Repairs and deep cleaning still need to completed
Movie buffs are going to have to wait a little bit longer to see movies on the big screen in Cordell.
The Cordell City Council, acting as the Cordell Development and Redevelopment Authority Board, at its monthly meeting Monday night put a hold on the Cordell Chamber of Commerce’s bid to operate the Washita Theater.
Board member Zetta Penner opened the discussion with a simple question.
“Will they go by the same rules and regulations that we made up for the Varners?” Penner asked. “And the same contract?”
The Chamber wanted to operate the movie theater at a $1 per-year lease, the same deal past operators have received, according to its proposal to the city.
“The Washita Theatre will provide the residents of Cordell with a long-awaited hometown movie theatre once again. The films shown will be first run, second runs and older releases of the popular movies in two target markets: families and young adults,” the chamber wrote in its proposal.
Some ideas the chamber had for the theater included featuring a business of the week, where if people shopped at that business during that week and showed a receipt, they would get a $1 off a movie ticket.
The chamber also wanted to rent the theater for private showing of movies, which would help with social distancing.
The chamber’s plan would eliminate free movies to avoid people using the theater as a “baby-sitter.” All children would need to be with an adult to get in the theater.
Chamber representative Sarah Lau told board members in the meeting that the chamber hadn’t yet discussed a specific age, but it could set the age limit for unaccompanied minors to as young as 10 or up to 13.
“We don’t want the movie theater to get messed up. We’re afraid if they go in and just kind of run around and mess things up, we don’t want that to happen. … Teen-agers are going to do stuff they’re not supposed to do anyway, so we just want to make sure they’re being watched over by an adult.”
The chamber proposed being open for 7 p.m. movies on Thursday-Saturday and a matinee showing at 4 p.m. on Saturday. The chamber said it could expand to other days, like Sunday, in the future if there was a need.
A few things still need to be worked out among the board before it feels comfortable moving forward with leasing the theater to any one organization.
Chief among the concerns is that the theater sill needs some needed work and a deep cleaning, mayor Jerry Beech said.
Beech said he hated to get involved in the discussion but offered a few thoughts nonetheless.
“I’ve had other people contact me about this theater,” he said. “I think that we need to have some parameters before we just jump into this deal.”
The city had previously discussed the idea that city employees would go over and try to clean the theater as best they could, and then the city would get a company to come in and finish the deep cleaning.
“We still have a roof that needs to be fixed. We have some deep cleaning to do. I think we need to start with a clean slate before you have to know what you’re really going to ask for,” Beech said. “I think whatever those parameters are, if one can try to rent it, I think the others who have asked about it should be able to also. That’s just my thought.”
The chamber proposed using the drug court to do the cleaning.
“Because we are a non-profit, the drug court can come in and help us clean,” Lau told the council.
Vona Baker (Hicks) asked about the mice infestation and other things that needed to be cleaned and sterilized.
“I don’t know. When we talked about it, we were going to get a company that actually does that so we would know” it was done correctly, Beech said. “That’s my issue with this.”
The city is going to move forward with having repairs made and deep cleaning the theater with an outside company before it decides whether to lease the theater to the chamber or anyone else.
In other business Monday, the City Council approved a new ordinance involving home-based businesses; adopted a new rate schedule and rules for the city swimming pool and adopted a new rate schedule for the New Cordell Ambulance Service.
WATER EMERGENCY
City administrator JC Moser said after Monday’s meeting that while the city isn’t in a critical water emergency anymore, the city is still asking residents to conserve water as much as possible.