Gulfport Little Theatre planning to restore after being ransacked by thieves

In 2020 when the pandemic hit, Gulfport Little Theatre disbanded — thinking they would all pick back up where they left off in two weeks.

As we all know, those two weeks turned into two years — ultimately leading to Gulfport Little Theatre being unable to open back up. Now, four years later, former members are banding back together to bring theatre back to the community — but it won’t be an easy task.

Members of Gulfport Little Theatre thought it would be a simple act of sprucing up the place before opening, but when they unlocked the doors, they realized it was going to take the entire community to restore Gulfport Little Theatre after being ransacked with nearly every inch of electric stolen.

“The building has been sitting empty now for three, almost four years. It’s fallen into disrepair,” said Bill Young, a former board member helping to bring the theatre back. “Very bad maintenance issues. Very bad issues. But also we’ve fallen victim to vandals and thieves who have come in and taken our electrical wiring from the building, exterior, and interior. They’ve also stolen a good bit of our copper plumbing.”

A handful of former board members are attempting to bring the theatre back, but truthfully, seeing their former theatre in this state is discouraging.

“There is not going to be a repair to that,” Young said. “That is not something that we can Band-Aid and fix where they took the wiring out. That all has to be redone. From the outside to the pole that feeds the power to the current transformer boxes to the meters to our subpanels within the building. Plumbing is the same thing. We can’t turn the water on until we know that everything is right or we’re going to end up flooding the building.”

This doesn’t even include the damage inside – like holes people used to get inside, water damage, and more.

“What’s really needed right now because, as you can imagine, we don’t have the funds to do it, we need a good commercial property appraisal done. So, if there is a contact out there that can assist us. once we have the appraisal done, then we know the exact dollar amounts.”

Like the community once leaned on Gulfport Little Theatre for entertainment, the theatre is leaning on the community to bring it back.

“The community has actually supported this theatre for over seventy years,” Young said. “I think the community has thought that the community has gone away. And in a way it has. But we need the community to come back together so we can give the entertainment to them.”

If you can assist the Gulfport Little Theatre with an appraisal, please email biyoung66@gmail.com.