The Citizens for a Civic Auditorium wants more time to raise another $7 million after the curtain fell on the Dec. 31 deadline to have $15 million in the bank to build and support a performing arts center on the site of the former Amoco refinery.

The CCA's president Ken Barbe asked the Amoco Reuse Agreement Joint Powers Board for a nine-month extension to gather large pledges under negotiation, in a letter dated Dec. 26. Gov. Dave Freudenthal is also urging the board to extend the deadline.

If the Joint Powers Board declines to grant the request at its next meeting at Casper City Hall on Jan. 24, the board can make the $7.5 million it committed to CCA available for other purposes, according to a memorandum of understanding the two groups signed April 14, 2004.

The memorandum required the CCA to have an endowment and a separate construction fund account, and file quarterly financial reports on those funds.

Also the group would have to have a business plan, a building plan, and a lease between the CCA and the Joint Powers Board.

All the money - about $15 million - was to be in the bank by Dec. 31 in order to receive the Joint Powers Board's commitment of $7.5 million of public money.

The CCA has not fulfilled any of these requirements other than the business plan, which came to the Joint Powers Board a half-year later than expected, according to a review of documents at the board's office at the Platte River Commons.

As of the Dec. 31 deadline, the CCA had about $400,000 in the bank, with some of that being used for operations, the salary of an employee, and advertising, Barbe said.

The CCA has pledges of $8 million, he said.

Barbe's letter also referred to six companies - ExxonMobil, Anadarko, Halliburton, Double Eagle, FMC and Burlington Northern - that were feted at the governor's residence late last year.

The CCA still is negotiating with these companies for pledges, and an extension would allow time for the pledges to be made and collected, Barbe said.

In a Dec. 28 letter, Freudenthal urged the Joint Powers Board to extend the deadline because, he wrote, this cultural amenity would attract professionals to Wyoming and offer an entertainment center for Natrona County.

In another letter dated Dec. 27, Barbe and CCA campaign director Audrey Cotherman asked auditorium supporters to lobby the Casper City Council to instruct its representative to the Joint Powers Board to extend the deadline, and ask the Council to consider a financial contribution from excess Optional One Percent Sales Tax No. 12 funds or other sources.

City Councilman Paul Bertoglio said the city legally cannot make such a contribution.

Barbe and Cotherman likewise urged auditorium supporters to lobby Natrona County commissioners and the Joint Powers Board, as well as attend the Jan. 24 meeting.

"We're encouraging people to make their feelings known because it is a community project," Barbe said.

The Dec. 27 letter acknowledged the CCA's failure to file quarterly financial reports, but stated its officers have met with the Joint Powers Board through a special liaison group.

The nine-member Joint Powers Board is composed of appointees from the Natrona County Commission and the City Council, which will interview candidates for open positions next week.

Meanwhile, the City Council and the Commission have named their direct representatives.

Commissioner Barb Peryam said she will vote as the other commissioners direct.

Councilwoman Stefanie Boster is taking her cue from a late 2006 meeting when the Council was split in telling its former Joint Powers Board representative Ed Opella how to vote, and left him to make his own decision, she said.

The comments Boster has received run equally pro and con about the proposed extension, she said.

But after reviewing the April 14, 2004, memo of understanding and talking with people, Boster has decided to vote against the extension on Jan. 24.

"I'm concerned the Citizens for a Civic Auditorium has not lived up to its terms of the agreement," she said.

"If they've not been responsible in turning over information to the (Joint Powers) Board, I wonder how responsible they will be with the $7.5 million of the Board chooses to give them that second chance."

Reporter Tom Morton can be reached at (307) 266-0592, or at Tom.Morton@casperstartribune.net.