Shoreline Regional Park Community - Regular Meeting

Okay. Oh, yeah.

We can just get rid of me again. All right.

I call this meeting of the City of Mountain View's Performing Arts Committee on Wednesday, September 6, 2026 to order at 627 p.m. This meeting is being conducted with a virtual component. Anyone wishing to address the committee virtually may join the meeting online at https backslash backslash mountainview.zoom.us backslash j backslash 82884578889 or by dialing 669-900-9128 and entering webinar ID 828-8457-8889. When a chair announces the item on which you wish to speak, click the raise hand feature in Zoom or dial star nine on your phone. When a chair calls your name to provide public comment, if you are participating via phone, please press star six to enable yourself. Item number two, roll call. Chair Donahue, here.

Vice Chair Fenwick. COMMUNITY MEMBER VARGUA HERE. COMMUNITY MEMBER CARCIA. PRESENT. COMMUNITY MEMBER FLORAL.

OKAY. GOING ALONG TO ITEM 3 MINUTES APPROVAL, 3.1 MINUTES APPROVAL RECOMMENDATION. APPROVE THE JUNE 24, 2026 PERFORMING ARTS COMMITTEE MEETING MINUTES. AND THEY ARE ATTACHED. ARE THERE COMMENTS?

I've noted that last time we had tabled the approvals, we didn't have our previous month's notes and it felt like there was a missing section on the work plan and Teresa had to check the recording and confirm.

Yes, we did. And we checked the recording and as amended was fine. There wasn't anything significant that needed to be noted.

Okay, perfect. That's all my own comment.

So is there a motion to approve those?

Motion to approve minutes from you two.

I second.

All in favor, aye. Aye. OK, let's move along to 3.2, minutes approval. Recommendation approved the August 19, 2026 Performing Arts Committee Media Minutes. And they are . Any comments? OK, there. Well, thank you. Does anybody know? OK, I move to approve the August 19th minutes as submitted. second that motion hey everybody in favor aye aye motion passes unanimously you have to go back Member Soody Tronson, Okay, right before oral communications from the public, are there any news of the public who wish to make a comment. Member Soody Tronson, No none. Member Soody Tronson, Okay. Member Soody Tronson, So there being no members of the public will move along the. Item number five, new business, 5.1, resident company presentation from TheaterWorks Silicon Valley. So we have some attachments. I believe it's customary. Lisa, would you like to?

Yes. So I have a staff memorandum that I'll read for those that might be listening online. And then we have the season analysis specific to TheaterWorks Silicon Valley. And then I will let them take it over from there and give a presentation and answer the questions that I've provided for them. So fiscal year 25-26, annual review for a resident company, TheatreWorks Silicon Valley. Background, TheatreWorks Silicon Valley is governed by a 26-member board of trustees led by board chair Katie Blaget. Am I saying that right? Giovanna Sardelli took on her role as artistic director in July of 23, and Phil Santora joined TheatreWorks as their executive director in July of 25. So TheatreWorks relies on both earned and contributed revenues with a significant portion coming from contributions. For the fiscal year ending June 30, 2026, TheatreWorks final numbers are being calculated as part of the audit prep. However, preliminary numbers show the fiscal year 25-26 revenue total was 9,094,306. That included 3,636,657 in earned revenue and 4,934,096 in contributed revenue and a draw on prior operational surpluses of 523,552 against what has been budgeted draw of 1,200,000. Total expenses were $9,094,306. As noted above, the budget asset draw was reduced by $676,448, resulting in a balanced budget and preserving more liquid assets for the future. For fiscal year 26-27, the anticipated total revenue is $10,323,925, with $4,018,925 in earned revenue, $5,555,000 in contributed revenue, and a budgeted $750,000 draw on prior year surpluses. Total expenses are anticipated at $10,322,662 say that three times fast, leaving a surplus of $1,263 for the fiscal year. TheatreWorks benefits from a long-standing resident company agreement with the City of Mountain View, providing stability and mutual benefits through the use of the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. The analysis, the annual review provides an overview of expenses, usage days, performance days, and gross ticket sales for TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, as well as revenues for the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. TheatreWorks will provide a summary of their effort for the 25-26 season. You'll find attached the season analysis of the season 55. Last year, they had Little Women in September on the main stage. Number of performance, 22 performances. Total ticket sales of 7,287 for that show. 55% of seats sold. A Driving Beat was in the second stage in October. And that was total tickets 4,230 sold with 83% attendance. And Hershey Felder, The Piano and Me in January for total tickets of 1,380, 810 and 82% attendance and closed the season with Come From Away in April through May. with 14,366 tickets and a percentage of 80%. So that comes to a total for the main stage performances at 75% attendance. And with that, that closes the staff report, and I will turn it over to Edward Silicon Valley.

Thank you. Did you want us to, I was going to talk through the report. Did you want us to read the report? Is that necessary on screen?

It is nice for the recording if someone wants to come back and watch it in day out.

I can read it. So, thank you for having us again. Good to see you again. I am bringing regrets from Both of our programmatic artistic leaders, Gio is, as we speak, playing with blood in the rehearsal hall, deep in Dracula rehearsals, and Jeffrey Lowe is on his way to Ashland to do some casting for the season. So they both set their regards. I'm Phil Santora, executive director at TheatreWorks, and I'm here with... Hi, I'm Katie Blodgett, chair of the board.

And...

I'm Aldo Billingsley. I'm an actor from TheatreWorks, but I'm also on the board now. And so I was going to ask if you want to read it.

Sure. I will pick you. Let me take a quick. We are less than I'll go with us today. Why don't you pick up marketing? OK, so. We submitted our report to you. We were in the process of cleaning up our financials from year end, working with the auditors. There are a lot of things going around, as they often do. But materially, it was a very successful season for TheatreWorks. We had planned to pull that $1.2 million in assets down, and we only needed to pull that cash back. And our cash position backs that up, so that's great news. addressing the questions you all sent to us. The first was about programming. And the programming question is interesting because it both talks about it from an artistic, but also from a structural point of view, which I think is really smart because the art drives the structure and the structure is driving the art at this point. So as we have written, TheatreWorks has spent the past four seasons exploring the structure for its main stage season, since resuming productions back in 2021 with Desert Boy here at the Mountain View Center. While pre-pandemic the company produced eight shows each season, five at Mountain View, the current model has focused on six productions. In 25-26, four productions were staged at Mountain View, the second stage hosted one, and the main stage hosted three. two four-week runs, and Little Women had an abbreviated three-week run, and two at the Lucy Stern and Palo Alto. Having explored this model last year, both the second stage run and the shortened three-week run for Little Women were financially unsustainable for us. And as a result, we saw decreased revenues and attendance for both productions, and it also impacted subscriptions across the entire season. subscriptions because of the way their seats got impacted. Based on Mountain View's performing arts availability for 26-27, our performance venues have shifted. We'll be producing two productions on the Mountain View Main Stage, three at the Loose Eastern and Palo Alto, and one at the Fox Theater in Redwoods. The implications of the season's venue structure is not simply about buildings. Each venue has qualities that require different programmatic choices. The Fox has over a thousand seats, so programming at the Fox must be able not only to fill a critical mass of the seats, but also to be able to artistically live in an auditorium of that volume. Mountain View requires an average of 65% capacity for us as a resident company, which focuses artistic choices in Mountain View on shows that appeal to a broader audience. The venue with a few artistic considerations is the Lucy Stern Theater, allowing for a wider range of artistic expression. Now, across these three venues, TheatreWorks can produce a range of shows that explores the breadth of our mission, but those titles are not necessarily interchangeable across venues because of the departments of each venue. But beyond the VNU changes, there's much exciting news we get to share. In 25-26, growing numbers of audience members continued to engage in our work. Despite some of the challenges around little women and driving beat at second stage, overall tickets, single ticket attendance rose by 3% year over year. Especially notable was the spring 2026 production of Come From Away at Mountain View, which aside from Hershey Felder, was the highest grossing single ticket show in TheatreWorks history I watched it. That's not in the written report, for the record. Almost 50% of the patrons who attended Mountain View in 25-26 attended a TheatreWorks show. During the 25-26 season, TheatreWorks produced two world premieres. As of today, TheatreWorks has produced 79 world premieres over its 56-year history. Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy, Jimmy, sorry, I have to get it all out because it's a terrible title. Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean, a new musical, which means a new title, won the Bay Area Theater Critics Circle Award for Best Overall Production, not just in the South Bay, but in the entire Bay Area. It's actually the second year in a row that award has been given to theater production. The year before was King James, also at the Mountain Bees. In addition, that show has been announced for an off-Broadway opening in New York in winter 2027, directed by our own Giovanna Sardelli, who will stop playing with blood and start playing with rain. And we're very excited to see that show opening in New York. We continue to commission artists through our New Works program and focus on nurturing local playwrights through Susan Fairbrook Core Writers Group. We've had two cohorts go through that program, and we're about to announce a third shortly. We're starting to put that together. The rebuilding of our education program continues to wider impact, but there are more details about that coming in the collaboration section, so I'm not going to spend a lot of time on that. So all three branches of our program, main stage work, new works development, and education, are continuing to grow as we rebuild. And we're reaching more audience members, engaging more students, and supporting more artists. Our last major demographic study was, oh, do you want to stop now? Would you like me to, what would be best for y'all? Would you want us to, like, go all the way through this and ask questions? Do you want to stop after each section? How would it be?

I think it actually would be kind of, I think a lot was just said, and I don't think there's a lot of thoughts already, but do you want to go through more?

