's point is that "out of towners" use the parking lots more than the residents - therefore it's all those suburdan people who don't pay for anything else, who will be hit the hardest but not so hard, they won't park in New Haven.

Since the vast majority of Shubert attendees also come from outside New Haven, using the same logic, why not go up on ticket prices in order to save the dependency payment for taxpayers who do live in New Haven? Afterall - people who can afford to pay $86 on average for a pair of tickets are not going to be miss favorite performances for another $8 - $12 dollars.

Posted by: jeffreykerekes | March 26, 2008 3:31 PM

Dear "I Hate Taxes":

Nice poem. Do you have any data that presents a different picture about ticket prices/attendance at shubert or the airport? I am open to new information that would result in a different conclusion. I am trying to understand the data behind claims and information to arrive at an informed opinion. We keep learning about new deficits such as in the self insurance fund (about $14 Million), the recent $17 M budget shortfall for the current calendar year, all of which is in addition to the GASB 45 unfunded liability of $430 Million which seemingly came out of nowhere and is now about 65% of total city debt.

We can differ on what we would do from a policy perspective -- such as funding things like the airport or shubert, but we should talk straight about the costs of these choices and all the other choices we made that has resulted in an out of balance budget.

I also am not against taxes. I believe in spending money effectively on the choices we do make. I am for compensating the people we do hire well, and letting go those we do not need. I am against things like $175/hour snow removal, funding essentially a private airport out of public funds ($800k in operating expenses and millions in bonds for capital projects), funding a trolley no one rides (9 people per hour at a cost of $350k/yr) and similar things. Is anyone for these things?

Posted by: I hate taxes | March 26, 2008 4:22 PM

Ouch! Ouch! Ouch!

As I sit here typin' on my couch,
someone started to use big finance words,
that sound so oh I dunno, absurd.

As if it's somehow different this year
than every other --
but is it brother?

I hated taxes last year and cried the sky it is a fallin,

But then what happened? The sky started stallin'

And there it stayed up above,
while the theater, trolley and all i just don't love,

ran on and on;

and the crazy people of New Haven,
seemed just not to listen,
because it could not be that they too looked up,
but did not see

the very same calamity.

Posted by: ADM | March 26, 2008 6:06 PM

I'd venture to say it wouldn't be as simple as raising ticket costs to eliminate the subsidy. Ticket sales are likely to shift from week to week, month to month, year to year. If the Shubert is completely reliant on ticket revenue to stay in the black, a bad month could mean closure. It is likely that the Shubert has fixed costs, salaries, heat, etc. etc. that need to be paid . Generally, a non-profit needs some money to pay for these kinds of expenses without relying on ticket revenue that would come in in small increments over the course of the year.
Keeping prices low in a city like New Haven means contributing to a wider portion of the population being able to afford to go to the theater. A place like the Shubert also brings people into New Haven and changes the perception of New Haven. Many people around the state still think New Haven is a war zone that they don't want to visit. We need to change that image. We also need to recognize the value of keeping the arts affordable and accessible to everyone and support our city by supporting the arts. Unfortunately the arts tend to be the first to be eliminated in a time of economic crisis. But I wouldn't be in this city in the first place if the art community wasn't so vibrant. I applaud the management of the Shubert for steering if from being shuttered to thriving. Let's not turn back the clock.

Posted by: Are we focused correctly | March 26, 2008 7:18 PM

I too cannot stand paying more taxes but are we focused in the right place? I found these two quotes from the Mayor's testimony posted by Mr. Kerekes:

"FY 09 health care costs are still projected to increase by 5.85%, an additional $2.72 million. This will bring the ten year increase to $24.2 million or a 96.80% increase in city expenditures not counting the increases in cost sharing."

"Despite these efforts, utility costs are set to increase by 10.9%, or $1.7 million, in FY09. This will bring the ten year increase to $13.1 million or 127%."

And then from this article there is this point about the Shubert: "The city supplement has not been increased since 1985, even to keep up with inflation, Fisher said."

Taken together, it does not seem that the Shubert is what is causing the threat of tax increases in New Haven.

Posted by: Bill Saunders | March 26, 2008 8:12 PM

The Shubert is a beautiful theater, and would hate to see it close its doors. For years, I bought my parents a gift certificate as a xmas present. However, programming at the Warner Theatre in Torrington, and the new Palace in Waterbury have proven to be a little more diverse for my parents tastes in recent years(How many times can you see Cats?).

