Local theater receives grant to refurbish seat cushions
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The following is a news release from Blackfoot Community Players. Stock image
BLACKFOOT — The historic Nuart Theatre in Blackfoot was selected by the Idaho Heritage Trust to receive $49,000 in funding to support the restoration of our beloved building. The money provided by this award will go directly to refurbishing the seat cushions to make our theater more comfortable for our patrons.
We are proud to be one of the nine historic theatres to receive $821,000 in funding through IHT’s Historic Theatre Revitalization Subgrant Program. The goal of which is to facilitate the restoration and preservation of these vital structures in Idaho’s rural communities (defined as having a population less than 50,000 people).
This program is supported by the Paul Bruhn Historic Revitalization Grant Program funded by the Historic Preservation Fund as administered by the National Park Service (NPS), Department of Interior and the Idaho Heritage Trust Fund, and we have pledged to match $4,900 to complete our project.
The objectives for this subgrant program are to preserve and protect buildings of historic significance, ensure our rural communities have access to the arts and culture, reinvigorate a key economic component of historic Main Streets, and provide a tool for our smaller communities to capitalize on Idaho’s growing population and heritage tourism industry.
“The Nuart Theatre is the preserved gem of downtown Blackfoot and provides opportunities to perform and view the arts in our area,” said Sharon Hoge, the President of the Blackfoot Community Players, the volunteer organization that owns and operates the Nuart Theatre comments. “Our goal has been and always will be to maintain the historic integrity of our theater. With this grant we will be refurbishing the seat bottoms to make them more comfortable and safer for our patrons. They are quite old and need to be updated and repaired. Because the Nuart Theatre is nearing its 100th birthday, it is important that we maintain the historic accuracy of the building, and that is why we are choosing to refurbish the seats instead of replacing them with more modern seating. It is a one-of-a-kind theater in Idaho, and maintaining the historic accuracy will keep this theater an historic gem for many generations to come.”