What is the next section going to talk about? Okay, yeah, maybe we should. Can I just get you to clarify again what happened with Little Women because the run was shorter?

The run was shorter. TheaterWorks is traditionally, to do a production, TheaterWorks is a five-week book. There's four weeks of run and a week of text. When the available weeks was set at 13, it became very difficult. We can't, it's math. Five times three is 15. So Hershey Felder luckily only needed four. So last year we tried this model where we took little women and went from four weeks to three weeks on the run. And what happened was a number of things. We have a lot of data and analysis of how ticket sales patterns move and how shows attract audiences. And they're all tied to stimuli. We announce the season, we expect to see a certain amount of movement. We announce the subscription campaigns and people go, I don't want to subscribe, but that show looks good. We then put single tickets on sale, postcards, advanced social media, opening. And one of the most important ones is word of mouth. So that show, by losing a week in the run, We lost the traction on that bell curve that last week. The audience decreased. In addition, I don't know how to say this nicely. Don't move little old ladies out of their historic subscriber seats. It's a bad thing. They get very upset. They didn't get their seats because the fourth week was gone and we had to take them out of their seats and move them to a different week. So I'm already in those seats. H101 and 102 on Saturday and week four. to get moved to different seats on Saturday and week three. It's just, you just, you just. It's a thing. It seems like a little thing, but it's a thing.

How many people did it impact?

I don't have that set off the top of my head. We have about 4,000 subscribers. I'm just going to totally guess, but what I know is we have about 4,000 subscribers, maybe a little less, but 3,500 subscribers. And we've tried to front load them so that they help through the beginning. And then the last week of the run, we had more single tickets. So let's assume maybe there's 500, 600 in that last week. But what happens is when a subscriber doesn't subscribe to things like that, they don't come to that show. They don't come to any. It's hard to get into the other shows. And the other thing is subscribers are so important artistically because they'll come see things they don't know they want to see.

Right.

I had a little lady in Chicago once. I said, ma'am, would you like to renew your subscription? She said, I guess so. It wasn't so bad this year. And I was like, ooh. And now she's looking for a checkbook. Like, Mary, I thought those both things ever happened back. She said, you know, I'm only going to like three of the five this year. But if you ask me which three, I'd be wrong. So I'll come see them all. And I was like, yes. Losing a subscriber who's willing to take a risk on stuff and now having to get them to come back and buy single tickets.

Mm-hmm.

has a deep filtering in our ability to get people across the threshold. The other thing we know is every survey ever done in the American regional theater, the number one way to consult. And that's where that bell curves. And so. You see when a show opens, we have to be a certain metrics and then word of mouth reviews and all that start kicking in and you see the stimuli. And we lost that last week of word of mouth. When you go to work and say, I saw the most amazing show last night. You've got to take your kids. So we did the analysis on what happened. And the problem is when the revenue decreased and the attendance decreased, but the revenue decreased, the capitalization costs decreased. It cost me just as much money to rehearse, build, and produce that show as it would on a four-week run or a three-week run. But I'd shortened the amount of run time so the amount of money I had to sort of offset some of those costs.

And the cost that you're incurring of having to rent the theater an extra week is still less than...

The actual run cost for the week.

Okay.

Yeah. And it's also about This is where we get into that gray area of money and mission. Because it's also about trying to build that core community who engages in the breadth of our work. And so every opportunity we get to bring people into the work. is an opportunity to get a new person engaged in what we do. Hopefully they come in because they've read Little Women and it was their favorite book growing up. And maybe they come back and see Shane this coming year, which, by the way, will be starring Aldo Billingsley, because they thought it was cool. They want to try something new. One of the reasons we perform as many performances a week as we do is we want to have as many entry points as we can. And once the show is open, my run costs are not nearly as high as the cost of getting it.

Also people who are not early adopters and they're single ticket buyers, when they hear that word of mouth, They usually come in the last week. So even though you don't have more subscribers in the last week, you often have more sales in the last week. The fourth week isn't there, and you've lost a lot of income.

And this is your first time doing a three-week? Yes.

And TheatreWorks had performed in second stage decades ago. I was at TheatreWorks from 2007 to 2022, and then brought me back in 2025. So prior to 2007, We had to perform to the second stage a couple of times. And we'd constantly done analysis on it. There just aren't enough available seats to make a full Actors' Equity production viable in the second stage.

And then Little Women was your first production of the season. Is generally your first production of the season around the same mark, percentage-wise?

Like everything else, it gets driven by venue.

I mean, here. Here, yes. The main stage. Yeah.

On a three-play season, we would do the fall October Dracula. We would have done a January. The old model was August, October, January. No one in this room thinks we should be doing five shows at Mountain View Center. No one, none of us.

But if the question was, Is our first show of the year typically like a little slower selling?

Yeah.

Employee Dharma Handbook, which is our first show of this current season, blew all of our forecasts out of the water. It sold amazingly well. Granted, it was at the Lucy Stern, so it's not a direct apples to apples comparison, but it's not like season placement necessarily that triggered the lower sales for Little Women.

Yeah, because Little Women's a popular watch. I would expect it to do that. Yeah.

It was doing well. It was tracking well.

But it's still only at, what, 50-something percent, right?

I'm sorry. No.

I was just saying that you were saying it did well, but the percentage is 55.

But we also perform seven to eight performances a week. Tuesday nights and Wednesday nights and Thursday nights, which There are reasons we do that also. It does also apply to venues. Like, Leicester has fewer seats. We need to have comparable performances in both venues. So if you were to look at, like, it's very similar to what a lot of the other people are doing, and it's much better, those Tuesday and Wednesdays. Pull those numbers down. But I have very little incremental costs for doing it, actually. And it's a couple hundred people who get to experience that show and also come to Mountain View to shop and dine in restaurants. So it both achieves economic impact, it achieves mission-based getting more people to visit. Honestly, also I can discount the tickets more on Tuesday nights, so it's another entry point for people. And... it does provide revenue to offset some of that capitalization of what's on stage.

As in my Santa Clara students, I often encourage them to go on Tuesdays and Wednesdays where they might get more of a discount. Some of those students, their eyebrows jump up when they realize they're going to have, on top of buying a book for the class, they're also going to have to buy a ticket. And so they're looking for one that's more affordable.

Right. So are Tuesday night performances discounted?

Sometimes it's easier to get a discount, a rush ticket, or those sorts of things on Tuesdays and Wednesdays than a Saturday, Friday, Saturday night that's selling really popularly.

One thing I just wanted to know on this section, and after hearing this, is it sounds like TheatreWorks is doing quite well this year, considering the changes, considering the past since the pandemic. So I think that's something to also note, that there is a stabilization with the different processes and still yearning on that part, still some things to consider. But if you had to kind of encapsulate the biggest gains that you see in this, just looking at programming, because you were talking about structurally. So obviously, the provocative statement of suddenly, OK, the artistic aspect and the structural aspect combine. So then thus, what really do you see right now? Now, this is my third year on this committee, and so my third presentation seeing you guys present, and it kind of is, so what main games do you see in this last year, or since you've been back as well, that you would like to highlight? I mean, obviously, these are the highlights, but... Let me tease that out.

There's a summary. Okay. So are we talking about gains that are making it financially stable? Gains as an organization delivering our mission? There's so many paths I can take on that conversation.

Which path compels you first?

Well, I'm here for the mission. If I'm not here for the mission, then what are we doing?

Yeah, yeah.

That's the point. But I have to tie it back to finance in this one way.

Well, that was your structural argument, yeah.

We are building, rebuilding that system. deliver its work stately and clean. That is no small feat right now.

But based on just kind of the section right here before we go like big, just kind of on what was just read.

So I think our ability to fit into these ever-changing facility structures and still remain true to the voice that we bring that as i said that last i think the one sense that i really lean into is across these three venues theater works can produce a range of shows that explore them for permission we're doing something at the fox that's hershey felder that's going to be throwing people into the fox and then we're doing beautiful here but beautiful is a very theater work show geo has a really strong voice about feminist approaches and empowering women That show, while it is a populist title that can start to address the 65% capacity metric, it's still the kind of joyous celebration we can come true, but true to who we are. And then I can also put Employee Dharma Handbook, which is one of my favorite shows of the season, over at the Lucy Stern and across the breadth of that show. you'll see the full range of who we are. We are fortunate that we've been able to find venues that can encapsulate us without forcing us to shift who we are. But, as I say also in that sentence, those venues aren't interchangeable. Yes.

So my question, understanding that each venue is, you're presenting a different thing at each venue, like you're not going to have the same show at Lucy Stern. That makes sense.

So our first show of the season was in July. It was the Employee Dharma Handbook. Now we're in Dracula for Mountain View. Over the holidays, we're back at Lucy Stern because for time immemorial, and I know far better than to mess with you. Let's all just acknowledge, all praise Nutcrackers. God bless them, they keep dance companies alive. 100%. And they're all here. And that's Alice, formerly of Wonderland, which is the second production of a new musical development. And we're with Hershey doing a world premiere with Fox, back with the Lucy Stern with Shane starring Alice. And then we're going to close out the season here with you.

So how many are we doing here? Two. Two, okay. Is that different than usually?

Yeah, they normally do. I think considering the center has shifted, and I think there was a strong focus on allowing more people into the center, which I have always believed. It's always been a goal to succeed. I think our optimal would be to actually, so far, it's selling very well. Look at a three-in-three model.

So to speak to that a little bit, the original MOU, in order for them to be a resident company, they had to do the majority of their seasons shows here. So it was four and two. So they always had to do one more show here.

