Inside the Blumenthal's pandemic year
Plus: Charlotte traffic returns to pre-pandemic levels; The 2040 plan and commercial development; How close were Mecklenburg hospitals to filling up?; DaBaby snubbed again at Grammys
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Q&A: Tom Gabbard on how Blumenthal Performing Arts held on despite darkened theaters — how it landed the Van Gogh exhibit — and how it’s reconfiguring its venues
The Immersive Van Gogh exhibit will be one of the first large-scale arts events to happen in Charlotte since Covid when it opens in Camp North End on June 18. It will run through Sept. 12. (Photo by Michael Brosilow courtesy of Blumenthal Performing Arts)
By Michael J. Solender
With more than 600 performances and events postponed or canceled and its six stages mostly empty for the last 12 months, Blumenthal Performing Arts announced a curious coming out party last week, with “Immersive Van Gogh” planned for a giant former warehouse and not a Blumenthal venue in uptown.
But it makes sense. The digital experience that runs June 18 through Sept. 12 will immerse exhibit-goers, safely, into dozens of Van Gogh’s signature works, set to a carefully curated soundtrack in Camp North End’s largest warehouse space.
“It’s designed for Covid times,” says Blumenthal president & CEO Tom Gabbard. “We’ll have capacity controls based upon Covid guidelines, and while people can freely roam the floor, there are spaced social distancing circles (lily pads) on the floor where people need to remain when stopped.”
The events of the past year have been devastating for arts groups — even the Blumenthal, which reported $43M in total revenue and a $22M endowment in 2019.
The non-profit holds long-term management contracts with the city of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County to operate the Belk, Booth, Stage Door and Knight theaters, as well as Spirit Square’s McGlohon and Duke Energy theaters — each eerily dark for the past 12 months.
Gabbard has headed the nonprofit arts organization since 2003. He’s the immediate past president of the Independent Presenters Network (IPN), a consortium of 40 leading touring Broadway presenters in North America, Asia and the UK. He’s also a member of the Board of Governors of the Broadway League, where he serves on the executive and finance committees and has been a voter for Broadway’s Tony Awards since 1997.
The Ledger caught up with Gabbard last week to learn more about how Blumenthal Performing Arts has fared during the pandemic, what audiences can expect when they return to theaters, Gabbard’s take on the city’s move to stop funding the Arts & Science Council and how the Blumenthal landed “Immersive Van Gogh.”
Comments have been edited for clarity and length.
Q: Tell us about the economic impact the pandemic has had for the Blumenthal over the past year.
Our expected annual revenues are in the high $30M to $40M range — we’ve essentially lost 90% over the past year. Our monthly operating cost was right around $900,000 and we’ve brought that down now to less than $500,000. That’s not just personnel; it’s utilities, insurance and other operating expenses. In September, we had to sadly furlough quite a few people. We went from a full-time employee count of 110 down to 70. On the part-time side we went from 177 to two.
We were lucky to get $1.7M in a PPP loan in the spring that allowed us to keep people employed through the summer. When the city and county distributed CARES money, we received $625,000. Those funds combined helped us with three months of overhead, which we’re grateful for. But ultimately, it was three months of overhead out of what will probably be a closure of 18 months.
Q: What’s happened to the subscriber base for the PNC Broadway Lights series and the Equitable Bravo series, which bring big touring Broadway shows to Charlotte?
The pandemic has certainly proved to us what an incredibly loyal group we have, because we had already renewed well over 10,000 season ticket holders when the pandemic hit. And we continued to sell some subscriptions. Now, I think we’re in excess of 13,000. But among those folks who had renewed before the pandemic hit, we’ve lost less than 5%. Most people are on payment plans where they pay monthly and have continued to pay through the pandemic. They’ve already purchased a year-plus of theater that will start up then, again hopefully, in late August.
Q: Have you worked on facility upgrades during the hiatus?
Our facilities and production personnel have been busy working on improvements to our theaters. Some of it is Covid-related, but a lot of it will just be enhancements to these venues to make them much better venues for the long-term. There’s going to be a whole different arrangement at Stage Door Theater, for instance, an entirely different configuration that we’re modeling on Joe’s Pub [a non-profit music venue] in New York.
We’ve invested in HVAC [systems] with bipolar ionization, and we’re working with Honeywell to evaluate every element of it. The city took some of its CARES money and smartly invested in upgrades like that. It’s something I want to really give a shout out to the city for taking on in a big way to make their facilities safer for everybody.
Q: You’ve said it would be easier and a faster return from Covid for Broadway to go on the road than to reopen in New York City. Why?
