The Des Moines Theater, recently purchased by developers Tom Lin and Isaiah Dummer is moving into the next phase. As the Highline Times/News reported in early December, the project has been in evaluation mode as the historic building is examined for necessary repairs and years of accumulated electronic gear, projectors and more are moved out or sold off. After about another week of clearing out rooms that had been filled with collected old electronic gear and more, and getting a basic clean up done they can begin to look more seriously at retail clients for the ancillary spaces in the 10,000 square foot plus building. "We're getting more requests right now than we can handle," said Lin in an exclusive interview with the Highline Times.

So far the plan includes a pizza restaurant, a lounge, a coffee shop, and they are talking to a speciality chocolate retailer plus a game store/gaming lounge.

These are likely going to be part of the project prior to the completion the work on the theater and are intended to become integrated parts of the theater development going forward.

Alloy Design Group in Seattle is doing the archtectural design and have been through the building to do a preliminary analysis.

The City of Des Moines, trying to shed a non developer friendly reputation has been according to Lin, exceptionally cooperative, "more than anybody could hope for," he said. They have indicated they want to 'fast track' the project. "They want it done today," said Lin, "even the mayor has stopped by to see how we're doing. Inspectors have come by to help us. We walk into the city offices and all the files are ready there for us to review.

The timeline for the project involves meeting with the City Manager in order to determine,"what's allowed and what's not allowed, from construction to zoning to things they'd like to see." Lin expects that to take a few weeks. That will be followed by the design phase and then once complete, construction can begin.

Lin, expressing his pleasure at how well it's gone so far said, "It seems like everyone is working together to achieve the same goal."