Bus Shelter Firm Seeks Contract Concessions : Chapter 11: Cash-starved Metro Display Advertising asks for easier payment terms, or even temporary waivers, from scores of government clients.

An Orange County bus shelter company that filed for bankruptcy protection in January plans to seek easier payment terms on its shelter contracts with more than 50 cities, counties and other government agencies, says the company’s president.

In some cases, Metro Display Advertising will ask government officials to waive payments on certain company shelters that are not generating revenue, President Robert F. Bicher said.

The request comes as the company is trying to reorganize its debts after filing for Chapter 11 protection from its creditors in federal bankruptcy court in Santa Ana.

But the changes will have to be approved by some local governments. The Garden Grove City Council, for one, is scheduled to discuss its contracts with Metro Display at a meeting tonight.

Bicher, who was named to head Metro Display by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge John E. Ryan last January, said the company expects to resume its normal payment schedule to local governments within a month. The rescheduling of payments, he said, is needed to help the company through a temporary cash crunch.

“Metro Display is contacting all the cities with which we have contracts, and we are negotiating for a change in the payment stream . . . in order to assist us with our reorganization,” Bicher said.

Tustin-based Metro Display, which also does business as Bustop Shelters of California, has more shelters than either of its two major competitors in Southern California. The company places street-side transit bus shelters and makes money by selling advertising space.

Unlike its competitors, Metro Display financed its operations by selling individual shelters to private investors for about $10,000 each. The investors then leased the shelters back to the company and received monthly payments.

Just as the company was entering bankruptcy proceedings, the Securities and Exchange Commission charged that Metro Display was being operated as a Ponzi scheme. Funds from new investors were being used to cover the monthly payments due to longtime investors, the SEC alleged.

Federal agents searched the company’s offices and Newport Beach home of the former president, Jean Claude LeRoyer, as part of a criminal investigation, which has not resulted in any charges being filed. LeRoyer is no longer in management, serving now as an outside sales representative with the company, Bicher said.

Rather than allow Metro Display to be liquidated, investors--many of them retirees--formed a group to try to get the company back on sound financial footing.

Garden Grove City Atty. Stuart B. Scudder said the company wants the city to forgive one year of fees on a contract signed last November, which called for monthly payments of $3,150 to the city.

Garden Grove is being “asked to waive those payments on the basis that they were making a similar request of all of the cities. I’ve contacted several agencies and none of them are being asked to waive,” Scudder said.

Metro Display also has not made its $3,700 monthly payments owed on another contract since last July, he said.

Bicher said some agencies may not have yet received Metro Display’s request. “Each contract is different,” he said. Aside from the cash crunch, he said, there are hopeful signs for the shelter company.

“Our advertising revenue is growing very rapidly and I am very pleased with our efforts to improve ad sales. It’s due to a united effort by all the groups involved, the creditor bodies and the sales staff,” he said.