Is that still part of it? Well, technically.

We're negotiating a new MOU. It's in flux.

One of the aspects of this is the benefit of seeing the successes that are happening and the pivoting that is happening and the flexibility that TheatreWorks is giving or is explaining right now. So considering all of these changes, there's still a lot of success happening, which is kind of the key element, I think. After three years of looking at it, there's been a lot of changes. But this presentation and what we're being presented right now, considering all of those changes, is what's happening. Yeah.

I mean, I haven't been here that long, but this looks like the best numbers I've seen from you guys in a while. Is that correct to say that? Yeah, fantastic.

Which is input that something structurally is working, which is good.

And to be fair, I think this is a fair thing to say. Because there's kidding. Gia was a new artistic director three years ago, new to the job. She'd been our director of new works for many years. And I think it's a couple of years, find your voice, understand how to balance your voice and the breadth of the programming. So I think we're seeing that sort of maturation of her understanding her voice as she picks productions and how they really interact with the sound.

Organizationally too, right? I mean, you weren't here three years ago. Yeah, so.

No, but you can't escape.

I hear the music world, you know, never leaves us.

Still hear the drums. The other question is?

Let's keep going because I think it'll come up. So let's go into marketing. One of the things too is just talking about voice again is I am curious as we continue on, considering these last couple of years, again, a hard moment is such a reflective point too because you from the organization get to look back at yourself, see what's working, see what isn't working. And so I don't think that needs to be answered in this very moment. But it is interesting to see within the last three years and the changes that have occurred, where do you see your voice developing? And I think I'm just kind of interested in hearing that as the conversation continues.

One thing that I'll just touch on, because Phil didn't say it, I think there's just a lot to celebrate in terms of the... say maturation of the leadership team of the organization. There's a lot of like really wonderful continuity over time within the team. But I joined the board, I think four years ago, I think four years. And in that time, Phil's come back. Keo is a new artistic director. We have a new-ish marketing director. We have a new-ish development director. There was a lot of new on the leadership team. And I think what you're starting to see now is the team really gelling and really hitting their stride as a team and having their vision and their talents come to light together. And so, you know, certainly all of the mission points that Phil mentioned earlier should be celebrated, but I think we're also just seeing people come to life as a team, which I think is also really wonderful.

I will add that it's not in the book, but our marketing department was structured last fall. And the minute Lorraine put that structure in place, we didn't go on the same show. So interesting to hear marketing next.

What a great segue.

Marketing. Although. Our last major demographic study was in 2024-25, lifting up some of those key findings again. 82% of ticket buyers live within 15 mile radius via Center for Performing Arts. Approximately 22% of TheatreWorks audiences comes from the Asian American Pacific Islander, 14%, Latinx, 6%, and Black, 2% communities. Over the prior five years, the percentage of BIPOC audience increased from 14% to 22%. Analysis for 2025-26 focused on our efforts to attract first-time ticket buyers. We've steadily increased the focus over the last five years with significant success this past season. 2025-26, 11,402 new. 2024-25 season, 8,904 new. 2023-24, 8,700 new. 2022-23, 7,000 new. I started to do the math. I didn't get it exactly right, but I looked over at Phil and said, that's almost 30% from 24-25 to 25-26. We have shifted our advertising budget from a decrease in print to an increase in digital advertising. New to our sales plans, we're partnering with a company called SIGN. or CTV commercials. In addition to the commercial appearing on streaming television targeted to likely consumers, Sign has the technology to geolocate patrons based on their proximity to MVCPA and populate the commercial to that patron's most used social media and gaming platforms. With younger patrons choosing streaming services over cable TV, we're reaching a younger, broader audience through this new advertising platform. We also continue to engage in partnerships to reach out to an even broader audience. Some examples include working with Enact Arts on Employee Dharma Handbook and Contemporary Asian Theater Seeing and Teatro Vision for a driving beat. Social media campaigns look to engage audiences and build brand awareness, specifically for millennial and Gen Z demographics. Ranking for effectiveness, one, Instagram, two, Facebook, three, TikTok, and four, LinkedIn. Instagram is the most effective platform where the majority of our audience is active and shares and reposts our content. Short-form content like production clips perform the best. Our strongest engagement occurs when audiences interact with our actors during Instagram takeovers. Questions.

First of all, all future presentations of this will be written. Questions about marketing.

First one is how are they geolocating that?

I know, because I was prepping this. I said, no, explain this new company again to me. And they can like geolocate your device and say, this person's only three miles from the Mathemedia Center. Why don't we shoot him some theater work sets? It's all done behind the scenes. It's both worth taking and terrifying.

As we clicked accept somewhere.

And so, yeah, it can say this person's in their courtyard. Send them an ad for come from away. Here's a tip. Essential cookies only. Questions about marketing. They constantly are refining, and there's a marketing brief for each show about audiences we're reaching out to, promotions we'll be doing. I mean, we brought up the, did we bring up the blood drive? No, that's coming, the blood drive around Dracula. Yeah.

Well, you said that you restructured the marketing department. Is that covered under organization?

I didn't actually write that down. I'm sorry. I thought I would mention it. It's a complete rework. We got rid of our in-house art director, brought in a series of different art directors who can provide different visuals with a unifying theme for each show so they're more specific to the artwork. We've changed our data management team we organize our data analytics person so that she can dive deeper into the metrics and help us say these sorts of the ROIs on investments in different tactics and also help sort by demographic, age demographics. For example, for Dracula, There's a social media pitch coming around tying Dracula to other pop culture vampires. And what we know demographically is our older audiences, our more established audiences, tend to buy further out, and our younger demographic audiences tend to buy a little closer to the performance state. So the earlier parts of that social media campaign, it's focusing on like Bela Lugosi, but as we move forward, we'll be switching into like Twilight. And so that we're actually tying the messaging to when that patron's buying pattern aligns with the way we're doing it. Okay.

Organization.

Katie.

Um, okay. So since we last met, and I know I mentioned some of the organizational changes, some of those were a little bit further back, but since we last met, Jeffrey Lowe, who I think some of you know, has actually been named TheatreWorks' Associate Artistic Director. So yay, Jeffrey, very exciting. He's been with the company for over 10 years and will continue to focus on new works and casting while also being a key part of the artistic direction and voice of the company. From a board perspective, over the past year, TheatreWorks board has grown from 23 to 26 members. While we still seek a Mountain View resident for the board, three of our board members work in Mountain View. In addition, we do have a board emeritus member who is a Mountain View resident. Her name is Eileen Nelson. She's not currently serving on the board, but she does serve as our HR liaison. between the staff and the board, which is a really critical role in our community.

I asked her to rejoin the board, and she said, we have too many people.

Is the board predominantly then from Palo Alto? We're from, like, all over. So going all the way up to San Francisco, and then how far south?

I'm in Santa Clara. Somebody further south, though.

Yeah. So, I mean, we really span the peninsula. How are you skipping that? I know. I know. 12 by 12. Yes.

Are you interested?

Yes. We actually have a conflict of interest for me. We do actually have a short list of things that we are actively trying to recruit for, both in terms of geographic residency to ensure better representation, but also talents and skill sets. So we do audit our board to understand representation of different groups from residency to skill sets, to backgrounds, et cetera, and do identify and sort of pinpoint, oh, we need a lawyer, for example, those types of things to shore up lots of different things that we're trying to maximize for.

started doing that because it was the other issue it wasn't what do we need is what do we have too much of yeah so when i was in illinois i was like okay two-thirds of our board of lawyers and three-quarters of our board came from the city council no more lawyers from and we have and that became then there was a flip on strategic about not what we have the what we have skill set geographic representation cultural representation generational representation yeah do we have enough voices in the room that we're not just for yeah yeah I mean it's kind of interesting because I mean still I mean how kind of tying to the thinking about like there is no resident Mountain View resident in

Going back, I don't think this question actually matters as much this particular year, but talking about how informing decisions on the organization or whether that's programming or whatnot. Forget those two words, but more so the question is, considering your board composition now and organization composition, how has that been informing the growth that we are seeing right now and that we are listing regarding programming or different decisions that are making as well as the cohesion that is going on?

You know, I think we are... continually diversifying and with those more diverse perspectives come different ways that the board challenges and pushes the organization. So for example, Evelyn, a newer member of our board who happens to be a millennial Asian American is constantly pushing our marketing team about like, why aren't our social media metrics you know, better than they are? Or what more could we be doing? So different individuals bring different perspectives that really push us to think differently about how we're programming, how we're engaging with our communities. That's just one example, but.

I would also say, I think that there's the composition of the board and then there's what the board is dealing with. The board was dealing with survival.

Right.

And that was really all the board could focus on. There was a lot of turnover. I was gone for three years and three people had my job. I think you met some, if not all of them. I literally cannot tell you how many people were. And what I think has happened is that the board has been intentional about bringing in individuals to work in the company who can provide a sense of which has allowed the board to stop paddling above water and start to look at being really strategic about board composition, marketing and support, fundraising, facilities and game plan. We have our first strategic plan in five years, which we're going to talk about at the end of the presentation. We've been able to shift the energy of survival to stabilization and growth and investment in who we are. three months of the strategic memory and the vision statement for the company. So I think there is the structural thing you're talking about and the different voices coming in. But I also think the energy has been able to shift to actually having those conversations that can help us evolve into being a better company.

Thank you.

collaboration i am i am going to with all unless you instruct me otherwise i'm not going to read every detail on every education program jake was so excited and he put them all in here and i will i think i will summarize those for the people who might be listening to listening in later

There's only three pages of them.

