Dec 7, 2015 2 min read

CHARLEROI – A nonprofit organization specializing in industrial development has assumed control of the struggling Coyle Theater project in Charleroi, with no intent to relight the movie screen.

The Middle Monongahela Industrial Development Corp., which manages business parks in Donora, Fallowfield Township and Speers, signed a contract Sunday to take control of the theater property from a nonprofit group that has been trying fruitlessly for more than a decade to reopen the historic theater, said MIDA Executive Director Lue Ann Pawlick.

“MIDA is not going to run a theater,” Pawlick said Monday.

She said the decision to take over managing the three Coyle buildings is part of MIDA’s new mission to eliminate blight in the Mon Valley.

“It’s a new challenge,” she said.

The Mid Mon Valley Cultural Trust, which owns the building at 331 McKean and two neighboring, closed storefronts, never managed to raise enough money for a restoration project estimated to cost millions of dollars. The trust has seen four different chairmen since 2013, and its board has had a string of members resign over the years. The buildings’ roofs leak, and there is no heat in the theater, built in 1891 as a burlesque house.

“It’s just sitting there getting worse and worse,” Pawlick said.

“It was time for an entity like MIDA to step in.”

The 1,000-seat theater went dark under previous owners in 1999 following a showing of the movie “Titanic.”

Pawlick said the trust board voted unanimously to turn over management of the property to MIDA, which intends to eventually purchase the property.

MIDA will have an assessment performed on the buildings and develop an action plan for the property before deciding what to do, she said.