County gives Palladium Theater upgrade a green light

A unanimous vote by the Pinellas County Commission has ensured the long-gestating renovation of St. Petersburg’s Palladium Theater will go forward.

At their Oct. 7 meeting, commissioners approved the allocation of $2.5 million in Tourist Development Council funds earmarked earlier in the year for the 815-seat performing arts venue, which is owned and operated by St. Petersburg College.

Initiated in 2022, the capital campaign calls for new seats, improved sightlines and acoustics and other technological and cosmetic changes.

Originally estimated at $10 million, the project’s budget has increased to $13 million, due to rising construction costs.

The Florida Legislature allocated $850,000 in the 2023-24 budget for Palladium renovations. On Oct. 25, 2023, state senator Darryl Rouson (left) and representative Lindsay Cross (right), co-sponsors of the bill, presented Palladium director Paul Wilborn with a check. Photo provided.

Palladium Executive Director Paul Wilborn said about $10.8 million is in hand, from private donors, the State of Florida and the City of St. Petersburg.

“Because we’re part of a state college, you can’t just build something on pledges,” he explained. “The money has to be in an account that can be spent.

“And this (county) agreement counts as money, since it’s an official government-to-government agreement. And that put us to the point where the project could be greenlighted.”

Built in 1925 as a Christian Science church, the 7,000-square-foot Palladium is on the Register of Historic Places. It has been operated by SPC since 2007.

“We came into the capital campaign knowing it really needed to be done,” Wilborn said. “We’ve been very successful, but we were limited in that we were a church with a stage, essentially. People didn’t like the seats, people didn’t like the sound when it was heavily amplified … we’re addressing all that.”

Wilborn’s original renovation plan included several items that had to be rescinded, due to rising costs. Among these: Raising the performance stage and installing an acoustic orchestra shell. He believes the withdrawn items – and perhaps even more – can be added to the list before the theater, and its 180-seat downstairs “cabaret” room, have to close for construction.

“As we raise more money, which we are certainly going to do, we’re continuing to push forward, trying to do as much as we can to do this all in one fell swoop.”

Raising enough launch capital was Phase One of the project.

Phase Two – the nuts, bolts and myriad contracts of the renovation – will be out of Wilborn’s hands.

“SPC has folks that do that,” he said. “We just had to show them enough money to get this project going.” It’s estimated eight to 12 months will pass before the first hammer will fall. The theater will close for approximately one year.

John Collins, the former director of the St. Petersburg Arts Alliance, has been part of the renovation project team since the beginning. Although he resides in Annapolis, Maryland, Collins is on the phone, and on Zoom, with Wilborn daily. And he visits St. Petersburg often.

“I absolutely believe in Paul’s vision for what the Palladium transformation can be,” Collins said. “And I think there’s an art and a science to a capital campaign. That’s been my experience for many, many years. I wrote my first grant in 1977.

“I’m perhaps more of a hands-on person, but I’m just a tiny part of this process.”

Wilborn, a writer, musician and former journalist, has been with the Palladium since the earliest days of SPC’s ownership.

“I’m not a fundraiser,” he said. “It’s just not in my history. So it was kind of daunting and scary. And there a lot of nights where I would wake up and say ‘Why did we choose to do this?’ What kept me going was that I ultimately believed it needed to be done.

“What’s gratifying is that the community has responded. The city stepped up. The state stepped up. The county has stepped up. Private donors have stepped up. And they said ‘We believe in what you’re doing.’”