Yes. Look, our education program was basically disbanded and we were rebuilding it. And Jake, who we brought back to do it, is so excited. And I was like, yes, we are going to put it all in. Yes. Although, to be fair, I did edit about a page of the words out so we can short it for y'all. Okay, as a resident company, TheatreWorks creates work here in the South Bay for our community. Our slogan is locally grown, but nationally known. We hire local artists, performers, educators, staff, and crew, employing hundreds of local community members each year. Unlike a traveling show using a facility, our service lasts well beyond the performance on the stage. Our work is on the stage, it's in the schools, and it's throughout the community as a year-round commitment to our home. TheatreWorks main stage shows serve Mountain View residents with over 2,700 Mountain View households attending a TheatreWorks show in the past four years. We're an economic driver, annually bringing tens of thousands of patrons to downtown Mountain View to dine and shop. As an example, Hershey Felder in 2026 played to approximately 13,500 patrons over four weeks in January. We invest in our community, offering free tickets to Mountain View schools and ticket vouchers to charity auctions, to Mountain View nonprofits, such as, and there's a list of well over a dozen names. I'm not going to read them all. We have an active partnership with the Chamber of Commerce and a part of the Mountain View Festivals. For 2026, we're exploring new partnerships, such as hosting a Blood Drive tryout to a performance of Dracula.

To the performance. Yes. Blood Drive performance? Yeah. You have extra cookies.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We've partnered with Hobies. They're doing a coffee cake, and I've asked them if they would do an orange coffee cake, but I don't think they're going to get there. We're also talking about having Dracula at Oktoberfest as a judge for something, and maybe having some sort of vampires at the Halloween parade. They're working on it. I don't know where they're going with all Dracula. They're having way too much fun with Dracula. Through education, TheatreWorks serves students in the Mid-Peninsula and South Bay schools for grades K-12 with arts-integrated residency programs, student matinees, and professionally-led workshops. Students, teachers, and administrators are offered post-assessment surveys on all programs, with opportunities to offer constructive feedback. Last year, attendance by and interactions with students with the YearWorks education programs totaled nearly 1,500 students. We've been a part of the Mountain View community since the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts opened, serving over 1 million of our neighbors from across the region throughout our productions of MVC Peeping. partnership has been central to the growth of the Center of the Years and to TheatreWorks' ever-growing presence as an individual theater in our home community. The education programs I'm going to editorialize and then bop through this. The thing about our education programs I wanna point out is we don't do plays with kids. I think that's a great thing to do. It's how I got into theater at a time. You got into theater at a time. Yeah, I think it's terrific. PYT does that and we are not competing with them. Palette of Children's Theater does that, we're not competing with them. We don't put these plays with kids. What we do is we use our theater techniques to help address social issues in the community, align students with certain core life skills like empowerment, and to also just help teach core curriculum subjects like English, math, science. That program is reconstituting this year. We have dropped that for a few years. But we don't produce plays with kids. We use our skills to help students achieve things or learn other core topics in the community. So we have a student matinee program where we bring kids in to see the shows. Those come with study guides. You have been provided with a copy of the Come From Away study guide. Again, Jake was really excited. I'm sure I'll include it in a separate attachment. We have a young playwrights project where we have invited kids to come in and write plays for the first time. They work with teaching artists, and then the teaching artists help pick several of those plays, go on to further development, and hire professional actors to stage the shows for the kids. They get to see their work with one of the professional artists.

That's super cool. It's a blast. You should see their parents line up when they get to see their kids as playwrights, and then some professionals getting to have those plays out. Some of the stories they tell.

Sorry, yes. Sorry, I was trying to... When you were saying... I lost the plot somewhere along the way regarding education programs. So mostly your education programs are happening, per se, in-house, like with a show, right?

Mostly they're in schools. Okay, so what are you doing again?

The only thing we don't do in schools is... You lost me with the English part.

The only thing we don't do in schools is student matinees. So the programs... Say that one more time. Student matinees are the only non... The only program we do... At a theater. Got it. Okay. Everything else is in schools.

Okay.

So we went to the classroom.

Yes.

And we're working at various high schools with the Young Playwrights Project, letting young teens write things for the professional playwright in residence, helping them exhibit.

The play is the program. Yes. That is the one? That is the program?

Yes.

There's the Children's Healing Project. We're in the Lucille Packard Children's Hospital and in the Even Disorders Clinic up at the same hospital in Mountain View, using theater games as an emotional healing tool for kids in need of care. We've discovered in the Even Disorders Clinic, for example, that kids will talk about things, but then we start doing sock puppet play, and suddenly the sock puppet will say things that kids We've also taken the Playwrights Project and evolved that to now launch the Senior Playwrights Project for people at the other end of the life journey to explore their voices and express issues. And the point of this is not to create the world's next great playwright. It's about learning self-expression. It's about exploring storytelling. It's about self-confidence. The points of these programs are about teaching life skills. There's a lot of other things we're launching. Jake is launching Shakespeare study, hip-hop freestyle storytelling, improv for neurodivergent performers, and more. We're going to try to launch concepts at play this year when we go into elementary schools and use theater techniques to teach English, science, or math. If you are... seven years old and learning about the circulatory system by reading it, maybe you learn it one way. If you push the desk back and have a bunch of red and white balloons and have to pass them around and you don't do your job and the heart stops pumping because the blood stops flowing, you've learned it a different way. So we try and use theater techniques To help kids understand core topics. One about weather. We go in about the weather systems. Poetry. They did a math one where they're doing fractions. All the kids laid on the ground in a circle as a piece of pizza. And one of the kids got up and one fraction of the pizza just walked away. It's immersive. Yeah, it's immersive learning.

Yeah, immersive learning.

That's what our education program does.

And who's doing these? Like, is it your actors and stuff?

Oh, yeah.

Like, everyone's doing it.

We hire specially trained teaching artists who have skills both in classroom. You do contract? We're also about to bring the medical clown project. We're working on that right now. We will go in and do the same thing with adults. We use clowning as a way for emotional healing for kids and adults in hospitals.

How often is this happening? This is a lot of stuff.

It is a lot of stuff. Again, we're rebuilding this pre-COVID. We had about 35,000 kids a year we would reach. Now it's only 1,500, but we're starting to rebuild it. And so we have, I think, about five programs we're launching this year or restoring. Jake's been on with us for one year. Jake was with our education program prior to COVID, and he's restoring some programs and bringing in other new programs. The Improv for Neurodivergent Performers is a new program he's launching with us, and I think it's great.

And in your restructure or rebuild, are you looking to go to that breadth of 35,000 or trying to go deeper with the...

Some programs go wide, some programs go deep. The goal for the program is to be effective.

this was actually the kind of was like, leave it to the crowd, is how does it coincide with the overall mission as well? And just, because again, actually, I don't know why this is hitting me this year. It's like, oh, this is really ambitious. Like, it's great, you know, lovely. But it is so many aspects. And then to the organization, I don't think this particular, is directly to the center, but as we're here and having this discussion, it is kind of interesting. How does the educational component coincide with the overall mission that is being performed on stage produced by your own creative teams? And so overall, so again, how does it cohere? How does it all combine together?

I think that's a really good question and no one's ever asked it quite that way before. So give me a second to connect the dots. I think what I would say is that It goes back to the statement I made about we are a resident company. This is our home. And it's about how our talents interact with our community. The most visible part of that is our main stage season. And sometimes those plays are there to provoke or question or meet people in a way. Sometimes those plays are simply there so we can gather together for a few hours in space and share joy and fun. But that sense, that's one way we serve our community. We acknowledge there are other constituents who can serve with our skills in other ways. And so education has always been a part of Heroic's existence. Theodore's was founded in 1970, the world premiere musical called Popcorn created by students on a main stage. And right before that very first show, you had New York's development because it was a world premiere. because students were doing it and you had a main stage production you sold tickets to and those three cornerstones have been there for the history of the company. It has always been part of our service as a resident of this community.

The other thing that happens is because where we are in California and how much art has been And we're going where they are. And they get to see some of the power, some of the influence that theater can have. They get to watch some people doing some performance. They get a chance to engage in those performances. I actually worked with the Young Playwrights Project before I got on stage at TheatreWorks. And so when those students were getting to see their story, we had two guys who did a story about... being on a track team at a private school that they've been brought into as athletes. And the coach dropped them off in the neighborhood and had them run back and they got lost. And they felt like because they were both black kids in this neighborhood, were they going to get in trouble or whatever? And they made a play about it. And that was one of the plays that got put up. And they just kept looking at each other going, That's us. Those actors are doing us. They were talking through those sorts of things, and they had a blast. They had a blast telling their story, and it's empowering. So that eventually, maybe those are audiences of the future. If not, there's still people who understand that the art moves them, and maybe they see those plays elsewhere.

Our mission statement when we were writing the strategic plan, the consultant said to me, What do you want the value of what you've done? How do you want your community to be different because you were, right? And that statement ties into what we do on the stage. There are things I see that I love that I'm like, I love this play, but this is not a theater works play. This is not the conversation we have. Sometimes it's silly and fun. Like, this is big, dumb fun, but we're not doing this show. Or this is pushing an envelope that isn't a conversation we would have with our community. These are the conversations we have with our community. Education is the same way. We want to have impact in a way that we can use our talents to make our community. That's the purpose. Yeah, I will say that in 2008, when the recession hit, because I was when the recession hit, we had to make really horrible choices. Salaries, benefits, we were cutting things. And if we could cut it, we could Like we were not going to cut education to protect other things. We tightened the belt a little. We said we had to be more strategic about some of that, but we weren't going to eliminate our education program, just like we weren't going to eliminate our new books. Because those are central to our identity and how we perceive ourselves in our community.