The advantage we have on the road is that all these [road] facilities are so much more spacious. Backstage areas are spacious. They have bigger lobbies. And so that is a huge advantage when you're trying to socially distance people. … The other things the road venues frequently have is that they’re more modern facilities. The HVAC systems are going to be even better than in these historic [Broadway] buildings that, no matter how hard they try, sometimes there are limits as to what they can do with the HVAC.
I think masking will continue to be with us through at least 2021. People should expect that there’ll be mask requirements. They can expect to see some social distancing remain; not in how we seat people, because these shows aren't going to work until we can seat at or close to full occupancy. But I would expect that when it comes to things like the restroom lines and lines at the ticket booth and things like that, that we'll see some distancing as a part of that. And some of this is going to just be everybody's behavior changes.
Q:What’s happening with the Spirit Square renovation/redevelopment on North Tryon Street that’s due to begin later this year?
Right now, we’re supposed to be out of the building by the end of September [2021]. This means the closure of the McGlohon and Duke Energy theaters. But it fits in with that entire redevelopment, which is a complicated thing. The entire schedule is intertwined with the new library and the commercial construction that’ll go on there. It is planned to take about 2 1/2 years to complete.
Q: One of the biggest talking points in terms of arts funding right now is the city council’s expected move to stop funding the arts through the Arts & Science Council, and to instead give funds directly to arts groups. What does that look like from your vantage point?
We are supportive of the discussion process that the city has opened and are also grateful they have recommended increasing funding. I really commend our council people for asking some broad questions that I think in some respects aren’t being given enough credit. And that is to evaluate what is it that we should support through this? And how should we go about it? What are our goals? And looking potentially at goals that are broader than we’ve talked about before — the discussion about arts being related to employment and generating jobs. That is, I think, a very reasonable thing to put on the table among the many things that we can accomplish.
Frankly, there’s been this rush to try to perhaps read too much into it when [city council members are] asking questions. And they’re asking good questions. And I’m thankful we have politicians that are willing to do that. I will say I’m frustrated, and have been for a long time, that the ASC becomes the focal point. And it shouldn't be. The focus should be on the importance of arts support to accomplish public good.
Some of that public good is intrinsic, but some of it is also economic, as our politicians have pointed out. It’s important we evaluate that. And ultimately, they must figure out who manages the money. And maybe it’s the ASC, maybe it’s parts of the ASC. Maybe it’s not the ASC. Those people who have been critical that that’s been an entitlement system limited to just certain groups, I think that criticism is fair. For the city council to open at least the discussion to evaluate how they support the arts — that to me is an appropriate conversation.
Q: How did Blumenthal land “Immersive Van Gogh”?
This is produced by a Canadian, Corey Ross. And Corey is somebody who we’ve done business with before. People locally would know him as the producer of [Harry Potter parody show] “Potted Potter.” A few weeks after they opened in July in Toronto, he contacted me and said, “Look, would you be interested in working together on something in Charlotte?” We needed to find a special place. And we looked all over town. It needs a massive amount of space.
I reached out to Tommy Mann, who’s the development director at Camp North End, and began the conversation. We worked together on “We Are Hip Hop” out there in November [2020] and did programs outside, including a big graffiti project. And we just really loved being at that site. We loved working with Tommy and his team.
What we’re ending up with is about 17,000 square feet, just the exhibit area. And so around it, there'll be places for a cafe and merchandise and other things. But the actual space where the images are is 17,000 square feet. But the other thing is that we know that Camp North End will be a destination, that there are other things to do out there. There are restaurants, and it’s just a very cool place to wander.
As to the local economic impact of the show, a local construction company will build out the space within the Ford Building, and we estimate there will be two local crews of 8-12 stagehands each who will work 8-10 hours daily for 5 weeks installing a complex digital projection system [100 projectors] and high-quality sound system.
We’re estimating it will take 25 people to operate it, including house management, ticketing, merchandise, food and beverage. We expect to be operating 70-plus hours a week. Similarly, a lot of these people who in the past did this type of work have been without work for a year.
We’re also going to be encouraging people to go early or stay late at Camp North End to enjoy the great restaurants and retail there. This is the Southeast premiere of the show, so we expect it to attract viewers regionally who will stay overnight to enjoy our hotels and restaurants.
Michael J. Solender is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in the New York Times, American City Business Journals, Business North Carolina, the Charlotte Observer and elsewhere. He develops custom content and communications for businesses and organizations. On Twitter: @mjsolender.
Want to (van) go? Tickets for “Immersive Van Gogh” go on sale Thursday at 10 a.m. at www.vangoghclt.com or 704-372-1000.
