CENTERVILLE — The Majestic Theater:

This is the most exciting project for many in the community. I’ve never been more excited about a project than I am this one. With the help and cooperation of Phil Radosevich and Nina Finch, Morgan Cline acquired the Majestic Theater and at the same time purchased the old Napa building on State Street.

The most asked question is, “What are you going to do with it?”  We plan to restore and operate it as though it was a non-profit, making it available for numerous uses as economically as possible allowing for continued operations in perpetuity. We are looking for all the pictures we can get our hands on and all the volunteer support we can recruit to finish and operate the project. We are desperate for pictures and stories about the Majestic, including memories about how the building and façade were laid out.

We do plan on maintaining private control to assure success but have no plans to take any money or profit out of the project.  Morgan’s goal is to reinvest all income and maximize any volunteer efforts or donated funds or assets. We are planning a special memorial picture wall to memorialize all efforts and gifts.

Currently we are expecting a new roof to go on the first week of September and tuck-pointers are working in earnest.

Ultimately The Majestic Theater will prove a wonderful community and tourism entertainment venue. We will be making every effort to make it available and enjoyable. Let us know if you have any interest in helping in any way!

 

The State Street  Building:

This is the building immediately east of the Continental Mews apartments (The Continental Annex). The plan here is rather simple too. Repair and restore the building making the back section into protected vehicle storage for those living at The Continental as space and availability allow. We will restore the front area into a retail space or business office. Restorations will include substantial façade work.

 

Porter Hall:

Porter Hall is the property directly across the street from A Catered Affair at the Beck Mansion. On the National Registry, Porter Hall is an incredible home. Morgan captured it from foreclosure and has done a fantastic job restoring the property. The home is listed for sale by Hometown Realty at $249,000.

The goal was to save this historic property and restore it to a substantial degree making it easier for a new buyer to own and manage having the major fears and hurdles of historic ownership taken care of. We completely replaced heating and air conditioning with two new forced air systems splitting the home into two zones for more economical operation. We replaced a substantial amount of plumbing and wiring in addition to tastefully enclosing the south porch. It is a stunning house calling for a new owner that is worthy of its grand stature.  Again, the goal was to save the property and make it possible for a new owner to take it over having many of the usual obstacles of  buying and restoring an older home removed.

 

The American Legion Building:

Renovation is almost complete. The building is now made up of three apartments and one retail/office space at street level. The entire building should be complete and available for rent by the end of September.

A number of people have asked about the glass blocks originally located in the front of the building. We have indeed saved those and are formulating plans to incorporate them near the Veteran’s Affairs office which is located in the lower level of The Continental at St. Joseph’s.

 

The Continental:

A few months ago we started the renovation of our apartments at The Continental turning some into what we call “Executive Suites.” Two units are finished with two more close behind. To date they have met with rave reviews and stellar success. They are truly incredible.  Thanks go out to a number of people including Connie Stater, Julie Mihalovich and Deb Robinson to name a few for their decorating prowess that took them from “Nice!” to “Wow!” They are wonderful one bedroom units. More information is available at www.thecontinental.info.

Also we will soon be welcoming Pat Parks as the new manager of The Continental. Pat comes to us from the Tarpon Springs area of Florida and has a significant history of success in providing a motivated level of “Casual Elegance” which she promises to bring to The Continental. Pat’s experience is successfully developing and managing combined boutique hotel and restaurant establishments on the east coast with a specialty in seafood. Pat’s experience as a chef provides an additional bonus to The Continental. She expects to hit the ground running on Monday. Please welcome her to the community.

 

Bradley Hall:

Bradley Hall is also seeing its share of changes. We regretfully share that Lisa Carter has chosen to change careers. Lisa plans to stay involved for some time and to help us transition to new leadership.

We are happy to announce at the same time the hiring of a new manager, Garry Zentz. Garry comes to us from a management position at Stein Mart and with an even longer history as a district manager with TG&Y. Some might remember that the national TG&Y chain from years past.

 

The Continental Care Center at Seymour:

No one enjoys thinking about a skilled nursing and rehab community except for me and the staff at CCS. We continue to make great strides to improve the quality of care and safety there. The new soffits, gutter and columns are done on the front of the building. Currently we are working on a $100,000 standby generator replacement that will be large enough to completely power 100 percent of our current needs indefinitely in the case of a power failure. Part of our goal is to be a community support center in times of outage. After the generator project we will turn our sights inward to further improve the rooms, nurses center, and other key function areas.

Many of our residents and clients are from Centerville, Corydon and the surrounding area. We know we have to go far beyond our peers and provide care and service that exceeds them by a great deal to motivate people to tolerate the additional 10 to 20 minute drive. It may not seem like much but it is a significant factor in choosing a nursing or rehabilitation community. I’m proud to share that our response times continue to average below five minutes. This is far below what I understand to be the industry average. We still have a number of things we can do to improve the aesthetics of the community but no one can touch our high level of quality care and the great people that work for us there. We still need to do all we can to get the word out that Seymour is worth the drive to help assure those we love get great care and service.

 

New Jewelry Store:

If all goes as planned Centerville will have a new jewelry store on the west side of the square by Oct. 1. We are thrilled to welcome Paul and Barbara Schnoor to Centerville. Paul and Barbara also have stores in Chariton and Iowa Falls. Thanks to Pat McAfee for her work to recruit Schnoor’s to Centerville and to Morgan Cline for his charitable and flexible spirit doing what it took to make the rental offer so good they took it. We split the old Spurgeon’s building space (directly north of Maytag) into two smaller and separate retail spaces.

 

Commercial Resources, Inc.:

CRI continues to grow providing accounting, bookkeeping, HR, management, consulting and Web management and marketing services to small businesses and organizations. If we stay on track we will double in size by the end of 2010 and plan to double again in 2011. Thanks to everyone who has supported us whether as clients or by referring business to us. Nothing is more thrilling than helping entrepreneurs, non-profits, government and pseudo-governmental organizations operate efficiently. Kudos to Rachel Hoffman, Julie Franklin, Dan Montgomery and Christy Brooks for making huge growth look easy. CRI specializes in working with organizations of between five and 50 employees.

 

Mystic Publishing, Inc. aka Freddie the Frog:

Most  of you receiving this know of her work with children’s music education based on the fact that children learning music makes them smarter. Freddie the Frog has become “America’s Music Mascot.”  Sharon was recently offered and accepted a distribution and marketing contract with the world’s largest music publisher. She is in the midst of book five, collaborating with some great people, and continues to receive more requests to speak across the country.  More on this later.