With an ever-tightening budget and more money going out than coming in, the Sampson County Board of Commissioners proposed a tough cut during Monday night’s budget meeting — the elimination of the Sampson County Agri-Exposition Center’s CenterStage Series.

While the proposal may come as a shock to some, commissioners had actually intended to phase out funding for the program a few years back, said Ray Jordan, executive director of the Exposition Center.

“They wanted the series to become self-sufficient,” he said. “It just was never able to.”

Throughout its nine-year existence, the CenterStage was responsible for bringing a truly diverse group of entertainment into Clinton. Despite this, there were only two sellouts in nearly a decade — Lee Greenwood and Ricky Skaggs.

“This community has been very supportive of what we have done here,” said Jordan. “It is just the way things are — the commissioners have really tough decisions to make — I certainly wouldn’t want to be in their shoes. With the economy the way that it is and the way things are right now, there has to be some way to balance everything.”

While the proposal was presented Monday at the Board of Commissioners meeting, Jordan had previously hinted about scaling back next season’s shows at a Sampson County Exposition Center advisory board meeting last year. In addition, to save money this season, the center had already cut down on printing rates (for mailing inserts, etc ...) and cut the size of this season’s brochures by 1/4 of last year’s size. The Expo board went as far as cutting individual ticket prices this season — current tickets range from $18 to $32.

“You know, the attendance was not where we would have liked it to be,” Jordan admits, “but we were confident that with the shows we brought through here, from ballet to country to theater, it pretty much ran the gamut and brought something new to enhance the lives of the people in this community.”

However, with Monday’s proposed 2009-10 county budget, seeing more of those types of community-enhancing shows, at least for the CenterStage series, seems unlikely.

Jordan, on the other hand, remains optimistic about the series and is already making calls to sponsors that could help independently fund some shows next year.

“It may not be like the usual seven or eight shows,” he said. “But it could work to where we get sponsors or private funding to bring in two or three shows ... It may not be the CenterStage Series, but we are going to try and have something Right now, that is something that I am in the process of working on.”

Jordan, who was partly responsible for bringing the series to the county in the first place, said he is not washing his hands of the series. “I won’t give up on it,” he said. “I think that the economy will turnaround, businesses will pick up and, hopefully, our tax base will grow and we can resume having a public performing arts series. Maybe not next year, but in the near future.”

The very popular Class Acts series, as well as the fund-raising for Class Acts, “A Night at the Beach,” will continue mainly because they are self-supporting events.

Founded five years ago, Class Acts-Sampson CenterStage for Students is an arts education initiative administered and supported by the Sampson CenterStage Performing Arts Series, Sampson County and scores of individuals, businesses, industries and civic organizations. Since the creation of Class Acts over 38,118 students have had the opportunity to attend live performing arts productions with no cost. The Class Acts program has gained statewide recognition for its quality programming, introducing many students to the arts for their first time.

“We are going to put all of our focus into Class Acts,” said Jordan. “That program is self-sufficient and we want to make it the best we can. Without CenterStage we will be able to put a lot more energy into that program and try and get as many people as we can involved.”

Despite what looks to be dire consequences for the CenterStage Series next year, Jordan says he understands. “We are set up to enhance the lives of the people of this community,” he said. “While this is unfortunate, it is what happens. We do what the commissioner need us to do to help bring that balance to the community.”

However, Jordan does say that writing those letters to the CenterStage supporters won’t be easy.

“Those are the ones I feel bad about, those sponsors and supporters that have been with us from the beginning,” he said. “The supporters and our board, they have always been very good about supporting what we have tried to do here. All of our sponsors who believed in what we were doing and trying to do with the series. For one, I am very appreciative of their support. And it is not for me, or anything that I am doing, it is all for the county.”

It should be noted that the season ticket sales for Sampson County Agri-Expo’s CenterStage Series were down by just 31 seats at the start of this season.

The Sampson County Board of Commissioners are expected to approve the 2009-10 budget in June.

To reach Doug Clark call 910-592-8137 ext. 139 or send e-mail to sisports@myclintonnc.com.