Written by Robin: \Some time ago I suggested to the mayor that once the Elks is demolished (and it surely will be) that the city make good photos of the facade and save the limestone and reconstruct it at some future date for the facade of an ampitheater at the bicentennial park. Likewise, the trusses could be used for the overhang (stage). By making it a community project with sensible (read not government involement), it could be accomplished without tax dollars and hundreds of thousands of dollars for some favorite architect. While someone dropped a price of $75K to demolish the Elks, the actual quote that the Elks got (during the peak economy) was $38K. That price included clearing the debris (bricks, etc) down to the floor. So add $5k to save the limestone, cart the bricks to a city location (how about the shovel ready industrial park), use the prison labor to clean the bricks, and walla, we have the majority of materials to build an ampitheater.

The big and only real draw that Madison has is the river front (as told us my many a $50,000 consultant.) The riverfront is the key to saving Main St. Bob Greene has put in man years of work on beautifing the west end (the cost was to buy land that he had no control over.)


An ampitheater open to any public event would soon fill up (think church services on Sundays, music by Hanover, plays by the high school etc, and we stand a chance of the getting the thousands of vistors necessary to make downtown viable.