San Diego : Balboa Theater Ordered to Close in One Month

In a month, the movie screen at the historic Balboa Theater will go dark. That was guaranteed Friday when the Centre City Development Corp. ordered the theater to close because it is likely to collapse in a major earthquake.

The decision to shut the movie house was made after CCDC, the agency in charge of downtown redevelopment, received a letter from the city’s building inspection department endorsing a recent engineering report on the theater’s construction.

Blaylock-Willis & Associates has concluded that the 62-year-old theater, at 4th Avenue and E Street, could not withstand a significant earthquake and estimated it would cost nearly $2.4 million to repair the facility.

As a result, San Diego City Atty. John Witt also has urged that the theater be closed because of fears that the city would be financially liable for any deaths or injuries.

David Allsbrook, CCDC’s projects director, said a letter giving theater operators 30 days to close was sent Friday. The 30-day countdown, he said, would begin Monday.

The theater is operated on a month-to-month lease by Walnut Properties Inc. of Los Angeles, which runs three other downtown movie theaters, the Aztec, the Bijou and the Pussycat. Terry Wiggins, a San Diego district manager for the theater operators, said his firm will likely show movies in the Balboa for the entire 30-day period.

“We have a lot of people still coming in to see movies,” said Wiggins of the 1,000-seat theater. There are another 500 seats in the balcony, which is closed.

While Wiggins said he was surprised by the city’s action, he said the company knew the theater would eventually be shut when structural work began to transform the building into the San Diego Art Center.

The city approved a contract in April with developer Chris Mortenson to gut the theater and renovate the building, which would entail making it safe for use.

The Art Center proposal is being opposed by some groups, including “San Diegans to Save Our Balboa” and the “Save Our Heritage Organization,” who want the building used as a performing theater.

Kristen Aliotti and Joy Higginbotham, co-leaders of SOHO, said Friday that the group will present a formal proposal to keep the Balboa a theater in two weeks. “Another engineer would have come to another conclusion . . . that the building is not unsafe,” Aliotti said in an interview after the CCDC meeting. “Safety is physical and political.”

Aliotti said, however, that she supports spending the $2.4 million necessary to make the Balboa structurally sound.

Gerald Trimble, CCDC’s executive vice president, said the $2.4 million covers only the structural costs of making the Balboa safe. Costs of making electrical or mechanical upgrades were not included in the engineering report.