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Posted: 12:05 a.m. Sunday, July 21, 2013
Auditioning for the Playhouse
The National Arts Institute has made public its proposal to re-open the island’s landmark theater but the fledgling group has disclosed little about its background.
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Auditioning for the Playhouse photo
Chris Salata
National Arts Institute staff and supporters attend a March Town Council meeting after announcing they have signed a letter of intent to lease the Royal Poinciana Playhouse. From left: Karen Poindexter, executive producer; Renee Morrison, Palm Beach resident and arts trustee; Kenneth Ohrstrom, Palm Beach resident, chairman and lead donor, and Pamela Stark Thomas, executive director.
Director Stark Thomas has been fundraiser, in trouble with law
Poindexter’s theater history has hits, misses
By Jan Sjostrom
Daily News Arts Editor
When Sterling Palm Beach revealed in March that it was negotiating with the National Arts Institute on a lease that could reopen the Royal Poinciana Playhouse, many heaved a sigh of relief, even though few knew anything about the group.
For years, the fate of the 878-seat landmarked theater, which has been dark since 2004, has been a contested issue. Sterling, the developer that controls the Royal Poinciana Plaza, has been under pressure from the public and Town Council to reopen the Playhouse.
The developer and others have argued that it’s not economically viable. Mark Schwartz, whose producing credits include Menopause: The Musical, Divorce Party: The Musical and the Broadway show My One and Only, was consulted a few years ago by a group that was considering re-opening the Playhouse. He regards the theater as a white elephant – too big to be profitable as a regional theater or an off-Broadway touring house and too small for touring Broadway shows, a niche already adequately filled by the Kravis Center, he said.
Proponents of the Playhouse’s revival say that a 1979 property use agreement between the town and the plaza owners requires the owners to ensure that the theater remains operational.
Sterling and the National Arts Institute are discussing a 22-year lease with a 20-year option. The National Arts Institute has been building its case for a $30 million fundraising campaign to renovate and build out the theater.
But what is the National Arts Institute and who are its founders?
The board consists of founding chairman Kenneth Ohrstrom and trustee Renee Morrison of Palm Beach, Executive Director Pamela Stark Thomas, and Producing Artistic Director Karen Poindexter. Until recently, Elaine Blake also served on the board. She resigned to attend to family matters, she said.
The group has disclosed little about itself during its public statements at Town Council meetings, and its website is short on specifics.
Ohrstrom heads a family-owned investment firm. Morrison is the wife of art collector Carlos Morrison. According to state records, her philanthropic interests include Save a Pet Florida and combating underage slavery and prostitution. Ohrstrom and Morrison did not respond to requests for interviews.
Stark Thomas and Poindexter, the group’s spokeswomen, said they were busy negotiating the Playhouse lease. In a July 11 email to the Palm Beach Daily News, they expanded on their backgrounds. But they declined to be interviewed about their qualifications to run the Playhouse until after July 26. “NAI finds no room, no necessity, nor any desire to invest efforts and resources on negative attempts to belittle or demean when such are better used in doing good,” they said.
Sterling Palm Beach declined to discuss its reasons for considering the group a qualified tenant for the Playhouse or whether it has researched the National Arts Institute’s background.
Town Council President David Rosow mediated the discussions that led to Sterling Palm Beach and the National Arts Institute signing a letter of intent in March. When asked whether he investigated the National Arts Institute’s background, Rosow said, “I did not do any research into any of them. Furthermore, I don’t think that’s my job. It’s up to the landlord to determine whether the people they’re negotiating with have credibility.”
The National Arts Institute’s website says the nonprofit group’s purpose is to create career-based programs for youth in film and the performing arts.
The group started life in October 2008 as the G-Star Arts and Education Foundation. The incorporation documents filed with the state list G-Star school founder Greg Hauptner, Anthony Marino, Stark Thomas, Poindexter and Ohrstrom as trustees. The foundation’s primary mission was to raise money for the The G-Star School of the Arts for Film, Animation and Performing Arts in Palm Springs, the school’s former board members said.
