PART TWO — As stakes climbed and talks stalled in the Birchmere deal, other venue operators got a whiff of their own possible Silver Spring expansions. One of those vendors was Live Nation, MoCo exec Ike Leggett admitted Monday night.
However, Live Nation wasn’t the only party flirting with the county. A few locally owned venues approached the county this spring, when it looked like negotiations with the Birchmere were circling the drain. Those venues have not been identified to protect existing lease agreements, Leggett explained.
When talks with the Birchmere were officially declared dead this summer, the county began to play the field in earnest. There was one caveat to any deal: The venue’s operator must be willing to open its space to county- and community-sponsored events, Leggett said.
“As you look at the community, it crosses a variety of demographics,” he said. “We want a future vendor to respond to all of that.”
It all goes back to those three words: return on investment. According to Leggett, the Birchmere’s musical offerings and supper-club setup would have appealed only to one segment of the community. Owners of the Birchmere also insisted on exclusive use of the venue.
That led the county to conclude that a smaller audience plus $8 million in public funds just wouldn’t add up. On the other hand, the venue could serve the larger community’s musical tastes with a combination of privately and publicly sponsored programs, Leggett said.
For example, the venue operator — who could be announced this week — would book its choice of acts based on market forces. However, dates would be set aside so that other private parties or the county could book events for various segments of the community, Leggett explained.
The venue’s wider appeal could mean a steadier cash flow, justifying the public investment, Leggett concluded.
“If it’s not successful, it erodes that [public] confidence,” he said. “Unless you have that element of success, none of it will work out.”
Editor’s note: Owners of the Birchmere and Live Nation have been contacted for comment. — JD (Sep 25, 2007)
Read 
What the hell are they building now? Learn more from 
Boxed wines and rosés are back in vogue. Just ask The Penguin's sommeliers.
“According to Leggett, the Birchmere’s musical offerings and supper-club setup would have appealed only to one segment of the community.”
Right, but that “community” would have included people not only from Silver Spring, but also from Takoma Park, D.C., Bethesday, Rockville, Wheaton, and even from Virginia.
Moreover, name a music venue that doesn’t, by and large, appeal to “one segment” of the community.
Leggett screwed up AND went back on a campaign pledge. He’s already lost my vote next time around.
[...] with the Alexandria, Va.-based Birchmere fell apart. MoCo exec Ike Leggett has said that other parties were flirting with the county to occupy the proposed $8 million, county-owned [...]
[...] According to The Washington Post, the concert producer was willing to meet the county’s terms of opening the venue to county- and community-sponsored events. Flexible programming would allow a wider audience to make use of the $8 million facility, Leggett said Monday. [...]
The Leggett administration squandered the opportunity to bring the Birchmere, who are now moving to College Park, and MoCo has the cajones to propose giving $8 million in taxpayer money to bring in an international chain and claim the high road of “return on investment”. What a smokescreen to the true nature of this project, which is simply a land development deal using music, quite literally, as a front to build a hotel and an office building. With this kind of behind the scenes dealmaking, the momentum and positive energy for the revitalization of Silver Spring is now collapsing before our very eyes.
Whirli B: I think spelled “cojones”… oh, and it sounds like everyone prefers Live Nation to the Birchmere…