HART DISTRICT WAITS FOR MONEY NEEDED TO REPAIR QUAKE-DAMAGED AUDITORIUM.

Byline: Mary Schubert Daily News Staff Writer

Workers have been busy making Henry Mayo Newhall Auditorium wheelchair accessible, but for four years now the 900-seat hall has been closed to everybody due to a lack of funds to repair earthquake damage.

The slow pace of refurbishing the 46-year-old auditorium, on the campus of Hart High School, has long frustrated students, district staff and the community at large because the brick building had been the venue for a wide array of concerts, plays and assorted functions for groups across the Santa Clarita Valley.

This week, parents appealed to the school board to find a way for the William S. Hart Union High School District to fund the necessary repairs to reopen the auditorium, which was damaged in the Jan. 17, 1994, Northridge Quake.

Lew White, the district's coordinator of facilities, said the district's plans must be approved by government officials - namely the state architect's office and the state office of school construction - before they can put the projects out to bid. At the earliest, the district may be ready to solicit bids for the work in May.

Once the repairs get under way, the work could take a year to complete. ``Somewhere early in the spring of 1999 (the auditorium) could be open,'' White said.

In the meantime, the district has used $380,000 in federal earthquake grants, given to the city by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, to modernize the auditorium, White said. The money was spent on building wheelchair ramps, refurbishing bathrooms, widening doorways to accommodate the handicapped, lowering drinking fountains and making other changes to improve the hall's accessibility, he said.

But the quake crumbled the auditorium's plaster ceiling, and replacing that is one part of the repair job yet to be completed; walls in the hall and the foyer also need to be replastered. The auditorium previously had cancer-causing asbestos in its walls and ceilings, most likely for acoustical reasons, but that asbestos has been removed since the quake, White said.

Meanwhile, the availability of funds to repair the damage hinge on pending litigation filed by the school district against its insurance company and insurance broker.

The school district complaint, filed in September 1996, alleges that RLI Insurance Co., its Peoria, Ill.-based carrier, should reimburse the district for quake damage to the auditorium. The civil case is scheduled to go to trial on Sept. 14 in North Valley Superior Court before Judge Jerold Krieger.

Previously, attorneys for the school district, RLI Insurance and Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., a Woodland Hills-based insurance brokerage firm named as a co-defendant in the lawsuit, had been meeting with retired Judge Edward Panelli in an effort to negotiate a settlement rather than take the case to trial.

Those sessions failed to resolve the impasse, said Timothy Dillon, an attorney from a Claremont firm that represents the Hart district.

Mike Stone, vice president of claims for RLI Insurance, said the company generally declines comment on pending litigation. Bob Schulman, attorney for the Los Angeles firm representing Gallagher, said the insurance brokerage didn't want to comment on the lawsuit.

The district's complaint alleges breach of contract by RLI Insurance, along with bad faith denial of the claim, Dillon said.

The latter charge, referred to in the lawsuit as breach of the covenant of good faith and fair dealing, also requests punitive damages, Dillon said. The school district is suing Gallagher for professional negligence.

``We're seeking repair costs, which are over $2 million,'' Dillon added.

White said that community groups, namely the Hart High School Foundation and the Auditorium Angels, have raised more than $300,000 to install an air conditioning system in the auditorium.

He estimated that, for about $933,000 beyond what has already been spent, the district could make the minimum necessary repairs and upgrades to reopen the auditorium. More than half that amount would be paid for by the community funds and some money available from the Federal Emergency Management Agency, White said.

``If the district could come up with $400,000 (on its own), the project could be done,'' White said.

``FEMA has determined that it will pay the equivalent of the deductible on the insurance policy, and that amounts to $246,937,'' he added.

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Photo

PHOTO (Color) Bob Schauer climbs down from atop the auditorium at Hart High after making ceiling repairs Friday.

John Lazar/Special to the Daily News