I think one final point on that, our ability to expand our education programs also creates jobs for more artists here in the Bay Area. So as we've lost programs, performing arts organizations, these additional programs that we are now offering creates another employment opportunity for artists. And I think that just keeps the arts community more robust for everyone to benefit from.

Because if it isn't robust, artists will leave. And artists are leaving.

Some are leaving. We've seen, again, the recession, losing San Jose Rep, San Jose Ballet, having Shakespeare's Santa Cruz Cobain constitute. That didn't serve any of us. I mean, we picked up some people, but we are healthier with a healthy system. Because going to the arts and engaging in arts breeds art. One of the things in our vision statement is we say we want to contribute to a more empathetic Silicon Valley. That's something we feel that we can do through the arts. We can do it on the stage and in schools.

Can you say that again? I liked it.

We want to contribute to a more empathetic Silicon Valley.

So you're rebuilding this program. Where on the horizon do you see yourself working with Mountain View High School, Khan Academy, St. Francis?

Well, so to some extent, and there were a number of Mountain View related organizations that were highlighted that we're already working with. For the Young Playwrights Project, to some extent, that's a little bit dependent on the educator relationships. So you'll see in there, we worked with like Burlingame High School. We worked with Castro Valley High School. And in the initial year, I think in part, that's... Who responded to the initial outreach? Who did we have a relationship with, et cetera? But I think, honestly, we'd love to do more with.

That's 100% committed.

Yeah.

If there are, we are committed to the region. And I'll be very candid about this. I have three buckets that educate. There's more demand than we can fulfill. So there are three criteria for an education program for me. the core to our mission. We're going to do this no matter what. The Employer Rights Project is so who we are. We're always going to do that program if it's supported financially in other ways. Two, does it make enough money that it makes other programs possible? I love us doing summer camps. But I don't want to pull money off the main stage to support summer camps. Summer camps need to parent themselves. And then the third is, is it in Mountain View or Palo Alto or as of now, Redwood City? Because those are our core home communities. And if we can support them in any way with our skill set, we will. So if you have connections, we would love, genuinely love to talk to you about how we can be a strong partner in those school systems. That is important to what the program is about.

That's an interesting opportunity that the center itself can facilitate. The partnership aspect between multiple organizations, including resident companies, is something potential to also go into an MOU as in some way that we can all collaborate more closely. And instead of us individually facilitating partnership, make it explicit to the community. So that's something that we can think about in the future, a seed that was just planted right now. I think that'd be wonderful.

I want to read through finance quickly because I don't think there's a lot to talk about, but we can talk if you want. How do we budget? We prepare an annual budget each spring based on income projections on historical data, changes in plans for the coming year, and projections based on programming. Expenses are crafted each year based on projected costs of running each department and supporting each program. Any gap is then closed through working on additional sources of revenue and economies that can be identified on the expense side. The proposed budget is reviewed in detail by the Board Finance Committee, reviewed and approved by the entire board. Monthly reports are delivered throughout the year to staff and board who monitor deviations from the plan and make course corrections as needed to steer towards maintaining a balanced year. Our auditors compare our overhead versus programming ratios to other performing arts-related nonprofits. We also field-stake against national surveys from the field. There were no material surprises and expenses in 24-25, and despite the revenue challenges from the beginning of the year on ticket sales, the productions throughout the winter and spring exceeded goals, allowing for solid revenue. Aeros currently has a cash surplus from prior years, which can draw on in case of emergency and be used to support operations. As you've seen, there is a cash draw this year as we are building out back to that sustainable model.

One thing I think in the future that I would love to see, sorry, because again, so many good things. I think this ecosystem, actually, this aspect of looking at your programming from an ecosystem lens, whether that's the education, the stage programs, Mountain View, Palo Alto, actually seeing that and how that ties to your financials actually is an interesting thing to glean. Because it's come up actually a number of times. And I think the other reason I think that would be beneficial to see is when we're looking at vitality ourselves, we're looking at an ecosystem's lens of how does each thing, each company and whatnot. And so your ecosystem allows us to also look at our ecosystem and just broaden that question. And as ecosystems develop, I think that'd be interesting to actually have that conversation.

Don't tempt Phil with it with an analytics exercise.

No, because I'm looking at the budget we submitted to you to see how it's broken down.

Yes. I think also from the narrative side as well. But I mean, because the numbers are fine, too. That'll also give me the ecosystem. I mean, I think I think I think budget narrative in the sense of also looking at. But because it is interesting, the ecosystem rhetoric is standing out to me and as something that also can continue to be developed into the future. So that is an interesting point. Like I said, I think it ties in to. just think about nodes, right? The different nodes in the ecosystem. That is something that we can directly also to the board and to the public continue discussions on, especially with the work that TheatreWorks has done in these last couple of years.

I am going to We'll just say we're going to wrap this up by being able to talk about our strategic plan.

No, I mean, we say this like sort of in an over the top way, but we are actually very excited to have done a strategic plan for the first time in a number of years. When I joined the board, we weren't doing one and we like sort of kept not doing one because we felt like we were in a little bit of an existential state and it didn't feel like the right thing to be focusing on at that time. And we did one this year. And so we now have our first three-year strategic plan in quite some time. It was adopted on August 31st, 2026. With an understanding that our artistic programming was the successful foundation on which all work focuses, three pillars were identified. One, stable facilities and strategic venue plan. Two, community connection and growth. And three, financial sustainability and organizational health. These three pillars will strengthen the company in ways that allow us to invest even more resources, both financial and human, in programmatic work and community engagement. Of note is pillar one, already discussed earlier in this report, is the ever-changing performance facility reality that we currently face. Concurrent with that is the current conversation with Palo Alto about a possible permanent home for TheatreWorks at the Coverley Community Center. The goal of pillar one is to resolve an operational model for TheatreWorks facilities, which allows the company to develop a sustainable and predictable performance venue model, allowing the company to focus fewer resources on figuring out where we deliver programming and more resources on the programming itself. In discussing the strategic plan, one word was consistently used by all presenters, momentum. Having weathered a period of extraordinary transition with key leadership transitions, facilities changes both for performances and behind the scenes, and crafting a new business model to address the changed landscape for the performing arts post-pandemic, Peterworks' energies are forward-focused. While there is still work to do, and that work is codified in the strategic plan, Peterworks is ready to step into its next chapter, serving Mountain View and the broader community we have called home for decades.

so how long is it good is it going to take cameras this year uh well yeah i think there's also another question there because i i think if i may if i may just introduce because i think that the question is um how is that that that's a very key component that ties again a number of conversations throughout the years together as well um and then also brings the starting point regarding the overall presentation this idea of needing a stable facilities and strategic Um, then you plan, um, obviously we have a little bit of detail here. How has that been impacting the org? And it sounds like you guys has a decision been made and a plan is already happening, but not yet. That's it's so. There are the plan for on August 31st that was.

Identifies the 3 things we need to address over the next 3 years to achieve the stable state. Yeah, let's get off facilities for a 2nd. Years ago, four years ago, Theodore's did a Safe Theodore's Now campaign that had a $3 million operational gap. Mm-hmm. Two years ago, the company had a $2.2 million asset or one-time funding. Structural deficit. Last year's budget was $1.2 million. We only did about $600 of that. The budget for this year is $750,000 on a $10 million budget. So you take that four-year trend line, your goal next year is to get to like $300,000 and then have... be able to generate operating values that cover the operations of the company sustainably while delivering our work. But we're not there today. We've made enormous progress and we've still got another two years, we think, to get successfully back, which is great. We have the resources to do it. God bless. The facilities piece is the same thing. We have a model for next year. We still have not performed at the Fox. That will happen in January for the first time. Every metric we have so far is doing well. We did a one-night movie showing in May of a documentary by Hershey, and that's 650 people come out on a Monday night to watch the movie. Not a single subscriber complained to us when we asked them to do their subscriptions about having to go to the Fox. And ticket sales for Love Notes, which is why it's doing this coming January, are double what they were on this date last year. So it seems to be going well, but we won't know anything until February 1. Having said that, that's the model for next year. And then we'll do the assessment and figure it out. I will be, our preference would, I think, be three shows of mountain through three shows of Palo Alto. I think spreading ourselves across multiple communities, although I will say as I was out of school, only a mile from the office. It's so easy to get. But that would be one path that I think would be sustainable for us if we could get to that model. Another path is Cumberley, Athens, but that's, years down the road, and we'll talk about that in one second. Another path is some sort of hybrid like we have now, where we're in three places. DataWorks has always been a little nomadic. We have a special skill in multiple places, but I don't think it particularly serves us. I have spent more time on facilities since I returned than any other time. And I think that's not necessarily the best use of my time. It's important to But like we said in this, if we could take some of that energy and know what the facilities, stable facilities home is for us, whatever that model might be for performances, for back at house, for scene shop. Still don't have costume storage. If anyone has a lead on the space for costume storage, I'm still in boxes. That being resolved and being able to take all that time and energy and put it into doing fundraising, building infrastructure, doing audience development, building partnerships in the community. Think about what that could, that the company, that human resource time could be more focused. We spend a good quarter of every quarter. It's just complex. And of course, it's Silicon Valley. Real estate drives everything. We know this. It impacts hiring. You know how hard it is to bring in someone from out of town? It impacts place selection. Out of town actors, it's hard to bring in. So the strategic plan is about finding out three years. By the end of this plan, what we're saying is we need to stop being in a, oh, we can pivot again and start being in a, this is how it can work. And now we can program and build a platform of stable results.