“I remember when Stark Thomas came on,” former G-Star school board member Al Mathers said. “There was a lot of hope she would raise a lot of money.”
From 2009 to 2011, federal tax documents show the foundation raised nearly $625,000 but gave the school only $100,000. Stark Thomas and Poindexter were paid a total of nearly $211,000, more than one-third of the amount the foundation raised. Administrative and fundraising expenses accounted for about 31 percent of the operating budget in 2009, 35 percent in 2010 and 55 percent in 2011, the last year for which tax documents were available.
According to tax filings, the foundation’s board had just five members during that period: Stark Thomas, Poindexter, Morrison, Ohrstrom and Hauptner, who was replaced by Blake in 2011. Poindexter and Stark Thomas also served on the G-Star school’s board.
Paying nonprofit board members as staff is “generally not done” and would be “a red flag,” said Sandra Miniutti, a spokeswoman at Charity Navigator, the country’s largest independent charity evaluator. Spending too much on fundraising and administration is another red flag. Of the 6,500 nonprofit organizations Charity Navigator rates, “the vast majority spend 75 percent of their annual expenditures on programs,” she said.
Stark Thomas said that in addition to raising money, she assisted the school in other ways, such as attracting clients to the sound stage and negotiating free painting and air conditioning services. Poindexter said her work for G-Star included proposing film, festival and theater projects, and arranging for Welcome Back, Kotter star Ron Palillo to teach there.
The foundation changed its name to National Arts Institute in 2011. The group ended 2011 with nearly $103,000 in cash and investments.
The name change came about when the foundation “decided to expand its charitable focus,” Poindexter said. As the National Arts Institute, the group “continued support to G-Star School until Mr. Hauptner formed a new foundation,” she said. Hauptner filed documents with the state creating a new support group, the G-Star School Foundation, in April 2012.
Former G-Star school board member Richard Tripp said he was aware of a few modest donations to the foundation, but he isn’t sure how much money was raised, what was donated to the school or how the money was used.
Another board member said an $86,000 grant from the foundation in 2009 financed the school’s movie It’s a Dog Gone Tale: Destiny’s Stand. The film, in which Gertrude Maxwell played an animal-loving philanthropist, was never released.
Blake, who was the G-Star school board chairwoman at the time, said she doesn’t recall how much money the foundation gave the school because the information Hauptner shared often was fragmentary. “Mr. Hauptner directed everything,” she said. “That was the biggest problem the board had.”
Five of the G-Star school’s six board board members resigned between 2009 and 2010, according to reports filed with the state Division of Corporations. Four said they left because of other obligations and one said he resigned when his daughter graduated from the school.
For his part, Hauptner accused Stark Thomas and Poindexter of taking over the foundation without his knowledge.
In a December 2011 Palm Springs police report, Hauptner said they removed him from the board and changed the name of the foundation without informing him or holding a board meeting. He accused Stark Thomas of diverting the school’s and his personal mail to Stark Thomas’ post office box in Palm Beach. He also said Poindexter attempted to withdraw $65,000 from the foundation’s bank account using an improper letter that said he had been removed as the board’s treasurer and they controlled the funds. Stark Thomas and Ohrstrom filed papers with the state in July 2011 removing Hauptner from the board and changing the foundation’s name to National Arts Institute.
In January 2012, Hauptner told the police that he was negotiating a settlement with Stark Thomas and Poindexter. Later that month, Hauptner left a phone message saying the dispute had been resolved. Hauptner declined to comment on the dispute.
Former G-Star school board member Analisa Whiting said other board members were trying to oust Hauptner.
CONT
Mr Tripp after G-Star went on to become Dean of Student Life at Oxbridge academy !Since becoming the National Arts Institute, the group’s activities have included organizing holiday toy drives and delivering a thank-you lunch to Oxbridge Academy’s staff.