A drama on four corners: No end in sight to Fresno protests over Tower Theatre sale
In the Tower District, Fresno’s most compelling drama occurs outside the namesake theater.
The performance takes place every Sunday morning — 36 weeks running — at the intersection of Wishon and Olive avenues, and contains the two most essential elements of any drama: conflict and characters.
But rather than actors on a stage, ours involves real people across four corner sidewalks. I ventured there on two consecutive Sundays, and this is what I discovered:
Northeast corner (Wishon & Olive)
Every drama needs a flashpoint. This one touched off in early 2021 when news broke that a conservative evangelical church was in escrow to purchase the iconic Tower Theatre.
That’s when a group of residents concerned about the potential impact on the Tower District began picketing across the street, spilling into the Roger Rocka’s Dinner Theater parking lot. The first protest was Jan. 10. Nine months later, with the Tower Theatre’s sale to Adventure Community Church tied up in court, there’s no end in sight.
“I’m out here for the duration,” said Laura Splotch, a longtime Fresno event promoter, artist and founding member of the Save the Tower Theatre Demonstration Committee. “I’m not giving up. I’ll be here till we win. And then I’ll still be here afterward.”
With her bright pink hair and tattoo-covered arms, Splotch is unmistakable at the weekly demonstrations. So much so that she had her address and place of employment doxxed by counter-protesters in early summer.
“They know where I live,” Splotch said, “and I’m scared for my kids.”
Save the Tower protesters hold up printed yellow-and-black banners with “No Rezone for Our Home!” and “No Bad Neighbors!” in capital letters and handmade signs that say “Keep Tower Weird” and “Zoning Law is Not Persecution.” They’re backed by a DJ who plays amplified music. Occasionally one of the organizers picks up a microphone and says a few fiery words about their fight to preserve the neighborhood’s bohemian flavor and accepting character — particularly to the LGBTQ community.
Would demonstrators feel differently about the situation if a more progressive church was purchasing the Tower Theatre?
“We’d still be against the sale,” committee member Jaguar Bennett said. “But if it were a more reasonable church, we might be having a more reasonable discussion.”
Southwest corner
Ever since counter-protesters in support of Adventure Church joined the drama, they’ve gathered and waved picket signs on the southeast corner of Wishon and Olive. But in Sunday’s latest plot twist, they were on the southwest corner for reasons that will be explained in the next section.
Where will they be next week? Stay tuned.
Far as anyone can tell, this group doesn’t have an official ring-leader. They’re a small but dedicated band of conservative evangelicals and local Republicans who steadfastly believe they’re standing with God and it’s the other side that is being intolerant. You’ll still see a Proud Boy lurking (costumed in black T-shirts and faces covered with yellow bandanas), but their attendance has fallen off since tensions escalated last spring.
Some weeks, Tower Theatre owner Laurence Abbate stands among them, wearing a baseball cap with the letters “AC” on the front.
Although he’s not a protester per se, Josh Fulfer is the most visible presence. The right-wing firebrand and video streamer records the proceedings with his camera while providing running commentary to his followers on Facebook and other platforms.
Perhaps best known for making the OK hand gesture (that has become a hate symbol) in a 2018 photo with congressman Devin Nunes, Fulfer insists he’s not a Proud Boy or affiliated with them. He doesn’t deny doxxing Splotch — but only, he says, after his home address and pictures of his kids were doxxed first.
In a recent Bee story, Fulfer denied making physical threats against Save the Tower protesters and others. However, in Fulfer’s own Aug. 29 video stream, the Clovis resident can be heard saying, “Next Sunday we need to get the patriots out here and take the corner back. … If these people need an ass-whoopin’, it’s open season.”
Which definitely sounds like a threat.
Southeast corner
The latest addition to the sprawling cast are homeless advocates led by Dez Martinez, founder of the local nonprofit We Are Not Invisible.
Why did Martinez decide to join the fray? She has a long-standing beef with Adventure Church (she claims church leadership “stole” large boxes of toys she collected in 2016 intended as Christmas presents for homeless children) and took issue with recent comments by a church pastor regarding mental health.
So on the morning of Aug. 29, Martinez and other advocates for Fresno’s “unhoused” arrived before 6:30 and pitched five tents on the sidewalk outside the Tower Theatre. Church officials responded by erecting six large speakers and blasting bland Christian rock right back at them.
Martinez’s group attempted the same thing Sept. 5, except this time the Fresno Police Department quickly removed the tents while citing and arresting four people for putting them up.
“We’ve looked at it and we feel like your tents and your presence here has heightened the situation for people coming to and from the church,” a police officer says in comments captured by Martinez on video.
Due to “the interest of public safety,” police moved the homeless advocates to the southwest corner of Wishon and Olive. However, Martinez claimed the southeast corner for her group when she arrived early Sunday morning. Why? It’s both shadier and directly across Olive from the Save the Tower protest so that neither like-minded group has to pass through the corner occupied by church supporters when they want to intermingle.
Northwest corner
The northwest corner is home to the Tower Theatre itself, a 1940s-style art deco monument with its covered foyer and 80-foot fluted prominence lit up at night in multicolored neon.
Added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1992, the Tower Theatre remains a pretty fantastic looking building. Which in Fresno is a rare feat.
During the weekly protests, the sidewalk in front of the theater is largely empty save for one or two sign-wielding Adventure Church supporters, hired security and a few church staffers keeping tabs on the goings on. (Most Sunday service attendees enter via the rear parking lot so as to avoid the protests.)
Every so often Anthony Flores, the church’s brash, outspoken lead pastor and a lightning rod for protesters, makes an appearance. Flores usually wears a beaming smile while taking photographs of the crowds gathered across the street and seems to relish the jeers and insults he receives.
Spotting me standing nearby Sunday morning, Flores cast a furrowed brow and asked, “Do I know you?” When I replied, “Yes, we exchanged Facebook messages. I wrote about you,” his manner abruptly changed.
“You’re the guy!” he exclaimed excitedly while pointing with his index finger. “I made you famous!”
With that, Flores retreated inside and sicced security on me. Moments later, three uniformed Fresno cops politely requested I move along.
All part of the act.
Supporting cast
● Fresno police: Between 16-18 officers are assigned to monitor the protest, according to Lt. Anthony Dewall, who supervises the department’s special events unit. Uniformed cops are stationed at all four corners.
Is the enforcement equal? That depends who you ask. Sunday, a 73-year-old northwest Fresno resident named Sandra showed me a picture of a citation she received Aug. 29 for … get this … “misuse of a (car) horn.”
We’re paying cops overtime to ticket 73-year-old grandmothers who honk their horns at a protest — while dozens of other drivers do likewise and don’t get pulled over?
Apparently so.
● Miguel Arias: Fresno’s City Council member for District 3 is a regular presence as he either walks or rides his bike along Olive on his way to purchase bread at a nearby Mexican bakery.
Careful to pass on both sides of the street, Arias never fails to rile up right-wing protesters who call him “Miguelito,” “Nazi” or by some racial epithet.
Arias says he’s just keeping tabs on the situation — the south side of Olive lies in his district — but certainly doesn’t go out of his way to avoid the confrontations.
● Bystanders: Believe it or not, there are people who visit the Tower District on Sunday morning who have no idea what’s transpiring. And even though you take time to explain the situation, they still look puzzled.
“Can you run through that again?” asked a visitor from San Luis Obispo.
Sure thing.
