The Greenwood Playhouse, which has housed the Cascades Theatrical Company since the 1980s, will continue to be owned by the nonprofit.

But that’s not all.

CTC has returned to its original structure: an all-volunteer organization.

When the theater opened in 1978, there were about 400 members and more than 600 season ticket holders, according to the theater’s archives. Today, those numbers have dropped significantly, and some members attribute the change to paid staff replacing volunteer involvement.

The theater was financially struggling to maintain operations because membership and ticket-holder numbers were down, said CTC board members. In an effort to save the theater, the CTC board arranged a tentative deal to sell the theater’s only asset — the Greenwood Playhouse — located at 148 N.W. Greenwood Ave. in Bend. But several members disagreed with the decision. So the board decided to leave the sale up to a membership vote.

However, before the meeting was held, the deal was taken off the table, said CTC board member Keith Clinton. A reorganization followed that included cutting paid staff and the resignations of board member Martha Samco and board chairwoman Marie Bernardy.

Clinton said the theater paid staff for office work during the past 20 years, which contributed to the operating debts the theater accrued. To help the theater with immediate expenses, Clinton said a couple, who have been long-term CTC supporters and wanted to remain unidentified, made a $10,000 interest-only loan to CTC.

“Out of fiscal necessity, we realized there wasn’t enough money to run the outfit the way we had been with employees,” he said. “So we’re hoping with an all-volunteer situation here, if we have enough people … we should be able to get in the black pretty soon in this coming year and sustain it all the way through as an all-volunteer organization.”

Jane Williamson, an actor and member of CTC who has been involved since the start, said she thinks the shift back to a volunteer operation will breathe new life into the community theater.

“The reality of it is the heart of the theater, when it was first started, … was kind of stripped away over those years. And I really, really believe it will come back,” she said Thursday. “The feeling of working as a group to create a show, or create an event, will come back. We just folded and stuffed envelopes last night … and it was so nice.”

On Friday, CTC opened its production, “The Fox On The Fairway,” which is scheduled to run through the rest of the month Wednesday through Sunday. And at 5:30 on June 25, CTC will hold a public meeting at the First United Methodist Church for those interested in getting involved with CTC.