An Analytical Discussion of the City Theater Associates (aka Biddeford City Theater)
By Bailey Farris
December 13, 2017
Professor Johnson
A wise man once said, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players” (Shakespeare). Within this larger stage, smaller stages do exist and some even come with spotlights. Citizens seeking to join the theatrical realm can find their opportunity on the corner of Main Street and Adams Street in downtown Biddeford. Attached to City Hall stands the Biddeford City Theater, with its historic architecture in tact. Originally built as a municipal auditorium space, “Biddeford City Theater” references the physical building owned by the city. “City Theater Associates” (CTA) refers to the independent nonprofit registered and operating out of these facilities. This paper seeks to outline and analyze various aspects of the CTA’s operations, beginning with the foundation of the City Theater Associates to lay the scene.
Founded in 1860, this memorable landmark has spent its days as an opera house, movie theater, and showcase for external programs of performing arts. Although the building has stood on the same plot of land since the 1860s, the actual structure burned to the ground in 1894. When it was reopened in the 1930s, the building was furnished for the times as a movie theater. Renamed the “City Theater” in 1955, two decades would pass before the City Theaters Associates would become a newly incorporated nonprofit. In 1977, under a new agent, the City Theater Associates began taking strides to become the nonprofit known today. City Theater Associates is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, which is a federal status that allows donors to receive a tax deduction.
The 501 status was first created as a way to incentivize people to donate to non-profits and, under the United States tax revenue code, a 501(c) or 501(c)3 businesses could file as a tax-exempt entity. Prior to 1954, the only entities which were tax exempt were religious organizations. In order to become an incorporated nonprofit, City Theater Associates had to first create an artificial entity with the state of Maine. Next, the CTA had to check that the name chosen to operate under was unique to all others and previously unregistered. Once approved, the founding group paid an application fee, created a mission statement, registered an agent to represent a physical mailing address, and applied for a federal government letter of recognition. Within this process, for any nonprofit, one of the most important steps is the creation of a mission statement.
A mission statement is meant to identify who a group is, what they intend to do, and how they intend to do it. According to Peter Drucker, along with accomplishing these tasks, a mission statement should be concise, clear, and inspire action. Over the years City Theater Associates’ mission has evolved based on the type of artistic performance hosted in the theater. Today, their mission is to “foster an appreciation for the performing arts by using creative avenues to increase community involvement.” As an operational statement, the theater’s mission inspires non-linear action towards the good of its cause, establishing a non-monetary, mission first foundation. While their mission statement is tidy, the dedication towards mission first operations depends largely on the minds of the fluctuating group in charge.
Tasked with protecting the theater’s mission exists the board of directors. While the number of board members have been as low as four in 2004, they also maintained their goal of twelve seats before. Currently, due to recent retirement, nine board members remain and President Mark Nahorney says that he hopes to find three more members again soon. Exerting their voting power, the board executes top-down management, dictating major decisions down to the managerial staff and volunteers for implementation. For a long time, board members doubled as staff and volunteers, as in 2004 the organization wasn’t financially stable enough to hire a staff. Now they have one part-time staff member, Linda Sturdivant, who acts as the artistic director. As part of the management staff, Linda works closely with the board of directors and is in charge of making day to day decisions based around production operations. Mark Nahorney says that the board, staff, and volunteers are a tight knit group and that “one would never make a major decision without consulting with the other”. From an analytical standpoint though, this is a very narrow view point from the president, as how can the board truly be consulting all others on decisions when the volunteers who comprise ninety-four percent of the work force have no power or outlet for creative input on management decisions? When asked if volunteers have any voting power, a quick and curt “no” escaped, closing down further remarks. While volunteers may always go talk to the board with ideas, from an etic perspective there is no formalized structure for volunteer brainstorming, feedback, or expression.
Perhaps these outlets have not been flushed out though because of the “double lives” board members lead. In organizations that operate under top-down management, it can be difficult to keep board members in touch with the people they serve and the mission they’re meant to protect. At the theater, board members are connected to the mission and audience through constant ground level involvement, as each member doubles as a volunteer in various aspects of their seasonal programming. These seasonal programs are a key aspect of the organization’s existence and play into the nonprofit’s essential nature.
The essential nature of City Theater Associates is as an entrepreneurial donative organization, which sells goods and services while receiving money via gifts from donors. Currently, goods and services refer to the concessions they sell during shows and the tickets to attend seasonal performances. As a donative based group, the funds raised are redistributed towards the advancement of the theater’s mission.
