That seems to be the gist of the consultant’s report to the Thousand Oaks City Council on The Lakes Mall. Oh yes, and throw in a parking structure too! Let’s have more parking for an underperforming mall that the City of Thousand Oaks supports in various ways.
My question, when does the Conejo Valley have enough movie theaters (or cinemas, if you want to be fancy)? Just how many do we need? Usually the free market would answer this question. If existing theaters were jam packed, showing a market demand for more theaters, some business person would step up and build one. Since we have not had a jump in population in the Conejo, I am assuming that there has not been a big jump in movie theater demand.
Besides, we already have yet another theater complex, Muvico at The Oaks Mall, that just opened this year. Isn’t that enough?
What bothers me about this recommendation is, that if another multiplex were built with help from tax payers money, it would be competing with existing older theaters that have been operating in the free market with no government aid. I am assuming the older theaters would lose patrons. Do we really want cities in the Conejo to be in the movie theater business in a way that might put theaters we now have, in possible jeopardy?
Whatever happened to the Children’s Discovery Center that was originally planned for the land where The Lakes now sits? That would be such an addition to our community!Â
Posted by Janna Orkney
eco-nerd // Nov 19, 2009 at 1:47 PM
TO is just grasping now. They thought that if they added upscale, the city would become upscale. They’re still a sleepy town looking for an identity other than the one that they were dealt.
Isn’t that how the valley got to where it is today? They turned ranches and citrus groves into malls and movie theaters. At each step, just wanting a little bit more while not thinking about the long term effects.
I’m afraid that TO’s true colors came out years ago when they chose comerce over community, Home Depot over the Field House and a trendy book store/cafe over a family friendly bowling alley.
Michael // Nov 20, 2009 at 4:15 AM
Didn’t the Oaks Mall in Thousand Oaks just add a new movie theatre? Google theatre attendance trends….obviously there’s no demand for this gov’t handout….but then that’s true of a lot of stimulus spending of late.
Jeanne Cope // Nov 20, 2009 at 10:33 PM
I totally agree with eco-nerd.
Tom // Nov 23, 2009 at 4:43 PM
While the preceding comments are all accurate and disturbing, a story on NPR the morning before Council considered this issue is more unsettling. Movie producers are considering direct release to home users of movies soon after the movies are first released. According to the story, such a change has the possibility of wreaking economic havoc on the entire movie industry, especially the movie theater business which already seems shaky, and DVD sales.
The advantages which the consultant suggests a theater might provide are based on past performance of the industry. Past performance is likely not a good guide to its future since the industry is not stable, thus prediction of benefits is not reliable. If the movie business is uncertain it is a bad time for the City to go into a partnership to open a new theater for two reasons. First, the new theater is likely to lose money, which means tax money down the drain. Second, any business a new theater does takes customers away from existing unsubsidized theaters, decreasing their economic viability.
Last time I checked, which IIRC was a couple of years ago, operation of the Civic Arts Plaza required an annual subsidy of about $800,000 of tax dollars, and the level of subsidy had been steadily increasing. This indicates of the level of business competence we can expect from such public-private ventures.
The City should not gamble with public money by investing it in business ventures. The City should not use public resources to compete against private business.