Nearly nine months after kicking off the historic Royal Theater’s long-awaited restoration, Guadalupe leaders lowered the curtain on the project.
“If we continue the Royal Theater [construction], by the end of this fiscal year, we will be $2.6 million in debt,” City Administrator David Trujillo told the City Council during its July 28 meeting. “That’s negative cash flow.”
According to city staff’s projections, to continue construction efforts tied to the theater’s revival “results in an approximately $7.6 million lower June 2027 cash position than stopping construction.”
“If I were to tell you to continue construction, I would be doing a disservice to this community,” Trujillo told the council. “Until we have $13 million in the general fund, we cannot start this project. That’s where this project went wrong.”
Trujillo added that budgetary reports prepared by past iterations of the city staff “intermixed” enterprise funds with the general fund, which gave officials the wrong impression about funds at the city’s disposal.
Guadalupe Finance Director Eli Martinez said that current staff is “still looking into this,” amid finishing audit reports “going back to 2022, 2023.”
During public comment, former Guadalupe mayor Frances Romero urged the council to heed Trujillo and Martinez’s advice.
“You have competent professional staff for the first time in 12 years, listen to them for a change,” Romero said. “[Past staff] apparently didn’t have any expertise at being able to balance a checkbook.”
Before taking part in the 5-0 vote to “terminate” the Royal Theater project while preserving the historic building “to the extent possible,” Councilmember Amelia Villegas said that looking back at the actions of past city officials serves no purpose.
“We just need to look at who we have now—who are in the positions to evaluate the financial situation,” Villegas continued, “and look at options.”
Councilmember Whitney Furness requested that the council take part in “a big lessons learned discussion” in the near future, “so that we don’t run into this again.”
Guadalupe resident Mira Beyeler-Ramirez expressed disappointment over the city’s handling of the Royal Theater project.
“Myself and individuals have been coming up to this very stand for years trying to prevent the exact situation that is happening right now,” Beyeler-Ramirez said during public comment. “It’s frustrating and saddening because all of this was preventable. … There do need to be long, hard conversations—especially for the incoming elected officials come November—about how to make sure that this doesn’t happen again.”
This article appears in August 6 – August 13, 2026.
