Financial breaks for Des Plaines Theatre approved
The company that operates the city-owned Des Plaines Theatre will get a significant break on rent for the next two years.
The city council approved the discount Monday. It also unanimously agreed to waive $63,243 in payments for back property taxes that the company, Onesti DPT, owed the city. The city already has paid those taxes to Cook County.
Onesti DPT requested the rent decrease and the property tax waiver, City Manager Dorothy Wisniewski told the council. Aldermen said they support the changes to ensure the theater remains open and continues to draw people downtown.
“The last thing we want to do is have an empty theater downtown that sits there for years,” 6th Ward Alderman Mark Walsten said.
Des Plaines bought the then-shuttered, century-old theater building at 1476 Miner St. in 2018 and renovated it. Officials have been counting on the reopened theater to bring music lovers to downtown Des Plaines and help revitalize the district.
Onesti DPT, a subsidiary of Onesti Entertainment Corp., rents the space from the city and operates the theater and restaurants in the building. Its lease expires Oct. 31, 2026.
The company had been scheduled to pay $16,000 per month in rent through this October. Under the deal approved Monday, rent will be free for the first six months of this year and $2,000 per month for July through December.
Likewise, the company was scheduled to pay $18,000 per month in rent from January 2026 through October 2026 but instead will pay $4,000 per month.
The taxes covered by the deal are from November 2021 to April 2022. The company puts $10,083 into an escrow account each month that the city dips into to cover the property tax burden, Wisniewski said.
Onesti DPT requested the tax waiver because it received a tax bill from Cook County for those months even though it wasn’t yet paying rent on the space, Wisniewski explained.
Fifth Ward Alderman Carla Brookman supported the deal, calling the changes “a short-term subsidy.”
As part of the new agreement, the amount the company puts into the escrow account for property taxes will increase to $15,500 per month. Property taxes on the building have increased unexpectedly, Walsten said.
That change will be retroactive to January, and it’ll be effective until the lease expires next year, documents indicate.
Third Ward Alderman Sean Oskerka suggested the city reevaluate the business plan for the theater once the lease expires.
An Onesti DPT representative was in the audience Monday but didn’t comment on the proposal.