Even though nonprofit organizations aren’t founded on a profit first basis, without adequate funding a nonprofit cannot complete programming to service their mission. In 2015, the City Theater Associates made $250,616 in revenue and spent $203,542 on annual expenses. Their greatest funding comes from program service revenue, which is the annual income from show related goods and services, such as ticket sales and concessions, attributing for $161,290. Pushing for more community performances with longer show dates, the CTA has expanded the total time for its most lucrative fundraising opportunities to be available to the community. Increasing the total time while increasing production costs was a worthwhile investment for the accrued revenue. They’ve also worked to better understand what shows their audience values in order to create better outreach and return on investment of production. Unrelated to production, other funds come from government grants, small donors, rental fees from other groups, such as the UNE Players, and fundraising events.
Drawing away from the City Theater Associates’ revenue, the top 2015 expenses were production costs, depreciation/depletion/amortization, and employee compensation. Approximately 35% of expenses were comprised of operating expenses, which can be one indicator of decent financial management, considering it’s less than half of their total expense. On a financial basis, City Theater Associates qualify as a publically supported organization, as 87.38% of their revenues come from public support. To qualify for this status, the organization’s public support needs to be greater than 33 1/3% of the total support received. This public support can be from government entities, the general public, or other publically supported groups. In this case, the biggest contribution comes from government entities, which isn’t surprising as they work so closely in their cross-sector engagement with the City of Biddeford. Playing into their costs and expenses, the CTA works with the city government by renting space from them, paying daily maintenance fees, and responding as a team to solve facility issues.
While interviewing President Mark Nahorney, his management approach to nonprofits came across largely based off of creating financial success. Perhaps being one of the four board members to bring City Theater Associates back from the brink of collapse in 2004, Mark has a deeper connection to and understanding that without funding, operations will fail. He said that “back then, we didn’t have to do development. At the end of the day, as long as we had five hundred fannies in those seats, that’s all that mattered.” While Mark’s worries for keeping the organization afloat are understandable, many times throughout the interview dismissed the power and importance of the theater’s mission. This is a concern when assessing the management of a nonprofit, since they are supposed to operate as a mission first entity. When I asked if Mark had any inclination on what drove people to come to various programs, I hoped for some acknowledgement that their audience recognizes their formal mission, a glimpse into how management responds audience contribution. At first, I was disappointed when he responded, “People come out here because they see success, not because of our mission.” I realize though this response isn’t necessarily a reflection of poor management, as many individuals in an audience may never be aware of the mission of an organization they support, unless specifically seeking the information. Mark says that CTA’s mission is fulfilled by the very existence of the City Theater, for without the theater, there is no mission. This naive perspective may stem from the lack of formal business or nonprofit management training that Nahorney had prior to his time at the CTA. He describes his training as more of a “life training”, since he has enjoyed leading and acting his most of his life.
Circling back to the idea of success, upon further reflection, Mark’s ideas of success may align with Drucker’s thoughts on success. Drucker says that the difference between successful people unsuccessful people is the amount of joy that they pursue through their lives. Mark’s use of the term “success” was originally interpreted as financial and technical, but in reality could be something quite different. What attendees experience in a performance is the final product of the joy that four hundred volunteers have pursued. In turn, that success of each production that draws the community back to another show is the direct result of pursued joy. Although volunteers are not involved in any managerial decisions, they are still the drivers of this non-profit, transforming objections into action and engaging the community to further foster an appreciation for the arts. With 450 registered volunteers filling roles as actors, stage crew, technical staff, house management, and more, a volunteer becomes the physical manifestation of an organization’s mission and the engine powering success within the nonprofit realm.
With plenty of room for improvement, the leadership of this organization strives to reorient itself with its mission statement in the coming years. Mark Nahorney defines himself as a teacher in his capacity of president, as he tries to demonstrate and articulate the way that things are supposed to be. As a man who likes to be hands on in every project and “doing it himself”, perhaps though he isn’t the best choice to be teaching future nonprofit managers. A successful nonprofit should be able to operate regardless the man in charge, and should he step back or retire, the entity should be able to continue onward without missing a beat. Although supported by eight other board members and another staff member, Mark wraps a large percentage of the theater affairs around his ability to complete the work himself. Hopefully, in the coming year when Mark retires from his duties, the rest of the theater will be adequately prepared to shoulder the weight. A large portion of the theater’s long term success will play off of the City Theater Associates’ ability to handle its programming and plan strategically for the future, not off of one man, but as an organized entity.
