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High drama at the Kiel Opera House

By Charlene Prost

Of the Post-Dispatch

06/26/2005



Although the sale of the Blues hockey team and the lease on Savvis Center was the big attention grabber last week, there's also related behind-the-scenes drama playing out over the fate of the empty Kiel Opera House.



The lease for Savvis that's on the sale block includes the city-owned Opera House, an ornate 1930s facility closed in 1991 so that adjoining Kiel Auditorium could be demolished to make way for what is now Savvis Center.



Developer Donald Breckenridge and associates have been working for more than two years - despite some rather unusual legal challenges from homeless advocates - to reopen the Opera House for Broadway shows and other entertainment.



At the moment, the Breckenridge group has a verbal agreement with the present lease holders, Bill and Nancy Laurie, to essentially sublease the Opera House long term for $1 a year.



But the agreement is not yet signed, said Mark Sauer, president and chief executive for Savvis Center and the Blues. And until it is signed, Breckenridge has no guarantees he'd be able to get the Opera House under those terms.



Breckenridge, however, is optimistic things will work out in his favor. He expects to have other loose ends for the project, including parking, tied up in another 90 to 120 days. And once the details are in place, he said, he intends to get the lease signed for the Opera House and contracts signed with Clear Channel Entertainment and others who would be involved.



"Our leases are all agreed upon now, but we've not pursued signatures because some things still are up in the air. And ideally, we want to have everything else done before the leases are signed," Breckenridge said.



"Our target date for getting leases signed is September, and we don't expect that the sale of the team and Savvis would be that soon," he said. But if a sale looks imminent sooner, he said, "We'll address that at that time."



Sauer said he's also hoping that Breckenridge will have the Opera House lease signed before the team and master lease for Savvis are sold.



"We have worked extremely closely" with Breckenridge, Sauer said, "but he is not ready to submit all the documents to us (for signing). ...When it gets to that point, we will attempt to execute the deal."



The Lauries announced June 17 that they had decided to put the Blues and the Savvis lease up for sale because of the team's substantial financial losses.



For the Breckenridge group, the announcement came just two months after it got over another hurdle that had slowed its plans for the Opera House.



In January last year, eight months after Breckenridge went public with the Opera House renovation plan, the Rev. Larry Rice came forward with plans to turn a federally-owned building next to the Opera House into a shelter for 1,000 homeless people.



Breckenridge also had his eye on the L. Douglas Abram Federal Building, intending to work with the city of St. Louis to acquire it and renovate most of it into parking he said he desperately needed to make the Opera House project work.



Rice, who runs the New Life Evangelistic Center for the homeless at 1411 Locust Street, claimed federal law gave his group first dibs on the Abram building, and he's taken the quest to federal agencies overseeing such matters, and to U. S. District Court in Washington.



Two months ago, the federal Department of Health and Human Services rejected his application for the Abram for a second time. The suit is still pending.

New Life's attorney, Daniel Boyle, said the suit is not likely to be resolved for many months.



And Jim Ogden, deputy regional administrator for the General Services Administration in Kansas City, the Abram owner, said the building can't be sold to anyone until New Life's suit is settled. The Abram is to be emptied by the end of next year.



Breckenridge, however, said he believes New Life's battle is all but over. "We've had opinions from three different law firms that his chances of winning in court are less than 2 percent," he said, "so we are moving forward."



What Breckenridge has lined up for the Opera House are two well-known companies committed to booking entertainment into the main 3,500-seat auditorium. Over the years, it has held events ranging from the Ziegfeld Follies and Metropolitan Opera to Elvis Presley and the Rolling Stones.



Clear Channel intends to bring in a variety of music, theater and other entertainment, and it has a signed lease with Fox Associates LLC, manager of the Fox Theatre in Grand Center, to book Broadway shows.



Four smaller theaters alongside the auditorium, each seating about 500, would be used by smaller performing arts groups. "There are small theater and other groups here who want to use them, " Breckenridge said, "and we're even getting calls from out-of-town people who want to use them."



He said original light fixtures and other features remain in the Opera House. "We will take it back to what it was ( when it opened) in 1934."



Much of the $30 million or so Breckenridge would spend to renovate the Opera House would go for new mechanical systems, new dressing rooms, expanding an outdated loading dock, a restaurant in the old Kiel Club and building an acoustical wall to block noise from Savvis Center.



He also intends later, as a separate but related project, to renovate the empty city-owned Municipal Courts building, just east of the Opera House, into a 150-room boutique hotel.



To finance the project, he plans to use leases with Clear Channel and a parking operator - and other assets - as collateral for a private loan. He said potential lenders "have been soliciting us" for the business.



He hopes to have construction contractors signed on by the end of the year and the project finished early in 2007.



One detail still up in the air is parking.



Breckenridge plans to build a parking garage with about 770 parking spaces into the Abram, along with space for rehearsals and other activities related to the Opera House. There are 600 parking spaces on nearby lots, and more than 1,200 parking spaces at the Savvis Center garage, built and operated by the parking division of the St. Louis treasurer's office.



Attorney William Kuehling, who represents the treasurer's office, said the garage had been struggling financially since the National Hockey League lockout. And he said that while "we want to see the Opera House go forward," there are concerns that another garage at the Abram would compete with the Savvis garage. "And if the Blues get moved," he said, "then you don't need the Abram to provide parking."



Kuehling said one solution is for Breckenridge to lease the Savvis garage and pay enough rent to cover the debt of more than $20 million for it and other related features for Savvis Center.



Breckenridge said he's willing to consider that. "We don't want to overbuild parking, either," he said, "and we would not start on the Abram garage if it (the Savvis garage) was available."



The cost of renovating the Abram building will be about $8 million, he said. Breckenridge wants to get city approval for a tax increment financing district that would generate about $6 million of the $8 million needed.



Richard Baker, president of Fox Associates, said his group is still ready to go once Breckenridge gets the Opera House reopened.



"We're just kind of sitting here waiting ... and I'm sure Clear Channel is, too," he said.



Reporter Charlene Prost

E-mail: cprost@post-dispatch.com

Phone: 314-340-8140

Curtain's up: Breckenridge signs Kiel deal

From the September 2, 2005 print edition

Christopher Tritto



Developer Don Breckenridge got the green light to move forward on his $45 million redevelopment of Kiel Opera House and an adjacent garage.



The go-ahead appears to indicate a local buyer is in the wings for the St. Louis Blues.



Mark Sauer, president of the Savvis Center and the Blues, agreed to lease the Kiel Opera House to Breckenridge and assured Breckenridge that he could proceed with his planned parking garage next door, Breckenridge said.



The Kiel Opera House, which includes a 3,500-seat main auditorium and four adjoining smaller theaters, was closed in 1991 when construction of Savvis Center began. Breckenridge's renovations will include constructing a sound-proof wall between Kiel and the Savvis Center and expanding loading docks.



Breckenridge has been trying for three years to redevelop Kiel as a venue for Broadway shows. The Savvis Center and the Opera House are physically connected, and Savvis Center holds the long-term lease on the building.



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The papers are already signed. I dont think they'll renege...

.I heard on KMOX that his family will continue with the project.

It seems to be more of Martin Van Der Werf's opinion than actual fact.