{"id":12705,"date":"2014-11-07T10:07:41","date_gmt":"2014-11-07T16:07:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bmovienation.com\/?p=12705"},"modified":"2014-11-07T10:07:41","modified_gmt":"2014-11-07T16:07:41","slug":"the-crest-closes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.bmovienation.com\/?p=12705","title":{"rendered":"The Crest Closes"},"content":{"rendered":"

The operators of Sacramento\u2019s Crest Theatre<\/strong>, including Sid Garcia-Heberger<\/strong>, said Monday that they have reached a negotiations impasse with their landlord and will end their management of the landmark building at 1013 K St. on Oct. 31.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe actually had agreed to a 25 percent increase in our lease amount, but there were some sticking points,\u201d Garcia-Heberger said. \u201cI think the biggest were some capital improvements<\/a> requirements that we just felt that we couldn\u2019t be 100 percent responsible for.\u201d<\/p>\n

Garcia-Heberger runs the Crest with three partners \u2013 her husband, Bill Heberger<\/strong>, Andy Field <\/strong>and Gary Schroeder<\/strong> \u2013 through their company CSLM Inc.<\/strong> Since 1986, their lease had obligated them to cover the cost of the capital improvements at the historic building, Garcia-Heberger said, but she and her partners didn\u2019t think they could continue to completely bear that responsibility along with the increase in rent.<\/p>\n

Garcia-Heberger, whose name has become synonymous with the Crest, is not booking events beyond October. That\u2019s when her landlord, Robert Emerick<\/strong>, a fifth-generation Sacramentan and an accomplished wastewater treatment engineer, takes the reins. He acquired the Crest for about $2.8 million in 2011, saying he wanted to preserve a signature regional asset.<\/p>\n

What Garcia-Heberger describes as a 25 percent increase of their $6,000-a-month lease, Emerick said, he sees as a 25 percent reduction from $10,000. Garcia-Heberger and her partners requested that he lower their rent because they had closed the movie screening rooms on the lower level and revenue had declined, Emerick said. Based on revenue figures he was quoted, he agreed to drop the rent from $10,000 to $6,000 until he could have an audit done.<\/p>\n

When the audit showed that the revenue was higher than CSLM stated, Emerick said, he increased the rent to $7,500.<\/p>\n

As for infrastructure costs, Emerick said: \u201cThey were paying 40 cents per square foot. Clearly, it\u2019s well under half of market rent, and the reason it was so low was they needed to undertake certain improvements. \u2026 There\u2019s plumbing in the theaters that\u2019s 100 years old, and if a pipe were to break, we would be washing out the theater, and that would render it unusable.\u201d<\/p>\n

And, there\u2019s more, he said: The Crest\u2019s air-conditioning system must be replaced, at a cost of $100,000, because the state is banning the refrigerant it uses by 2020. And, if the Crest is ever to show movies again in its historic theater, it will need to upgrade the projection equipment at a cost of $100,000 to $150,000.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe industry moved from film projectors