Today’s supporting sponsors are T.R. Lawing Realty …
… and Blind Date Night Charlotte: No swiping, Meet up, We do the rest.
Charlotte’s return to normalcy: traffic is back
Is it just us, or has traffic gotten a lot worse in the last week or so?
Traffic data is hard to come by. Charlotte doesn’t measure it, aside from taking traffic counts every few years on different roads. But there’s a company that offers traffic stats by collecting mobile phone data.
The company, Inrix, says that for Charlotte, traffic is pretty much back to pre-pandemic levels and has been flirting with that threshold for months:
You’ll notice this chart, a 7-day trailing average of Charlotte-area traffic, shows a couple recent spikes — around Thanksgiving and Christmas. Local traffic has been at around 90% or more of the January-February 2020 baseline since the summer. It had dropped by about half in late March and April of 2020, during the lockdown.
Since Feb. 20, Charlotte traffic has been slightly above the pre-pandemic baseline more than half the time.
Hard to decide if we should be happy about that or not. —TM
What would Charlotte’s 2040 plan mean for commercial development?
Surely by now you’ve read about the brouhaha that’s developed the last couple weeks related to the goal of allowing duplexes and triplexes in single-family neighborhoods under the 2040 Comprehensive Plan the city is developing.
But it’s a 320-page plan, and there’s a lot else in there. What would it mean for other kinds of development? Charlotte real estate consultant and broker John Culbertson of Cardinal Real Estate Partners pondered that question in a blog post this weekend — and found more questions than answers:
In the 320-page Plan, specifics related to commercial development are rare. The city is projected to grow by nearly 360,000 people by 2040. Where will they shop? Where will they receive services? Where will they work? The plan fails to specify the specific areas and the zoning changes that will be coming in the future.
For three decades, I’ve worked in commercial real estate, and I struggle to make sense of how this plan will regulate commercial development. I understand that these comprehensive plans are meant to chart a path to guide future growth. But a plan that is too aspirational is not achievable.
For example, the plan talks about “place types,” not zoning districts. I do not understand how to develop in “place types.” Charlotte has zoning districts, but where is the plan’s geographic map showing zoning’s future? I don’t see it anywhere.
Suppose you are Amazon or Trader Joe’s or Little Lilly’s Lemonade stand and you open this plan to see where the city will allow you to locate. You wouldn’t find it.
I work as a consultant, and if a developer from out of state asked me, according to this plan, where they should build their next warehouse, it would be impossible to give them an answer. …
There are 1.179M jobs in the entire Charlotte MSA. The 20-year growth rate is 2%. The number of jobs projected in 2040 is 1.752M, roughly 583,000 additional jobs.
Currently, there is 340M s.f. of industrial space, or 288 s.f. per job. Therefore, there will be a demand for an additional 168M s.f. of industrial space. Assuming you can build 10K s.f. on every acre, the entire Charlotte MSA will need 16,790 more acres of industrial land. That is about an additional 25 square miles.
Again, I suspect that one of the city’s consultants has done this type of work. I just want to see it and use it to map future growth.
Culbertson concluded: “I admire the work [planning director Taiwo] Jaiyeoba and the Planning Department are doing. It’s a great start. They just aren’t finished yet.”
You can read the full article here.
➡️ The Ledger is committed to providing a variety of informed opinions on the 2040 Comprehensive Plan. If you have an opinion, drop us a line, and we might share it in a future edition.
Other 2040 plan news:
Neighborhood objections: On Friday, a coalition of more than 30 neighborhood organizations called the Charlotte Community Benefits Coalition held a news conference asking the city to delay a public hearing on the plan to allow more time for community engagement, Queen City Nerve reported. The plan “really hasn’t addressed the actual question of the equity element, particularly for communities that haven’t seen the benefits of development but are facing the brunt of displacement,” organizer Ismaail Qayim said.
Community conversation: The city is holding a “virtual planning community conversation” on Tuesday about the 2040 plan, in which a panel will take questions from residents. It’s at 12:00 Tuesday and will be streamed on the city’s Facebook and YouTube channels. More info here.
Listening sessions: The city announced 5 “listening sessions” this week designed to “allow city staff to listen to community feedback on the plan.” Space is limited, and participants are asked to register ahead of time. Details here.
Financial impact: On Twitter on Sunday, planning director Taiwo Jaiyeoba highlighted a 101-page consultants’ report dated January 2021 that examines the projected effects of the 2040 plan on the city’s finances. It found that the plan “generates a more fiscally beneficial growth pattern for ongoing operations for the City” than the current approach and that “some major expenditures/departments lack dedicated and/or reliable funding sources to support the community’s desired future vision.” Builders and developers have asked for an economic impact analysis, though this one focuses only on city finances. —TM
How close did Mecklenburg come to running out of hospital beds?
