PORT ANGELES — The Port Angeles Downtown Association began charting a new course of revival for 2015 this week after three of 13 board members resigned before a special board meeting.
The group’s efforts will include hiring a new executive director, reviving a city contract and helping to develop the shuttered Lincoln Theater, they decided.
At the outset of the ambitious hourlong meeting Monday evening, new board President Josh Rancourt announced the resignations of 2014 board President Bob Lumens of Northwest Fudge & Confections, Grace Kauffman of Sterling Impressions Photographic and Drew Schwab of Anime Kat.
“I don’t need to be a distraction for where they’re going now,” Lumens said Tuesday.
“I have a business to run, a life to do.”
Schwab said he wants to concentrate his energy more on his store and the gaming events he coordinates.
“It’s something we’ve been looking at for a while,” he said.
Kauffman said in her resignation letter that health and family commitments will prevent her from continuing on the board.
Names for replacements as well as input on PADA board decisions made at Monday night’s meeting will be solicited at a public meeting at 6:30 p.m. Thursday in The Landing mall conference room, 115 E. Railroad Ave.
The meeting will begin at the end of a Revitalize Port Angeles meeting that had already been scheduled for 6 p.m.
The board will name new board members for the organization, which has more than 150 members, at its regular Feb. 9 meeting at 6:15 p.m.
Monday night’s meeting at that location, which followed a four-hour work session Sunday, produced several unanimous decisions:
■ Restart a suspended contract with the city for disbursement of Parking and Business Improvement area funds, which passes through the city as taxes based on the square footage of businesses.
Revival of the contract would release at least an estimated $25,300 to the association for PADA administrative operations and business improvements.
■ PADA will make its case to the City Council at the council’s regular Feb. 17 meeting.
■ Sign a contract with the state for the group’s participation in the state Main Street Program and pursue hiring the executive director necessary to participate in it.
That would make the association eligible for collection of business and occupation (B&O) tax credits of more than $100,000 — none of which was generated in 2014 despite the association’s membership in the program.
The program allows business owners to devote a percentage of their overall B&O taxes to PADA for downtown development.
■ Dedicate up to $100,000 of B&O taxes to join festivals and events producer Scott Nagel in redeveloping the shuttered Lincoln Theater.
■ Sponsor a large-scale event similar to Arts in Action, the 5-decade-old festival that had its last year in 2014, and tie in the event with a beer-and-wine festival.
Nathan West, city community and economic development director, said the board needs a 2015 work plan its members are comfortable with and that simultaneously provides good business support to downtown businesses.
“That is really important to the City Council,” West said.
Nagel, who attended the meeting, said transforming the Lincoln Theater into a center for educational, art and theater activities is key to developing downtown.
“We can’t have a dead theater sitting in the downtown,” Nagel said.
He said it would take about a year to obtain tax-exempt status for the nonprofit organization that would operate the 500-seat facility, adding that it might be run by the Juan de Fuca Foundation before the nonprofit is formed.
“Without that major flagship program, we won’t get the confidence of the membership in the program,” warned board member Melissa Williams, executive director of the Feiro Marine Life Center.
Longtime PADA critic Kevin Tracy of Tracy Wealth Management said he was “cautiously optimistic” about what transpired at the meeting.
“I’m encouraged by the new leadership and new direction,” he said.
“The board has a lot of work ahead of them.”
________
Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