I have an interesting question on this because you're building momentum. You're pivoting still. You're getting good at pivoting. You are nomadic and saying good at that aspect. So this is a core part of kind of theater works in its development. And so that's interesting. So that's an interesting right narrative. And then, then this facility in the future of we would like, and then what does that bring? How does that then change the structural problem within the organization that has been long been dealt with? I think that's just an interesting kind of actually tidbit to think to look at or just acknowledge. And then, so that's one thing that's kind of, as you're saying that, that's bringing my mind. And where is the current momentum coming from? Because one of the things that's also in the presentation here is looking at scope and reach of mission. And so Is that being fueled, is scope and reach coming from being in different locations? Is that your marketing right now is geolocating people? So that's what I'm saying. You have a very interesting component right now. You're very much tied to being in multiple locations at this moment and that you're planning for that from seeming from this report a little bit. I mean, again, it's a constraint, right? So it's not necessarily the ideal location. So again, how does that tie? Is that a part of your momentum, or is your momentum despite it, because of it? Because I really do, in this presentation, hear this, again, this momentum, and it kind of goes back to questions about, like, what were different things? Where is it coming from? And again, I think coming from a lot of places, but that's interesting to me.

I would say two things. I would say there are two paths for theatre works. Period. I'm not going to say with facilities. One is the multi-city hybrid world we live in. And I say when people come in from other institutions, they're like, wait, how does this work? I'm like, I don't know how it works. Just make it work. It's called theater magic. Yeah, just make it work. And that's the model that we're currently in. This is stretching to a third venue. is not something I particularly love, but we're making, I'm not going to say we're making lemons out of lemonade because, okay, that's who we are this year. But, it becomes a lot about how do we logistic, we spend so much time on the logistics of what's going, where, this is like here. If, That's one path, though, and we could do that. I think we would have to truly get back to two cities. The other path would be something like Cumberley, although it's not specifically Cumberley, a single home of our own. TheaterWorks would become a different organization, but one thing TheaterWorks would do on its own is all these ancillary programs. for the building is we see a place that is open from the first thing in the morning to the end of performances at night. This is not a place where we're opening the doors at 7 o'clock. The show starts at 7.30 and we're done at 10. We want to have a cafe. We want to have daytime lectures and education programs going on and concerts. It's a true performing arts center complex. And it is all those things we've been talking about all night about the different ways we interact with the community that a permanent home would allow us to do that are more constrained now because we don't have access to all that space all the time. Monday night, late night comedy sports, like whatever we would do. That's a different theater works. The theater works, but it's a different theater works in program delivery, but at its core, it's still the same. which is trying to understand the various ways we can interact with our community. One of the questions I ask our team is how do, if you want to talk to a constituency who is not engaging with us, how do they want to engage in our art form as opposed to wondering why they won't conform to the way we want? And so right now we jump through hoops to make things happen sort of as we can. With our own space, we wouldn't. be able to be more responsive to different ways of getting people across the threshold. One of the best ways to get people to see a show, which is theater, is to get them to come into your theater and to welcome people into your theater. Right. Orton Center Stage built a theater, rented it out for weddings and bar mitzvahs and had a lunchtime cafe and stuff. And after three years, discovered that 11% of their ticket buyers first entered that building to do something for their decision. And they felt comfortable in the space and they came back. So that is, it would be a different theater works, but its DNA and its purpose and its mission don't change because it's still about finding various entry points, education, works, names, whatever. It allows that energy to be focused not on the logistics of how we make it happen, but actually on the space.

It's also true that you might be really good couch surfing. But when you feel like you have a place that's home and people realize they can come and meet you there, then that's helpful too. And so it's just a lot of energy that you have to spend figuring out the move from this place to that place and those sorts of things. So wherever you are, whether it's just those two places or three, try to connect. As an actor who was on the road and one year worked in six different states and trying to connect with community in each of those places, it takes some energy and some effort and it costs a little bit that will have to come from somewhere because it appears finally.

As far as Coverley, the timeline is it's Number third, ballot initiative, city of Palo Alto, sales tax increase. If Prop J passes, that's what funds the city buying the land for the Cumberley Community Center from the school district and funding improvements to the campus. We would do a capital campaign in conjunction with them. The earliest, let's put it this way. I've seen a timeline that said we could be doing a river cutting in 2030. That's Palo Alto.

No, I'm kidding. It's not a museum. It's pretty much in every city.

Yeah. Yeah. So anyway. Katie has said to me multiple times, you've done a very good job of making sure our excitement and expectations are leavened with the reality that this could go away at any moment. There are a lot of politics involved in this. Having said that, if Prop J passes, we are prepared to move forward with this project. That would be probably four to five years. We don't have lots of time to figure it out. And so it also falls within our strategic plans. By the end of this year, we know if we're cover-lying or not. And at the same time, we're trying to figure out what the process has been. Facilities are simply the tool that lets us do the work. It's not about the building. It's about the ability to deliver the product. We talked for a long time, and there was a lot of information. Other questions?

Well, I think I should ask, are there any members of the public who want to make a comment on this? We don't have any.

I think it's really, I think it was great to see the changes from yours.

And then clearly the momentum is felt, I think. I think it's interesting to, well, suddenly we have this conversation of also a more serious conversation regarding what is, how exactly is facilities and there's an internal question on facilities as well. I do, the multi-city aspect, again, it's everywhere in your program, the presentation. And so there's an interesting, obviously one home gives capacity and it gives a certain, but there's a, are we what we practice or what we say we are, right? And so kind of the interesting thing. And so I think it's great to hear the Cumberley thing is a great thing for voters to vote on taxes and things. But I think it's quite lovely to hear where the strategic plan is going. And I think that it'd be interesting to talk about a way that we can do a public partnership type of event between community resident companies, other clients at the center. And I think that would also get to the note regarding an open kind of like theater aspect and a home aspect and building community in various ways. So that would also be on number two of their strategic plan. So I think there's a lot of fruitful things that came forth in this meeting and a lot of great developments to keep looking for.

Yeah. And you guys have pivoted a lot and figured it out a lot and are in a lot better shape than a couple of years ago. So that's great.

Agility. Agility, right? Who knows where things are going?

Yeah, the show will go on.

The show will go on. Somewhere.

Kudos to you guys, because we all know it's not easy for theater companies right now. Turn it around.

But the budget is being built, so it's gotta be good!

Well, I just wanted to say thank you guys for your engagement, for, you know, serving in this capacity. My knowledge, you don't have to be doing this.

You can correct me later.

Thank you for advocating for the arts, for being so engaged during this multi-multi-page read-through. And, you know, I think... TheaterWorks, to my recollection, has been at the Mountain View Center since the Mountain View Center opened. And so we would love to continue partnering. I think to the extent that facilities remain a little bit uncertain, we would love to be able to be doing more with Mountain View or have the flexibility to do more. This is a home for us. So thank you for having us. Thank you.

I think it'll be interesting to the discretion of the chair in the future to also, once you guys do the strategic planning meeting and different aspects, I think it would be great to have TheatreWorks back before next year, actually, and to have a conversation about how things are developing and what ways we can be useful in building partnerships. I think it'd be interesting to continue to move on. use their momentum as well and see um so you want more details about no i actually think we can have more more conversation collaborative conversation i actually think there's an uh there's some i think there's opportunity there um with the with the community partnerships and different things i think there's um something fruitful here that we can um discuss further in the future i think that's great i'm in oregon sorry am i i'm down here every other week okay great the people the residents

What I would say is we're supposed to come once a year to do this, and that's great. We reach out. Yes. If you don't want to, please have people from your school district contact us. We want to be in your schools. I'll be honest. It's been over the years. It's been hard to get into the Bagby School District. We have tried and tried and tried. Please make introductions. Get us in. Find those advocates. Believe me, it's not about the money.

like education programs it's not it's core to our service to the community please reach out to us we will make it happen well i think this is a this is the third time we've heard that exact like um i think there's a way that we can i know that um i'll go back through it because i know i think last year because pyt is in the school district and i know christine has forwarded an email with a contact so i just need to dig that i think jake is trying to reach out but but

I mean, you have different people. Teachers have so many challenges and so many things before them. And they vote with their feet very clearly on where their time needs to be spent. So if someone can advocate and say, this could actually be great in your classroom to help you with these things, we would be very happy to have those conversations. And we... Our programs, in other words, we use this community responsive. There's a program that would serve the Mountain View School District that we can help create in conjunction with them, that delivers to them a goal they're trying to achieve. We will do that.

If y'all know any school teachers, tell them there's a cowboy named Shane. talk to their children about being a cowboy.

I think that is something that we can publicly actually perhaps facilitate because I think it'd be better than giving one just in the same spirit of bringing someone into your building, usually bring them into something before the show. I think the same thing, getting a conversation because I do think that the community itself, at least with could use a facilitating conversation. So if we as a committee can help facilitate as people with privy to what they just said, privy to our communities, I think that might be beneficial. And then you guys can be there and that would be lovely. We'll have that conversation instead of having emails and no one answering your emails. Yes. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks.

Dracula, scary boo.

What's the youngest age you would... We're saying teens.

Depends on the... I haven't seen it yet.

Like scary-wise. This is a scary-wise Dracula, not a silly Dracula. Okay, okay.

There are silly Dracula's out there, but we're working on our blood recipes. And we have hired a magician, a magic consultant. Strange, scary people.

I shall be there.