But, if, we as taxpayers are going to subsidize this theater, I would ask in return that the theater better utilize it's available resources -- In particular, putting on shows during the summer, when they are typically closed.

It's hard to generate money when you are not even trying.

Posted by: on whalley | March 27, 2008 8:07 AM

"It's hard to generate money when you are not even trying."

Once you're on the dole why bother to generate money? I've sat face to face with an ex-friend while she tried to explain to me how her and her deadbeat man were trying for another kid because their unemployed/welfare benefits were scheduled to run out or change in the near future.

That's what the Shubert is to me now. Some worthless scum sucker who'd rather bring another child into poverty to keep the handouts coming in than get a job doing whatever to earn your way. A liability. A blight. Who cares how nice something looks if it's propped up by welfare. Pretend it's a pretty building or houses something of value and it's still on welfare. It becomes a gold chain, nice shoes and a friendly smile on a crackhead living under a bridge.

Posted by: Ned | March 27, 2008 8:10 AM

Since when is "H.M.S. Pinafore" considered "art"? boring is more like it. Perceptions of New Haven might change if the streets weren't littered with garbage, where corruption flourishes. If you want "art" make it yourself or get some rich friends to support your art. What is "art" anyway, and who decides which "art" taxpayers are forced to support?
There's more "art" and entertainment in one night, at Cafe 9, than there is in ten months at the Shubert.

Posted by: Ned | March 27, 2008 9:17 AM

P.S.
Dear I hate taxes:

Summer! tax increase
ghetto bass kills the bird song
New Haven death throes

Would you please write something about how I hate tennis and Broadway musicals and subsidized "art" too?

Posted by: Gary Doyens | March 27, 2008 10:18 AM

I want to be very clear - I support the arts including the Shubert. I think it has value and adds more color to the fabric that is New Haven. But when property taxes are rising 2.5 times the rate of inflation - we all have to make choices at the family level and at the city level. In more than four years of advocating for families and taxpayers - the sacrifice each year is always one sided.

Those of you who want to maintain a great theater and falsely claim or worry that the Shubert will be forced to close it's doors need to disabuse yourself of this complete exaggeration. What will likely happen is that the patrons will be asked to contribute more, ticket prices will increase by a couple of dollars and the development team will have to seek additional grants and operating revenues. This happens at nono-profits all across Connecticut every year.

To the best of my knowledge, the Shubert pays no rent to the city. If this is accurate, then the rent subsidy is an additional contribution to the cash of $410,000.

Just to fact check Mr. Fisher: The $410,000 is not a management fee - it's a dependency payment that has provided almost $9.5 million of tax dollars over the years. The Shubert by the way, has been a contributor to downtown revitalization but has not been a driver by any sense of the word. The original driver was Joel Schiavone, followed by Yale and other private investors and entrepreneurs who saw an opportunity and took it.

As for the Shubert giving away free tickets to the community - there is a severe limitation to what they give away and a foundation just last week was told they had exhausted that limit for the rest of the year. Non-profits who want to use the tax payer owned and subsidized theater also have to pay plenty to use it.

It doesn't come with crabcakes and wine either.

Posted by: EarlyBird | March 27, 2008 12:28 PM

How about more Wilco & Pat Metheny, and less Annie? Seems to me a couple of good concerts in the summer could go a long way to making up the loss of the 400K.

Hear Hear, Mr. Doyens.

Where my crabcakes, indeed.

Posted by: jeffreykerekes | March 27, 2008 1:58 PM

With the announcement of yet another $10 million less to work with, where would folks suggest making some cuts? The thought behind cutting this $410,000 is that the Shubert should be able to go on without too much of a burden. Cutting other places to get to $10 million plus, will hurt a lot more. Where would you suggest we look? We all need to be looking around for ways to make up these cuts in funding. Its simple math. When less comes in, there is less to go out. This is a fact. Now it is a discussion about where that comes from. Where do you suggest?

Posted by: Bill Saunders | March 27, 2008 3:27 PM

How 'bout selling the Shubert to a private interest?? (Or are they saving that one for next year?)

Posted by: Brian Hornby | March 27, 2008 7:16 PM

Just a quick FYI about the Shubert.

