CITY FOCUS:Best seats in the house

The historic Huntington Beach High School auditorium will be getting a new look over the summer, including a paint job, new heating and air systems, bathrooms — the works. Somehow, though, the funding did not include renovated seating, so the school’s Academy of Performing Arts decided to raise the money itself to make the transformation complete.

“We thought if they’re going to spend all this money trying to fix things up, it’s going to look great. And then you sit in this old, falling-apart seat that they don’t even make parts for replacing anymore,” academy’s foundation chairwoman Lisa Zia said.

To raise funds for the new chairs, engraved brass plaques will be sold for $300 a piece on a first-come, first-serve basis. Buyers can even pick the seating assignment for their chair. As of Wednesday, 125 plaques had been sold, Zia said.

“It will stay there until the next time they renovate the theater, which won’t be that soon,” Zia said.

There are coding issues to deal with as well. The 705-seat theater will have to lose 76 seats to meet handicap-seating standards. Also, two rows of seats will be removed from the center balcony to make room for lighting and sound equipment, Zia said.

“It’s really not worth it to have seating there, because you won’t see anything,” she said.

Renovations begin in June and are scheduled to be completed at the end of October, Principal Dave Linzey said.

“The auditorium, of course, is front and center in our city and on our campus,” Linzey said. “We’re taking special care to make sure that it gets into top shape.”

The school will also gain a new Black Box theater, but that new addition will come after the renovations. Until the work is completed, rehearsals will most likely take place at the Rose Center in Westminster, Linzey said.

Each plaque engraving can include two lines of 20 characters, Zia said. Applications are available for downloading on the academy’s website at www.hbapa.org. Anyone with questions can call Zia at (714) 746-9402.