All right. Thank you again so much. Okay, 5.2 fiscal year 2020.

25, 26, Final Attendance, Recommendation, Performing Arts Commandment through Teresa Yvonne. The whole year?

Yes. We tried to do it last month, and we found a typo.

So we should start it over again. Final Attendance for the year, and there is an attachment, and it's recessed. So now...

Yeah, so July, August, September. I'm going to go through this fairly briefly because we've kind of looked at this before, but basically our grand total for quarter one, we had, you know, 4,698 tickets sold. Average 52% of all the houses and our ancillary spending. And always July, August is going to be light for us. Typically we kick back up in September. And then October, November, December, as you can see quarter two, we ended up at 25,597 tickets sold at 60%. So doing very well there. And then continuing on into quarter three, January, February, and March with the total attendance of 21,718 at 73% of the house. And then quarter four, April, May, June. Keep in mind that June is always, we lighten up in June typically. So we ended up at 21,851 with 66% of the house. So we've got a grand total for the whole year. of 271 performances, 73,864 tickets sold, 74,302 attended. So keep in mind, I think this question was asked previously that we knew when we have more attended than sold, that's our comp tickets. And the ancillary spending for all four quarters. or the facility is $2,922,060, close to three months.

And we have a comparison of what that was to previous years?

So last year, if I remember correctly, we were closer to like two and a half. So that's what I've been bragging about, is two and a half. Now I can brag closer to three.

Nice, nice. Okay.

where's the gains coming from from just higher attendance or yeah so you know we have higher attendance i mean obviously um like you know just just looking at quarter four um with them doing come from away they did very well with that show you know that was at 80 attendance to come from away um for them

This is our first year seeing all of these different implemented changes from the resident companies. Is it reflected in this slide?

Yes.

Okay. Yeah. I think this is something like very much to note that some of the changes that we worked with the resident companies aspect and structural changes that we made to programming needs to be driving ticket.

Well, it's bringing in new types of performances and I've seen a lot of more dance performances on the calendar. And also Southeast Asian companies.

Can you remind me again how many productions they're doing here? I couldn't tell if it's two or three.

They're doing two.

Two, and they do five weeks? It's five weeks, yeah. OK. But then I thought they had 13 weeks.

Yeah, but they can't do a production in three weeks.

Oh, OK. And the previous one of the Little Women was, why was that? Because they were doing three that year.

So Hershey never needs to meet five weeks. So they did four weeks, and then they did four weeks before they did five. I see. And then the other show was at Second Stitch. But that was all negotiated with their interim executive director. So that was before they brought

So then they are effectively then just renting it for 10 weeks.

Well, they're a resident company, so they're not renting anything.

Yeah, they are. They pay rent.

But per product, how are they doing? What do you mean? So they are, for the 10 weeks, they're just, and so then they're not, in their 13, those extra three weeks are not being incorporated into their budget. They're not spending on With us?

No, because the contracts for the shows are per production. Okay. So that's.

That are done.

Well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

So compared to before, how many weeks did they use to rent before? One. One. Wow. So it's come down. How many years ago was that when they were doing 20?

Well, just. Was it last year? The last year is the 13 weeks, which. Okay. You know.

Yeah.

And then the year prior, they were at 20 weeks.

So 24, 25. And then...

So that's 10 weeks that we've picked up in two years. Well, that's room for... Because a lot of the new things that are coming in are shorter runs.

They're much shorter runs. And then what I'll say is the diversities. And just because... Young Moon. His performance isn't coming up, but he set a record for us. He launched his on-sale date. Chinese comedian in two hours. Yeah, he's impressive. I wonder if he'll come back regularly. Well, we weren't the only venue. But he, I mean, he basically had a huge on social media campaign of tickets go on sale at this date, at this time, this date, this time, this date, this time.

So are you tracking new companies or? Yeah. Okay.

I have a question. Do you as the facility kind of like try to cultivate that relationship? Like, okay, they did really well. and try to be like, hey, come back again next year? Versus like, they might feel, oh, I sold out this one so quickly, let me go to a bigger place, and then we lose that. Like, how does it look?

I wouldn't say we cultivate, but I mean, we take care of our, I mean, they're all clients, so we take really good care of them. I think a better example of that is Feiyu Theater, which is probably one of the reasons why we were pushing to get some of our mini-stage dates back. They came in in the first year, They were here, they did two shows in second stage and their first one was okay. And then the second one, they actually sold out a weekend.

And then the next year, asking for dates, they wanted to move into the main stage and we had no dates to camp. There was just nothing available.

And so they went to Campbell. And then enough time had passed and we did some rearranging on the main stage and pulled some of those dates back. Now they're at the main stage and the most recent one, they did a Friday and Saturday or speaking might be Saturday. They did two performances on the main stage and did very well. They were like, I'd have to say 70% for two performances. So they've grown with this and that's in Mandarin.

So you don't have like a, um, like a short list of like companies you.

feel like have done well and you just kind of at the top of the booking season shoot out an email to them and be like you know we invite everybody we're a city so like we're so that's what i'll say is the difference between like you know private enterprise and us being a city we send out an invitation to everybody that has rented the facility for the last three years okay and your your years in fact i'm just have a draft on my laptop right now of the memo that we send out and it goes out to every single client for the last three years of you know this is the primary dates we need your dates you know starting from here to here or open you know as we book next that window opens up in september and closes in december the primary reservations and that's for october of 27 to september of 23 and so we open that up to everybody um But obviously there are, you know, there's folks that are more successful and they want to come back. And then there's times when, you know, like Feiyu as an example, they were successful and then they wanted to move to the main stage because they really did well in second stage and sold out and had to turn people away. And so that would be the next, you know, evolution of them. And then we didn't have any dates to give them.

Right.

You know, which is unfortunate. It's nice to be full, but it's also nice to be able to expand the repertoire.

Yeah, which is obviously a big part of the work we're trying to do here. It's bringing more diversity of audience. All kinds of demographics.

I think that's been my concern since I got here, so to speak. When I walk downtown, there's seven different languages.

But when I go into my loft,

It really should, as much as we possibly can, it's never gonna be 100%, but as much as we can, we should reflect with that.

There's kind of an interesting secondary question that's like coming up because we're seeing more diversity. So there's an interesting question arising of between fragmentation and a consolidation aspect regarding programming or like what is being, TheatreWorks has even looking at that when talking about multi-city versus one home. There's this interesting, there's a, as, as we're, it's not necessarily the primary issue yet, but one of the things I see in the coming years that we will have to contend with is yes, how do we be visible? And yet too many audiences is, and too many communities that is arising now in small forms that those questions are being formulated now. So it's kind of, that's just an interesting aspect that might not make sense now, but we'll, we'll be a question in five years, at least. Sure. We'll see how we do with that.

Okay. I think everybody's ready to move along. To number six, committee staff announcements, updates, requests, and committee reports. Did the leisure tour happen?

Yes. Yes, it did.

Okay. Tell me about it.

It was fun. It was fun. It's very interesting to see another facility that like similar size just bigger because they have three stages and not to be the same architect as us. They are as old as us so they are having similar things. They just redid their floor like a year ago or something also. And then they're like, we're getting this fixed. We're getting that fixed. And now we have to get our smoke detectors, you know, because like all sorts of stuff that has mold building stuff.

Yeah. Yeah.

And I was like, Oh, okay. So this is common theme that, um, you see, well, I thought what was most interesting was that, um, they are nonprofit, um, partner. leg that they have. So they're city run, city operated, but they also have their, the other presenting. Yeah. What is it called? The Abloh Valley Arts Association. Yeah. Right. DBA. And they, they're their nonprofit organization. organization that's doing all the hiring of the presenting presenters blah blah blah and they have apparently a very very nice symbiotic relationship wasn't always the case and like at some point I think got to this place where it was like well you know why wouldn't DBA put their name why should it say Lesher presents but it sounds like now the two executive directors or whatever are working together really well and um I was excited about their Diwali presentation that they're having. They're doing an outdoor, open to the community kind of performances and that kind of stuff, similar to the space we have out here. Not the space we have behind, but kind of like where the city does their stuff. And then at night, that same evening, they're having a headliner, an Indian comic. So I thought that was interesting, like to have a Diwali thing in the daytime and then have a Salvation person begin at night. So yeah, that was cool. And any questions?

Did you go?

No, I didn't get any all about it is what I'm going to say.

We went a couple years ago.

I didn't go to Leisure Center. I didn't go to Walnut Creek.

Oh, you went, oh, that's right, you went to the other one.

Yes, but it's okay, I haven't gotten any emails about this work, or this board in a second, so I don't actually know, I don't know anything that's happening, other than that we just watched that presentation. But I didn't go, no questions, but it was great. Mommy's great.

Yeah, you were, you went to the Bankhead.

Yeah.

Where is that? Livermore. Okay.

It's newer, it opened in 2005. Slightly smaller, it's 500 seats. Okay.

And the Wesher Center is pretty impressive. And I love the way they have it organized. And they have a big marketing staff to do all that stuff, right?

They have a beautiful art gallery. I thought that was also interesting. Like their art gallery is very deliberate. You know, like ours is kind of there, but unless you kind of point people to it, I don't think it's as obvious. That does bring me to a question. Remember that art event that I went to? yes the monday night the open hours with the yeah yeah i was just curious about is it okay for me to move on to that question um i was just curious about how something like that is marketed because it was really really just kind of dead and i felt bad for the artist that was there you know um I think there was as many staff there, more staff there than there was like audience, at least at the time that I went and obviously when it's open two hours, I may have just caught a quiet moment. Um, so I'm just wondering like, you know, how is this marketed? I went on to the MVCPA website and I didn't see anything about it, but then you mentioned that it went out to the city, the city sent it out.

