The Center for Arts and Innovation was intended to replace Mizner Park’s amphitheater and surrounding area, but the deal died last month after a fundraising shortfall came to light. The center’s organizers said they would analyze alternate sites. Rendering provided
By Mary Hladky
When construction of a Boca Raton performing arts center was proposed in 2018, it seemed manifest destiny — exactly what the city needed to cement its status as a growing, culture-rich, economically strong place.
City Council members were gobsmacked when they saw the first conceptual plans presented by a consortium of city-based cultural organizations, even as they sought assurances that the city would not be burdened by the cost.
The project became the Center for Arts and Innovation, whose officials negotiated with the city for two years to hammer out a development agreement and the lease of city-owned land in Mizner Park. The council blessed the deals in 2022.
Another milestone came in 2023 when the renowned Renzo Piano Building Workshop, which accepts only two or three commissions a year, agreed to design the center. The new design was unveiled in May.
And then, over the last three months, it all came crashing down.
Facing a shortfall in donations, TCAI organizers asked city officials to amend the development agreement to give them more time to raise money.
Unable to persuade them to do so, TCAI terminated the agreement on Jan. 8. City officials acknowledged that the next day.
What comes next is not yet known.
Both sides have wished each other well, and left open the possibility of creating a new deal in the future if, in fact, either one will want to do that.
Priorities and possibilities
The city already has signaled that it is moving on.
In a Dec. 19 memo to council members, City Manager George Brown said drafting a new agreement would take months and would diminish the city’s focus on redeveloping the 30-acre downtown government campus to include a new City Hall and community center and the addition of residential, retail and office.
Brown described that effort as “the highest strategic priority of the city” that is backed by council members.
TCAI chief executive Andrea Virgin did not respond to requests for an interview.
But in a Jan. 8 press release, the center said the termination “allows the Center to begin analyzing alternative sites to ensure its transformative vision becomes a reality.”
“Together with our donors and partners, we will bring this project to life — whether in Boca Raton or another site that also shares our aspirations for success,” Virgin said in the release.
Center officials also updated their website to say in part, “This step allows us to pause, realign, and strengthen the foundation for the future.”
Showing that TCAI remains a going concern, officials announced on Jan. 22 that Paul Block, the chairman and CEO of the investment banking firm Proteus Capital Associates, had joined the board of directors.
“Joining the Center for Arts and Innovation allows me to contribute to a vision that empowers creativity and ensures the arts remain a cornerstone of South Florida’s future,” he said in the announcement.
Republican state Rep. Mike Caruso, a TCAI booster, wrote a Jan. 22 op-ed in the Palm Beach Post that pressed city officials not to abandon TCAI.
“The Center will happen,” he wrote. “It will thrive and elevate whichever community it calls home. Will this cultural hub be the game-changer that puts Boca Raton on the map, or will another city benefit from this great opportunity?
“… To the leaders of Boca Raton: I urge you to be bold. See beyond immediate challenges and envision what this project can mean for our community, not just today but for future generations.”
How dispute came to head
From the beginning, city officials supported TCAI’s vision but insisted that the organization pay for its development and construction costs. They were willing, however, to lease city-owned land in Mizner Park for the project.
The development agreement agreed to by both the city and TCAI stipulated that full funding for construction, estimated then to be at least $101.6 million, had to be in place prior to the issuance of a building permit.
The agreement spelled out fundraising deadlines, requiring TCAI to raise 75% of the project’s hard construction costs within three years. TCAI met its first deadline in 2023.
But Virgin stunned and angered city officials on Oct. 21 when she told them that she would not raise the required amount for 2024.
TCAI needed to raise a total of $50.8 million, but donations came to only $32 million.
Some council members accused Virgin of withholding information she must have had months earlier even as she led them to believe that all was well.
Their concerns were elevated when they learned Virgin had paused fundraising in September, an apparent sign that she knew she would not meet the target.
“I was quite frankly shocked” by the shortfall, Mayor Scott Singer said at the time.
Brown, who negotiated the agreement while serving as deputy city manager, offered a harsh critique, saying he had met with center officials in early October and was not told fundraising was falling short.
“I am just disturbed by a lack of accountability, a lack of transparency, a lack of forthrightness and in this circumstance a lack of humility,” he said.
In explaining the shortfall, Virgin said she had not known that donors can need five to seven years to finalize donation commitments. Donors, she said, don’t want to be rushed into making commitments.
Had she known that, she said that she would have tried to negotiate a deal with the city allowing for that.
In an interview with The Coastal Star at the time, Virgin denied withholding information and denied making unequivocal promises to council members that the fundraising target would be met.
Since it wasn’t, both the city and TCAI could terminate the development agreement and lease of city land.
Virgin proposed a “realignment amendment” to change terms of the agreement. Even though the council rejected that idea, she submitted one on Nov. 25.
It proposed that full funding for construction not be required until the project was to be completed in 2032. The agreement, though, stipulated that TCAI had to raise the full amount before a building permit would be issued.
Brown concluded that TCAI’s proposed changes were unacceptable and placed the city at risk of ending up with an uncompleted building or a finished project without enough funds to start operations.
TCAI, Brown said in a memo to the City Council, had created “a totally new approach to funding obligations” that “creates significant additional risk for the city.”
Brown recommended that council members terminate the deal. TCAI beat them to the punch.
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