Letter To The Editor: C.L. Barnhouse Company Talks Bandstand

Oskaloosa Bandstand

Oskaloosa Bandstand

Editors Note: The views and opinions expressed in this editorial are not necessarily the views or opinions of Oskaloosa News.

Dear Oskaloosa Citizens:

The C.L. Barnhouse Company has had many local citizens ask us for our feelings concerning the recent proposal to relocate the Oskaloosa City Bandstand. We are very proud of our company’s over 100 year connection to the Oskaloosa Bandstand and we believe that the beautiful City Park and Bandstand is one of our town’s most impressive assets. We want everyone to understand that we are opposed to the idea of moving the bandstand from its present position.

From a practical musical standpoint, in 1911 when our company’s founder, Charles L. Barnhouse asked architect F. E. Wetherell to design the bandstand around the concept of a cone which would direct the sound of the band in all directions so that people sitting in any part of the square could equally hear the band playing in the center of the park. If you move the current bandstand to a side of the square, much of the sound coming from the bandstand will be wasted because that design will be directing the sound away from the listeners.

That being said, we also believe that it will be extremely difficult for the city to move the bandstand for several reasons. The Oskaloosa City Park/Bandstand was added to the National Register of Historical Places in 1983 and the Oskaloosa City Square Historical District was added to that list in 1986. It is a quite long and difficult process to get properties listed on the National Register of Historical Places and those listings in themselves are a very prestigious “branding” for our community. Changing or moving a structure or property requires redoing the exact same processes to get permission for a move or change.

Moving or making significant changes to any property on the National Register requires the permission of both the Iowa Historical Society and the National Register of Historical Places. These two groups are there to protect the integrity of these historical properties and therefore have regulations which govern proposed changes. By checking their own rules you can find that the reasons for which you can move a listed structure are limited by the following excerpts from their rules:

Sec. 60.14 Changes and revisions to properties listed in the National Register.

(b) Relocating properties listed in the National Register.

(1) Properties listed in the National Register should be moved only when there is no feasible alternative for preservation.

Therefore in order to move the Oskaloosa City Bandstand the first step would have to be that our City Council will have to agree and to vote to proceed. Then representatives of our city will have to convince the Iowa State Historical Society to allow the move and then the Iowa State Historical Society will then have to vote to make a recommendation to the National Register of Historical Places to allow the City of Oskaloosa to make the proposed move. After all of those processes take place the National Register of Historic Places must then disregard their own rules and vote against Sec. 60.14 as shown above if the move is going to be allowed.

You may ask what would happen if our city would move the Oskaloosa Bandstand without receiving their permission and that also is covered in their laws:

(4) In the event that a property is moved, deletion from the National Register will be automatic unless the above procedures are followed prior to the move.

Assuming the extremely unlikely event that all of those processes were to be accomplished there is still the very important issue of exactly who is going to pay for the moving of the bandstand structure itself. Moving the bandstand would require the work of engineers, huge machines, contractors, and a multitude of other factors all of which are very expensive. I really can’t believe that the citizens of Oskaloosa would choose to raise their own taxes to move a structure which doesn’t really need to be moved. I have talked to a city council member who has expressed the view that our city doesn’t have the money to do a lot of projects which actually need to be accomplished (like fixing our infrastructure) and so would be unlikely to able to fund this anytime in the foreseeable future.

We certainly appreciate the efforts all of the people who have shown support for the Oskaloosa Bandstand and the heritage of music in Oskaloosa that it represents. It also shows how much pride the citizens of Oskaloosa have in this great work of art and its beautiful surroundings. We have great confidence in our City Council and other officials that they will study this issue and do what we think is in the best interest of our city, which is retaining the present City Park and Bandstand location.

In closing we would like to suggest that citizens of Oskaloosa make their feelings known to our local government in a respective manner and then show their support for the current location by taking part in the many activities which take place on our square.

We also would like to suggest that you visit the park on Thursday nights this summer to enjoy the wonderful Oskaloosa City Band concerts to see for yourselves what a great asset the City Park and Bandstand are to our town!

Sincerely yours,

Andy Clark, President/CEO C.L. Barnhouse Co.

Posted by on May 19 2015. Filed under Editorial, Local News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.

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