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Developer Bryan Bowers, of property owner Schines Theater LLC, did not respond to a request for comment by ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» on the South Street theater's rehabilitation.

Jennifer Haines, director of Auburn's Office of Planning and Economic Development, said the city has not received any recent updates on the Schine from Bowers.

"We would be very interested in the owner appearing for an update to City Council," she told ÈËÊÞÐÔ½», repeating what she said about the project in September.

Bowers last appeared at City Council in June 2022, when he said the $6 million project had encountered financing problems but reiterated his commitment to bringing back the Schine as an event and entertainment venue. He added that he hoped to reopen the theater by Sept. 15, 2023, the 85th anniversary of its opening in 1938. He then volunteered to come back to City Council that fall.

"I think there's going to be a lot of progress by that point and we hope to share a lot more information," he said.

However, the most visible changes at the art deco theater since then have been the replacement of broken windows with plywood in the ticket booth and one of the front doors.Ìý

In October, The Daily Sentinel in Rome similar inactivity by Bowers at several historic properties in Utica he purchased over the last decade. The city's code enforcement office issued him tickets to appear in court to address code violations at the properties, and he pleaded not guilty. The developer has been in a years-long eminent domain case in Utica as well.

In the absence of any news on the Schine, ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» will attempt to answer a frequently asked question about the 26-year project: How much money has been spent on it? 

An exact number is hard to calculate due to the unavailability of complete financial records. The project has been supported mostly by state and federal grant funds, some awarded to the Schine's owners from 1998 to 2018, the Cayuga County Arts Council, and some to the city. But it has also been supported, albeit less directly, by contributions from the public and other sources of income.Ìý

Still, according to ÈËÊÞÐÔ½»'s archives and the arts council's tax filings, the number is about $1.7 million.

The biggest single piece of that sum is $800,000 in Community Development Block Grant funds from the city to remediate the theater's asbestos and other hazardous materials in 2017 and 2018. The work coincided with the sale of the theater from the arts council to Schines Theater LLC, whose registered address is the East Syracuse office of Bowers' firm, Bowers Development.Ìý

What that sum does not include is the $1.2 million grant awarded to the rehabilitation project through the Central New York Regional Economic Development Council in 2017, nor the $1 million Restore New York grant awarded to the city of Auburn on the Schine's behalf in 2018. Both are reimbursement grants, so their money will not be received until the sums have been spent.

Empire State Development, which administers the grants, confirmed to ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» this month that neither grant has been reimbursed, but that the Schine project remains eligible for both.Ìý

Three of the bigger grants awarded to the project, and reimbursed, were administered through the New York State Historic Preservation Office: $88,000 in 1995, $288,255 in 1998 and $117,500 in 2002. The grants supported the acquisition of the Schine from its previous owners, its stabilization, a new roof, structural support and restoration of its façade and lobby, including its front doors.Ìý

The office told ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» that the three grants were combined into one contract for $493,755, which was reimbursed in 2013. As a condition of the grants, the office holds a preservation covenant on the Schine, and therefore must approve any changes to it, until July 25, 2036. The office said the only work it has approved since 2017 was attaching a banner to the theater in 2021.

Another $387,275 was awarded to the project in the 2000s through two Economic Development Initiative grants to the city from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, according to ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» archives. The funds supported improvements to the theater's electrical system and sump pumps for its flooded basement, as well as utilities and other operational expenses.

Over the years, the Schine rehabilitation project has also received many smaller grants that, in turn, supported smaller work.

Technical Assistance Grants from the Preservation League of New York of $1,500 in 1993 and $3,000 in 2013 went toward hiring Syracuse architects Crawford & Stearns to complete a study and a building condition survey, respectively. Through the city, a portion of a $50,000 New York State Urban Development Corporation grant was used for a 1993 study of the feasibility of restoring the theater by Dan Coffey & Associates of Chicago. A portion of another $50,000 grant to Auburn from the Environmental Protection Agency's Brownfield Program in 2013 funded a site contamination study.Ìý

Additional grants of $4,000 from Cayuga County are listed in the arts council's 2010 and 2011 filings with the New York State Charities Bureau. Further information about the grants was not listed.

That comes to a total of about $900,000 in grants awarded to the Schine project during the arts council's ownership, and $1.7 million overall.

How that $900,000 compares to what the arts council reported in its tax filings is, like the number itself, hard to calculate.Ìý

The Charities Bureau filings, which require less accounting than tax returns, are the only arts council financial records available for 2010 through 2015. The council's returns for those years, as well as 2000 and earlier, were not available from the IRS due to its records retention policy. Through , ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» was able to review the council's returns for 2001 to 2009 and 2016 to 2018.

In those tax returns, the arts council reported that it received $673,628 in grants from 2001 to 2007. Grants were then included among "contributions, gifts, grants and similar amounts" from 2008 to 2009 and 2016 to 2018, adding up to $39,976. With the $8,000 in county grants in 2010 and 2011, then, the council reported a total of $721,604 in grants from 2001 to 2018.

But the presence of contributions, gifts and "similar amounts" in that number, as well as the absence of returns from 2000 and earlier, makes comparing it to ÈËÊÞÐÔ½»'s number of about $900,000 all but impossible. The grant amounts in the arts council's tax filings don't appear to match up, either — namely, the council's 2013 filing does not list a $493,755 reimbursement from the state.Ìý

To go along with that $39,976, the arts council reported public support of $73,775 from 2001 to 2007 and, in the Charities Bureau filings, $6,870 from 2010 to 2015.

The arts council's other major source of income while it owned the Schine was revenue from programs and special events, which totaled $88,646 from 2001 to 2018.

Altogether, the arts council reported $890,895 in grants, support, and program and special event income from 2001 to 2018. But while the grants went directly to the Schine, the other income also went toward the council's operations, namely the organization of those programs and events. At the end of 2018, the council reported in that year's tax return a fund balance deficit of $4,785.

The $15,000 that Schines Theater LLC paid the arts council for the theater went toward that debt, said Dia Carabajal, a longtime council board member. She told ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» the board has continued to meet as needed to talk about ways to serve the council's mission, but the council has not "engaged in any projects as of late." The council briefly helped the LLC with public relations as well.

In calculating how much money has been spent on the Schine's rehabilitation, there is one more number that should perhaps be considered: The amount of taxes that the council, as a nonprofit, was exempt from paying on the property for 19 years. Based on data provided by the city of Auburn, and at a conservative rate of $35 per $1,000 of assessed value, that number is $98,434.

Auburn Treasurer Robert Gauthier told ÈËÊÞÐÔ½» this week that Schines Theater LLC made its last tax payment in January 2022, for $9,485.30, and currently owes $19,208.01.