At the peak of the Covid surge in January, Mecklenburg County’s hospitals had about 27 ICU beds to spare.
Maybe that’s a close call, but since the summer, local hospitals had somewhere between 30 and 60 available ICU beds, according to an analysis of hospital numbers disclosed to the federal government.
In December and January, local health officials said they worried about running out of hospital beds as Covid numbers worsened — which they used as justification for keeping schools closed, shutting down some government services and urging residents to stay home through a non-binding “directive.” Now, data is showing just how close the hospitals came to running out of beds.
The county’s ICU beds were 90% full at the time when there were the most seriously ill Covid patients. Countywide, on Jan. 1, there were 250 ICU patients — 42% of them with Covid — and a total of 277 available ICU beds. There was always a cushion between the number of filled ICU beds and available ICU beds, aided by the addition of 21 ICU beds at Novant Health Presbyterian in December, the data shows.
The ICU units of some of Mecklenburg’s smaller hospitals filled completely at that time, the numbers show. For example:
Atrium Health Pineville, which said it has 30 ICU beds, reported 31 ICU patients on Dec. 25 and Jan. 8 and 29 patients on Jan. 22.
Atrium Health University City’s 8 ICU beds were filled between Jan. 1 and Jan. 15, until it doubled the number of ICU beds in late January.
The 10 ICU beds at Novant Health Matthews were filled throughout most of December and January.
The two major hospital systems are accustomed to managing the number of available beds at levels that are close to full capacity. They generally don’t like talking about specific numbers of patients or beds publicly but are required to disclose them to government agencies. A number of websites make that data easily available, including the University of Minnesota Covid-19 Hospitalization Tracking Project and Rational Ground.
The Observer analyzed the same data set in early January, found similar numbers and suggested they could worsen, since Covid case numbers were continuing to rise. The paper quoted county commissioner Leigh Altman saying she heard Mecklenburg hospitals were “basically at zero capacity” and that she wondered if it was time to start “ringing the alarm.” In hindsight, the hospitalization numbers remained steady in early and mid-January and then started falling.
Since the peak, the number of patients in Mecklenburg ICUs has fallen from 106 to 40 in late February, the data shows. The most recent data show 44 available ICU beds.
There was more of a cushion on regular, non-ICU hospital beds. At the peak of the Covid cases, there were about 250 available hospital beds countywide. —TM
In brief:
Duke quarantine: Duke University has ordered students to remain in student housing for the next week except to get food or other essential supplies, seek medical care or spend time outdoors in a safe way. The “stay-in-place” order comes as nearly 400 students were put in isolation or quarantine in the last week — a spike that was “principally driven by students attending recruitment parties for selective living groups,” the university said. (Duke Chronicle)
Vaccine eligibility: Adults in North Carolina who want a Covid shot should be eligible for one by May 1, state officials said. (WFAE/AP)
New culinary trend — ‘vegan soul food’: “In the past year, in defiance of Covid’s vise-like grip on the restaurant industry, at least a half-dozen vegan comfort or vegan soul food restaurants, food trucks and pop-ups have opened in Charlotte,” Charlotte magazine reports. Dishes include “a soy-based Nashville hot chicken sandwich” and “wheat-based barbecue ribs and crabless crab cakes.” (Charlotte magazine)
South Charlotte odor update: The S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control says it’s continuing to work to resolve the problem of a strong odor that has wafted across south Charlotte and Upstate South Carolina. “DHEC is investigating all concerns and remains committed to providing information to those affected by these odors,” the department said Friday. (WBTV)
Hotels hurting: The cutback in business travel is hurting Charlotte hotels. Several projects are on hold, and it’s uncertain how quickly the industry might recover. “If companies aren’t traveling, hotels uptown basically have no business,” a Charlotte hotel developer said. (Axios Charlotte)
Local man performs at Grammys: Troutman resident and international rap star DaBaby performed his hit “Rockstar” at last night’s Grammy Awards. “DaBaby, decked out in an all-white suit with Chanel pins and diamond gloves, simultaneously performed the track while conducting singers dressed like Supreme Court justices,” Rolling Stone reported. BuzzFeed rounded up social media reaction under the headline “OMG, I Cannot Stop Laughing At These Tweets Roasting DaBaby’s Dancers At The Grammys.” DaBaby was nominated in 4 categories, including Record of the Year, but did not win.
Taking stock
Unless you are a day trader, checking your stocks daily is unhealthy. So how about weekly? How local stocks of note fared last week (through Friday’s close), and year to date:
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