All of the necessary legislation has passed through the Government of the Student Body in order for the presentation for the Cyclone Cinema to the Iowa Board of Regents to take place.

The property lease has not yet been finalized, but a bill allocating $30,000 towards the lease was passed unanimously at the last meeting of the year.

Once the lease is finalized, GSB President Luke Roling, Finance Director Anthony Maly, Vice President Nate Dobbels, and former Finance Director Tom Danielson will give a proposal to the board, and they will decide whether or not to sign the lease.

The project would change the currently vacated Varsity Theater on Lincoln Way into the Cyclone Cinema.

The project was initially started by Danielson, who took the initiative to research the feasibility of buying the theater and eventually wanted to reach out to students and administrators with the idea.

The Varsity Task Force was created soon afterwards, which included several members of GSB including Danielson, former Vice President Chandra Peterson, Maly and former Senator Brian Ryherd.

The Task Force created a budget for the theater and an initial proposal, which was presented to the Senate.

The budget includes one-time startup expenses at $185,165, with annual expenses at $169,271.33, and revenues at $133,744.50, which would leave the Cyclone Cinema operating at a $35,529.83 loss.

The budget is based off of a plan that would have the cinema running at 33 percent capacity for 28 weeks per year, with 16 showings per week.

Danielson said in an e-mail, “the project benefits students by giving them an alternative entertainment option close to campus.”

Danielson said it would be a benefit to students because it would give them a cheap and quality entertainment opportunity to put student fee dollars toward.

“It is a large initial investment, but it’s one of few projects that has the ability to actually affect every student at Iowa State University,” Danielson said.

Danielson said in the e-mail that a lot of times capital projects money goes towards individual organizations that put the money towards, “a single venture,” but the Cyclone Cinema has the potential to be, “an ongoing venture that has the ability to be self sustaining and can benefit not only current students, but students in the future.”

The group of students who have been working on the project have been, “a very dedicated group … that have spent a lot of time analyzing the feasibility, potential successes and downfalls, and financial stability of the facility,” Danielson said. Not everyone agrees that this project is a responsible investment, however.

Jacob Johnston, who served as an off-campus Senator from August 2007 through Dec. 2009 and is currently a senior in business management and logistics, said he believes the idea behind the project, to promote Campustown, is a good one — but believes the idea is a “horrible one financially.”

Johnston said that the last time he added the numbers, the cinema would use about $500,000 in student activity fees in five years.

“This money is taking away from groups who do competitions and sporting events — anything from skydiving to cultural activities — we’re taking away money from them for a theater to eat popcorn in,” Johnston said.

Johnston said he would like to see the money be put somewhere where it can generate a profit so it can be distributed to student groups, adding that it would be a way to raise student group funding, and not have to raise student activity fees.

“It needs to be a sound business plan. Otherwise, with the current economy and the rising costs of education, it’s not a good time to be flushing money down the drain,” Johnston said.

Former GSB President Jon Turk said that he believes he made his opinion plenty clear during his time in office about the theater. Turk said several times he was not for the plan.

Current President Roling wasn’t originally for the plan either, but after the $316,000 was allocated towards the theater, Roling said the best thing to do was to be supportive and try to make it work.

A survey that was sent out to students yielded poor results as well.

About 1,193 students, or 57.2 percent, said they don’t believe that a theater is needed in Campustown.

After being given some background into the plan of the theater, 67.8 percent, or 1,412 students said they don’t support the use of student fee money to acquire the theater.

Roling sent out a new survey to students on April 27.

“The goal of the survey is to provide a bit more objective feedback other than that from members of the committee itself, or from Jon Turk who was not so keen to the Cinema project,” Roling said.

Roling said that he is trying to make the feedback for the Board of Regents presentation as standardized as possible.