Historically, the City Theater has hosted opera, movies, and other live performing arts as various programs to execute the “what” of their operations. Initial programming dealt a lot more with bringing in outside groups and performers to fill the space. Famous singers Eva Gray, Edwin Booth, and Joseph Jefferson all performed in the theater during its formative opera days. While President Nahorney didn’t know much off the top of his head about the City Theater operations prior to his time, he said that the upstairs offices are filled with cabinets that hold records back to the 1800s.
Nowadays, the theater focuses on producing their own shows supported by volunteers, board, and staff. In a single year, City Theater Associates produce six performances engaging all age groups during production. Their key programming seasons are summer, when they see the widest distribution of audience members, and winter, for the performance of their Christmas show. While this nonprofit currently focuses on theatrical performances to propel the “what” of their mission, part of their five-year plan is to bring cinema back to into the space.
In order to bring the cinema back into the facilities, the City Theater Associates needed to work these ideas into their five-year plan. Thinking along Peter Drucker’s guidelines, to be effective in strategic planning and tackle their mission, the board of directors had four key criteria that needed evaluation. First, a nonprofit must define the current state of affairs based off of what they’ve done and are doing right now. Unfortunately, the City Theater Associates forgot to complete this assessment, which meant that their five-year plan starting point didn’t align with where they stood at the time. In the second and third steps though, they did a great job defining where they want the theater to go in the coming years, and set attainable goals. Their measurable goals are articulated through ticket sales, finances, and attendee travel “radius” as quantitative measures. Qualitatively, Mark hopes to be at the point where people wonder what is happening in Biddeford before heading north to Portland. One of the biggest goals for future strategies is expanding the CTA audience. For their last big summer production, 25% of their audience came from out of state, and their biggest town draw was Saco and Biddeford. This expanding audience is reached through social media, newspapers, magazines, their website, and plastering the town with posters and banners.
City Theater Associates are constantly evaluating their marketing strategy to be sure that all of these great programs are reaching their audience. Part of their marketing is even outsourced to Canada because the City Theater Associates recognized they don’t have the human resources to create some of their promotional materials, and it makes more financial sense to capitalize on other’s resource strengths. The main advertising avenues that the CTA utilizes are newspapers, posters, magazines, social media, and their website. The City Theater Associates are being careful to take the time to understand the importance of reaching their audience and understanding their market.
The City Theater Associates have been helping drive economic revenue and local business in Biddeford for the past decade, and hope to continue doing so as the city rises. Although hope is not a plan, it’s a good directional for strategic planning. The Biddeford City Theater has a special tie to the town, for like the town, it too has risen and fallen, only to rise again. While the City Theater Associates operate out of rented facilities, they’ve been presented with a unique cross-sectorial arrangement. The history of the building and its architecture brings audience members back time and time again. A second step in the right direction was taken when the CTA was established with a clear, concise, and operational mission statement. This kind of mission statement leaves plenty of room for well thought-out strategic planning and innovative ideas.
Unfortunately, with two steps in the right direction, City Theater Associates aren’t operating at their peak efficiency. The board of directors head the management of most the CTA’s affairs, through top down management, which may become more problematic in the future as they continue to grow. Hopefully, as their strategic plans are detailed and finally in a current state of affairs to be implemented, they can look to redirect management flow and allow for a bottom up approach. Success isn’t cheap, and while the CTA is supposed to be a mission first entity, it seems that its leadership shies away from the mission towards monetary focuses for survival. On the other hand, though, this financial struggle and focus is what pushed the board to buckle down and create a plan so that they could get back to their mission once stable. Although occasionally flawed in approach, everything President Nahorney does is for the continuation of the theater and the next generation of board members, staff, and volunteers. Now that they’re in a stable financial situation, they’ve been looking at what programs the community enjoys, and what programs would push the envelopes for growth. Filling a void left by the government in the arts community, the arts are a representation of a community’s values, and in order to foster an appreciation, there must first be a spark of conversation. The City Theater Associates will continue to push not only their own limits, but the limits of their audience to catalyze that spark. As Peter Drucker says, “the best way to predict the future is to create it”; the City Theater Associates may not be the most historically efficient nonprofit, but their motivation to rise with the city, driven by their planning, shall lead them to create a mission driven future of which to be proud.
Works Referenced:
Drucker, Peter. Managing the non-Profit organization. Routledge, 2016.
Farris, Bailey. “City Theater President Mark Nahorney.” 28 Nov. 2017.
Shakespeare, William. “As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII [All the world’s a stage].” Poets.org,
Academy of American Poets, 16 June 2016, www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/you-it-act-ii-scene-vii-all-worlds-stage.
