Rising From The Ashes

Wow! I just reread my post from February 14th. The road ahead looked a whole lot prettier than it turned out to be. Bellevue Creative Arts Community subsequently had a near-death experience!

First of all: the Bylaws and Articles of Incorporation. I wrote them from a template, with many questions to put to the Board about how we wanted to be structured and how we wanted to get things done. I know from long experience that the best first step is to go ahead and write them, then make changes from there. So I did. I brought several copies to the next meeting, each with blanks to fill in and all areas of concern highlighted. I was prepared for a meaty session of discussion of everything I had questions about and anything else the others might find to hash out. But no! The writers of the spiffy musical Once Upon A Tree were there with copies of 2/3 of their script. They and President Mary were hell-bent to do a read-through of it. So there was no discussion of Bylaws that evening. I gave a copy to President Mary. I feel certain that she never read them - to this day!. Mary said that she would be happy to go over everything with me sometime during the week. So we communicated via Messenger and found a chunk of time when we could do it by phone. I called her at the appointed hour. It turned out that she was in her car somewhere and it was pouring rain. "So, looking at the second page of the Bylaws..." "! don't have them with me," she said. So we limped through the session, me reading the questionable portions out loud and suggesting possibilities. It mostly went pretty smoothly, considering. We didn't have time for the Articles. I didn't have the heart for it anyway, and most of those questions were the same issues as in the Bylaws. I made the changes, printed several copies, and got them signed by all Board members present at the next meeting. I wasn't happy with the Bylaws - to this day. But we needed to get them signed so that we could move forward with the IRS. We could change them later.

And then! And Then!! Mirabelle, who was working diligently toward submitting our 501(c)(3) paperwork, noticed that Mary had signed a different last name than I had printed on the page. Oh, the name I used, the name I knew her by, was her maiden name, her pen name. She had, of course, signed her legal name. So, I made that correction, printed more copies, and gave them to Mary to take around to get signed again. March 19th was when the last signature was obtained. May 9th BCAC became 501(c)(3).

Then there was the May 19th Bellevue  Picnic. I did my research. A booth at the picnic would cost $500.00. We could have a cool booth with scenic elements from Once Upon A Tree. We wanted to perform a song or two from our spiffy musical on the stage. I wanted to put together a flash mob. Mary wanted to generate flyers to pass out to the crowds. It was all very exciting. I let the Chamber of Commerce know what we were thinking about, and they were excited too. I needed to let them know ASAP if we were using the stage so they could assign us a slot. I issued a survey to the membership asking which of these projects they would like to be involved in. Eight people wanted to pass out flyers, and fifteen wanted to do the flash mob. We asked the writing team for a full script so that we could hold auditions and cast the June show and be ready to stage a song or two at the Picnic. It was then that I learned that the script was not finished yet, but they would finish it by the end of March. Auditions were tentatively scheduled for the first weekend in April. From that moment on, the whole thing went south. The script wasn't going to be finished in time. I let the Chamber know not to expect us. The fundraising wasn't going well. We couldn't reserve a booth.  We called rehearsals for a flash mob. Seven rehearsals advertised, a grand total of three people other than Mary and me showed up (two at one rehearsal and one at another.) Mirabelle put together the flyers, and we told everyone where to pick them up on their way to the Picnic. NOBODY showed up. Mirabelle passed out some and Mary passed out some. I didn't even go. By then I was sick to my stomach about the whole BCAC project.

There were those among the Facebook group members who told us that there was much more interest in the visual arts than in theatre. Arleen proposed a meeting at her place for interested visual artists to brainstorm about how to get that action going. Arleen was there. Mirabelle was there. Cheryl was there for support - she wants to support BCAC any way she can - and Glen was there, a new face to the project. Nobody else. Not even Mary or me.

We called a regrouping meeting. Nobody showed up other than the three of us. Still we kept working. We found a carrier who issued liability policies for nonprofits, because we were required to have insurance for a million dollars in order to rent any venue for a show. $650.00 per year was the best rate we found. Mary offered to borrow money to get the policy so we could move forward. Mirabelle advised against it. Mary persisted. Mirabelle resigned.

Mary and I began thinking about abandoning the project. We went to the bank with Mirabelle to get her name off of the account, and she offered to help us dismantle the whole thing. We decided to hang on for a little longer, to let the group know what we were thinking about, to see if anybody stepped up to help get back on track.

Lo and behold, Joe stepped up. He was ready to take on the whole show and carry it to the next level. The existing Board members voted Joe president and Mary vice president, and at Joe's first meeting there were ten people. The second meeting is in a week and a half, and I hope that it is at least as well attended.

Who knows, Bellevue may yet have community theatre.