Keep in mind that the gallery is the Visual Arts Committee. It's not us. We host the walls, but it's not really our artists. And then the gallery talk that we did, that was a collaborative. But if I hadn't dropped $8,000 in postcards.

No, no, I wasn't thinking postcards, but even just like putting it on our social media or our website, like, because it's just another opportunity to get really open hours for the artists and it's intended for them to invite.

I think it's a visual arts quite.

Yeah, they're getting ready to hire a visual arts person. So, I mean, the city in the economic development, because

person's not really smart i mean just feel like it's kind of a wasted opportunity to get more people in the door you know like kind of like what that guy was saying about whatever performing arts center he was saying that more people had come to that place for weddings and other events and then started attending for the shows yes so similarly like whoever the visual arts community is, it's giving, they're coming into our space. So it's an opportunity to just, you know, more eyeballs, more mailing lists.

So let me give you some context on this. The reason why we're doing the open Monday nights is because I've shut my lobby down. I don't allow you to come down. Historically, and we never had, we never advertised those very much either. We would have occasionally a dozen people walk a couple of hours and that's it. Um, so the open hours on Mondays, it's just a response to try and replace that. Okay.

Um, just fruitful, you know, consolidated.

Yeah. It's just, um, you know, we would be open every Wednesday and it just got to be problematic because downtown has changed so much that we have people that come in and use our restroom and harsh, but it became a concern for us. So I shut my lock for safety. So it's the occasional Monday night that we have open.

It's open for the artist.

It's really just in response so that the artist is not ever viewed at. But the other thing is when we have 74,000 people coming through the building in here, it's being viewed.

Right. Yeah.

Yeah.

In my, in my opinion, if you, if you, if you want to engage it, then we just, we, my hope would be that we would be gallery talk for every artist. I'm not sure that we have time on the second stage to make that happen, but that's the way to engage your gallery.

Right.

Because galleries are very passive anyways, even when it's like Bedford, you know, and it's, it's a dedicated space. It's still kind of a passive space. People come in and wander through it and engage.

So there's one coming up at Gallery Talk. Yes. November, what, 24th? Yes, November 24th. So that's the same as the same as what we had done with the I suppose donated wine.

Yeah.

I mean, there's and we can, if we want to advertise more, I mean, I agree that there's a perhaps a great way to get people and advertising for into the building so that but that would be a conversation again to bring the visual arts chair to or staff person to into one of our meetings and ask them but otherwise we're not doing the marketing right now i mean i'm not thinking anything like you said flyers and putting any money on it in it but something as simple as

posting it on our social media and having it on our website. So when somebody's coming to see what's going on at the theater, they know that there's a random, whatever it is, like, because the artist is there, right?

The artist is typically there. And I know that the visual, I know that Economic Development did, it went out on a newsletter. Right. Council Connections, I think, or the newsletter. Yeah.

Well, and then the Visual Arts Committee staff liaison is usually there on Mondays nights for those events. Teresa, you don't have to be there. So, I mean, it's their event.

You know, I understand that. I'm just saying, like, to...

Yeah, I know. I think that's possible. What you're saying and kind of the under thing of like the underside of it is it's in the building, getting people and potentially new people. It is already an opportunity that exists. I wouldn't I wouldn't stop at like, oh, we need to throw money at it. No, it might be like. City Penny there, City Penny there. But I think also, though, if there is to be a next step, it's not to our committee alone. We would need to invite either staff person or, and it would just be a conversation, I mean, but that's up to the chair and staff.

Well, you missed, so she was leaving and I was just coming and we had a chat. So when I went to enter, there was a whole phalanx of Japanese businessmen in black suits They were from Sister City somewhere in Japan. I don't remember which one. They came out of City Hall and walked through and walked through the building. So there was a critical mass there for a little bit.

Yeah, like I said, I think I went just when there was like no groups.

And then the artists have different conversations. I don't remember if I told you, but a couple of months ago I went to one. And there was a woman from the organization in Palo Alto that does public art on private buildings. And she showed up specifically to talk to that artist. And they had a conversation about maybe, you know, her commissioning something for Los Altos. So, I mean, those are like quiet little talks that aren't going to happen if it's flooded with people and everybody wants to talk to the artist. And the other thing I think too is it's a Monday night and people aren't, Rushing home. I don't know.

Probably. Yeah.

I don't know. So I think, you know, we're all like, we've got an Instagram account.

Well, I don't think we have anyone managing that, right?

We do. We just hired our marketing person.

Oh, okay.

But I'll be frank. It's like, we've got a lot on our plate right now. And so the gallery is not our responsibility. I mean, yes, we host it in our building and I'm not trying to like, you know, I don't want anything to do with it. That's not the case. But it's like, we have a lot right now.

I mean, maybe.

And I have a part, I have one part-time person.

So, you know, it's like.

Is she going to be there tomorrow?

Yeah.

Can I come by and read more stuff? Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. I mean, maybe it could even be more passive where they post something on their Instagram and just invite us to be a collaborator.

They usually, I mean, they usually do put something on the Facebook. So I don't know if it just got missed for that one.

I don't know.

we we usually do cross collaborate on that because sarah takes good care of it so we have a new marketing person yeah she's been with us for longer three months yeah three or four months yeah okay she's getting automated yeah she's a good egg well i have an announcement next tuesday september 22nd uh

will be receiving the city's proclamation declaring october arts and humanities month in mountain so everybody's invited to show up usually after that's presented then they take pictures the city photographer takes pictures and so all committee members are welcome to join me 22nd at what time so it's at the city council chambers upstairs okay and the meeting starts um

Is it 6 or 630? I can't remember. Yeah, I want to say it's 630. And we can send out an email. But it's usually the presentations are first up. It'll be like the opening of the meeting. Housekeeping details and then presentations. I'm sure ours won't be the only one. Presentations are first up.

Proclamations.

Nice. Okay.

So thanks to Teresa for getting a donation request over there.

Oh, I can actually do Tuesdays.

Anything else? Announcement. Oh, this here. We've got the little green.

OK, should we put this up ?

Yeah, or if you know people and if you want an email to you, you know, to forward to folks, we can do that. Because Irene is not going to renew. And she and Carol is termed out. Oh, because she was. She filled a petition. Yeah, so it was a short term.

Okay, cool. So you're done with this position in December?

We don't even meet in December.

Wait, you and I are on an ad hoc committee together.

Well, I was just thinking about that. We need to have a conversation with the guy from Make Music Day. Yeah, let's do that. In the next two weeks.

Get me in touch.

Teresa, anything else? That's it.

Oh, well, I do want to let you guys know that next month, so I wasn't able to have the resident company spread out, so next month there won't be any resident company in November. It will be PYT at 6.15 and then at 7.15 because neither one of them

Oh, okay. Who is now the recognized comms position at PYT?

Her name is Lauren. She was their previous managing director, and she left the pandemic.

Yeah, so we need to have a report about Make Music Day for October. Otherwise, I don't know what it is we're going to be talking about.

Right, you and I should get on that.

I feel like we have latent initiatives, honestly. I think we have some parts this year that are coming together in interesting ways. But that's where we need to go.

So and then secondly, before I forget, the Performing Arts Committee work plan was approved by city council.

Yay. Woo-hoo. And Teresa, do you have any update on 35th anniversary? Is there anything?

Yeah. January 16th, Saturday from 4 to 8.

Greg, does he know that one of the committee members, he knows that, I have to read, he hasn't answered me yet. I can follow up. But does he know that a committee member is the one, that staff isn't coming, it's a committee member? You have that conversation with him?

Oh, he knew that.

Okay, I just need to double check that. I haven't gotten an answer yet.

Oh. Okay. Okay.

Because like, what does he want me to do? It's kind of what I was like, I can do all these things, but he has to let me know.

Yeah. Okay.

Which I can follow up. I don't know. Right.

So part of the programming for the day is we're giving the YAC, the Youth Advisory Committee, an hour for open mic night and second stage. And to be in charge on that. Greg Milano, he's the staff liaison to the Youth Advisory Committee.

more to come very nice well i've been doing research on this history of the center and theater works was invited after seven weeks that place opened the calendar was in right well what would be well um you're gonna start getting proposals in september

That's now it's open. Okay. Proposal period.

So our letter goes out and then they have a, they have a frame basically like from the end of September, a timeframe in September to beginning of December to get their resolution requested.

And is our second stage initiative happening this season or is that going to be next year?

So that won't happen this year. Cause we kind of missed the, missed the deadline and he still needs to go to council. Okay. It didn't go to council? No.

Well, that's too bad because I taped my accomplishments for the celebration of service.

Well, we'll get there soon enough.

You told me to say we await city council approval. Yes. I did close with that. Okay. So next year you mean January. That next fiscal year. What do you mean?

When is council going to vote on it? Hopefully I get it to them by the end of the year. It's always a problem when you don't get anything to them because they don't meet in July and August. So then getting anything on September 25th is impossible. Oh. Three months worth of time.

Oh, I see. Okay. So if you miss that little window, then you're kind of... Oh. Okay. Okay. Well, I think we can move along to adjournment. Yes. Okay, seven adjournment. The next Performing Arts Committee meeting will be held on Wednesday, October 21st, 2026 at 6.15 p.m. in Atrium Conference Room 500 Castro Street. I close the September 16th, 2026 PAC meeting at 8.24 p.m.

Thank you.