Why We Need Your Help
The Cheatham Street Music Foundation (CSMF) was established in 2008 to perpetuate and carry forward the work of Kent Finlay, a long-time mentor and promoter of Texas songwriters and musicians. Cheatham Street Warehouse, a business venture owned by Finlay, has been an incubator for emerging Texas songwriters for nearly 30 years. In 2005, the Warehouse property was purchased by Gregg Andrews, a San Marcos musician and professor of history at Texas State University, in order to save it from demolition and redevelopment. (Finlay continued to lease the building.)
In Novemember 2010 CSMF secured financing to purchase the Cheatham Street Warehouse property, including the South Side Thrift Store, from Dr. Andews. CSMF will pay off the property by 2020 using only revenue from the thrift store rent revenue and the Cheatham Street Warehouse management contract. (Cheatham Street Warehouse is currently opperated under contract by CSW Management LLC which is owned by Kent Finlay.)
With the future of the property now secure, it is the responsibility and mission of the Cheatham Street Music Foundation to restore and preserve the Cheatham Street Warehouse for future generations. Your help is needed to support this mission. Its future is now once again in jeopardy, as Andrews is retiring and must sell the Warehouse before he relocates to Missouri in June 2009. CSMF’s first goal as an organization is, therefore, to acquire and renovate the Cheatham Street Warehouse property. Once secured, monthly lease payments from the nightclub business that Finlay operates at the Warehouse will generate income to help fund CSMF’s operating and programming costs, as well as the building’s ongoing maintenance.
