The smell of rot permeated the second floor of the abandoned senior center in Brighton on Oct. 18.
Black garbage bags full of dead leaves swung from the ceiling, mimicking slabs of meat on hooks in a butcher shop. Throughout the maze of darkness and cackling strobe lights, teenagers lurched through trap doors and screamed in agony while chained to the walls.
Downstairs, the opening credits of “The Exorcist” played on a projector screen.
“We wanted there to be a decaying sense everywhere,” said Brighton Youth Commission member Arik Ringsby, 14. “There’s a whole lot more detail, and it’s more intense this time.”
The Old Senior Center on 575 Bush St. closed Friday the 13th of January, 2012. Since then, the rooms of the 94-year-old building have been silent, except for two weeks before Halloween, when the Brighton Youth Commission turns the creaking, creepy space into Slaughter House.
“Last year, we used about four rooms,” Ringsby said. “This year, there’s about seven with the maze downstairs.”
Of those rooms, Ringsby said his favorite is the clown room — a winding, claustrophobic path lined with mirrors and ending in front of a giant Jack-in-the-box.
More than 30 years ago, that room was a bright, airy library where kids were not allowed to run shrieking down the hallway — especially not covered in blood.
The original building was constructed in 1919 as Brighton’s first city hall. After that, it became the public works building. All of the old pipes and circuit boards are still in the basement. It served as the Brighton Library before receiving a new extension in 1986 to become the senior center.
The Eagle View Adult Center opened in January 2012 and replaced the Old Senior Center three days after it closed.
The building’s fate has been a widely discussed issue among city council since then. The city commissioned an assessment of the building in February and provided the architect, Bret Johnson, with a list of possible future uses that they wanted to see some price tags on.
Johnson said city council requested projected expenses for repurposing the building into a performing arts studio, a space for the Brighton Youth Commission or a learning center for disabled students in the 27J School District.
“Those are easy enough,” Johnson said. “The building is in good shape, it just needs some attention because it’s old. Most of what we found can be categorized as deferred maintenance.”
A performing arts studio or hub for the Brighton Youth Commission would run between $25,000 to $30,000, Johnson said. Most of those costs are code updates. A space for the school district would be a bit more — something like $46,000 — which would also cover the necessary disability access modifications.
Overall maintenance repairs including a new roof, all cosmetic exterior restoration and any projects deemed as capital renewal items might be about $287,000, Johnson said.
The city council was split when it heard these numbers in August. Mayor Pro Tem Wayne Scott suggested the center be deemed a historic building, and so the council handed that idea over to the Brighton Historic Preservation Committee for further study.
Sheryl Johnson, Brighton’s city administrator, said the next historic preservation committee meeting is Nov. 14. She said the group will present its recommendations for the Old Senior Center to council Nov. 19.
If council wants to restore the building to its original state by removing the extension, it would cost a whopping $310,000. Johnson said most of that money would be used to install an elevator or other means of getting up to the second floor once the added stairway is torn out.
Right now, that stairway is the narrow entrance to the first room of Slaughter House, the haunted forest.
The 22-member Brighton Youth Commission has enjoyed using the open, empty space to create its house of horrors for the past two years, said Tawnya Russell, manager of Youth Services in Brighton.
This year’s seven-layer scare fest is thanks to a budget 10 times the size of last year’s $300. The youth commission uses all proceeds from the haunted house fundraiser for annual projects like Suicide Prevention Week and the National League of Cities conference.
“It was tight last year, but they made it work,” Russell said. “This year, they received a grant that was actually written by a youth commissioner and former youth commissioner to the Brighton Lodging Tax Committee and funded their own project.”
With the help of about 20 teen zombies, dead nurses and escaped mental patients, Slaughter House is a high school horror dream.
The terror continues for just two more days at 7 p.m. Oct. 25 and 26. Tickets are $10 at the door. Guests are asked to enter from the east door, if they dare.
Megan Mitchell: 303-954-2650, mmitchell@denverpost.com, or
