The Schoolhouse Arts Center is looking to raise $3,000 to maintain its aging building in Standish. Rory Sweeting / Lakes Region Weekly

The Schoolhouse Arts Center, long a staple of the Lakes Region’s artistic community, is looking to raise $3,000 to help maintain its aging building.

SAC was founded in Standish in 1988 by Hank and Nancy Beebe, who transformed the town’s former high school into a hub for performance arts and education. In the years since, the theater has grown into a vital part of Standish’s community, with recent productions including “Carrie the Musical,” “Be More Chill” and “God of Carnage.” Artistic Director Kristofer Kauff said that in recent years, SAC has been raising the artistic quality of its shows, going beyond typical theater fare.

One of the plays that Kauff was most excited about this season is the “Laramie Project,” which will be staged in June. The play is based around the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard, a gay man living in Laramie, Wyoming, with the script consisting of actual interviews from people connected to the murder. Kauff praised the “beautiful and honest” writing of the play, which will have eight actors, each playing multiple roles, and hoped that attendees would come out of it more aware of the dangers of bigotry and hatred. He also noted that SAC has been working closely with the Matthew Shepard Foundation and that, in the coming weeks, the cast and crew will speak with Dennis Shepard, Matthew’s father.

Managing Director Joellen Lemont, left, and Artistic Director Kristofer Kauff of the Schoolhouse Arts Center hope to move the center from Standish to Westbrook. Rory Sweeting / Lakes Region Weekly

Even with increasing theatrical ambitions, SAC’s biggest issue is its current theater space, which is over a century old and becoming increasingly dilapidated. According to Kauff, an assessment found that it would cost upwards of $9-10 million to bring the building up to safety standards, a process which would involve completely reworking the building’s electrical system, leveling out the floor and redoing the front porch. He noted that repairing just one of the building’s several boilers would cost tens of thousands of dollars, and he also lamented that the building is not wheelchair accessible.

To help maintain the building and enhance its programming, SAC has started a GoFundMe with a goal of raising $3,000, of which $950 had already been raised as of Monday. In the long term, however, the plan is to move to a new location, most likely in downtown Westbrook. Kauff said that moving to Westbrook will work out well for the theater because it’s not only moving closer to where the majority of current cast and crew members live, but will also be able to attract more people because of Westbrook’s location, which he described as being in the center of a triangle, as opposed to Standish’s more peripheral location.

“We don’t want to let the mission die because the building is unsustainable,” Kauff told the Lakes Region Weekly.