It is a city-owned property and we pay CAPA a management fee to maintain and operate the facility (which is the only theatre with that capability downtown), if the management fee goes away, CAPA doesn't increase ticket prices, they pack their bags. That is how their contract works.

For the City's investment of $410K, (unchanged since 1985) we have gotten $90 Million in economic impact downtown since 2001. Thats right, for $410,000 we get over $12,000,000 return economic impact downtown.

The fee that the City pays CAPA is not a subsidy, but a management fee that should be called an investment.

Brian Hornby
Program Officer
Office of Cultural Affairs
Economic Development Administration

Posted by: Bill Saunders | March 28, 2008 1:07 AM

Brian,

It is nice to know that management fee has remained flat over the past seven years. At some point, however, all contracts get renewed/renogiated (Unless CAPA has lucked into a lifetime, self-renewing contract). Is the Shubert now consistently operating in the black since CAPA took over? If so, where does that money go?

Not to be persnickety, but these 'economic impact' numbers always smack of fuzzy math. If you can show me an actual accounting of how each individual theater goer spends his/her money upon coming to New Haven to see a show, I would be more apt to believe your statement. But such accountings never exist. More likely, economic impact numbers are naturally inflated to justify more government handouts to that non-profit in the future.

Posted by: Walt | March 28, 2008 11:14 AM

Typical City Hall stuff by Hornby

Sets up a fake straw horse and destroys it just to change the subject.

I saw no one advocating dropping of the management group as in Hornby's example,

Most , if not all, of the comments were about who pays for the management contract, the subsidy, the deficit, or whatever you wish to call it.

Bitsie and the other arts touters sold the City a false bill of goods 30 years ago and the City taxpayers are still suffering,

It is time to tell the Arts folks that they must carry the expenses themselves,

If they continue to refuse to pay for their favorite venue, let it close again, Most folks will not miss it.

Back in the eighties ,Bitsie, and the Tylers, Trowbridges, Townsends, and many other Arts elitists sought aid from the City to renovate their favorite venue, with back-up data like Hornby's , supposedly showing it would be self-sufficient after only a few years of subsidy.

Never happened of course and now they seem to be complaining that the annual subsidy never increased.

A few bucks increase in ticket prices, ad prices , donations from the elitist Arts Council crowd could easily make the Shubert self-supporting, but its fans prefer that the costs be borne by New Haven taxpayers, who may never have even entered the hallowed Shubert lobby.

The $12 million annual economic impact, if it really exists, that Hornby touts, goes to the bars and restaurants in the neighborhood, the Shubert itself, and for the benefit of the "AHHTS" enthusiasts,

Why shouldn't they pay their own costs via increased ticket prices, more expensive or more ads, higher donations, special entertainment district taxes,etc.?

Those that benefit must start paying their own expenses, or shut it down again. Most New Haveners will not even notice.

Posted by: Gary Doyens | March 28, 2008 12:15 PM

Brian: I also would like to see how you arrive at $12 million in annual economic impact. I've been around these discussions for decades - and in more cities than I would like to count. I have never, and I do mean never, seen a real metric for measuring economic impact, especially from a small venue like the Shubert in a large and diversified metro district like Greater New Haven.

I suspect not only fuzzy math, but an intentional inflation of the numbers similar to City Hall's heroic calculations re: PILOT reimbursements from the state - where valuations are seriously inflated to justify higher PILOT.

By the way, I doubt CAPA would just disappear if they didn't get the annual dependency payment - they earn a very decent living and I suspect they will work hard and get creative on how to keep the Shubert alive for the relative few New Haveners and a lot of suburdan folks who enjoy it. I hope they do. If they don't - there are a number of arts folks across the state who operate very successful venues who would more than likely be willing to run it.

Posted by: Edward_H | March 30, 2008 11:18 AM

Brian Hornby

I would also like to to see some justification for this 12 million dollar number.

If a theater can bring in such huge numbers to a concentrated area you would think malls all over the country would use theaters as major anchors and attractions.

Posted by: Walt | March 31, 2008 11:03 AM

Surprised that Mr Hornby has not responded to those questioning the truth of his statements?

Could it be that his figures touting the subsidy of the Shubert are no more accurate than those City Hall tossed out 30 years ago promising that the rehabbed Shubert would be self-sufficient in the 90's?

Seems likely to me!!