Denton’s Fry Street Fair, the festival that built a reputation as one of Dallas-Fort Worth’s premier alternative music fairs over the past 28 years, will not return, ac­cording to the group that stages the fair.

A founding member of the Delta Lodge, an independent fraternity with headquarters on the edge of the University of North Texas campus, said the fair has been losing money and attendance for several years, and the time has come to end it.

DRC/Gary Payne

A worker cleans out the Delta Lodge house Wednesday on Fry Street.

“We just see this as a really good time to re-evaluate what Delta Lodge is all about,” said Todd Kaastad, a Delta Lodge founder. “It’s called ‘Delta’ for a reason — it’s about knowing to accept when change is necessary.”

Moreover, members of the Delta Lodge have moved out of the lodge at 1305 W. Oak St., a few steps away from Fry Street, and are seeking to sell the building and find housing elsewhere.

“The house and the fair essentially are distractions for us; it allowed some members to lose sight of the fact of what we were all about,” Kaastad said. “They didn’t help us achieve our goal of providing to charity, so we’re making some changes.”

Demolition of the main block of Fry Street begins Monday, to make way for new retail space and restaurants from Houston-based developer United Equities. A grassroots organization called Save Fry Street at­tempted to halt the development and save the 1920s-era buildings, but was unsucces­sful.

In 2002, the fair drew approximately 20,000 people to the area. Later that year, after receiving numerous complaints from residents and police about public drunkenness and vandalism, city officials told the Delta Lodge that the group could no longer hold a fair attended by that many people on Fry Street.

In response, in 2003 and 2004, members moved the fair to Dallas’ Deep Ellum, with disappointing results. In 2005 and 2006, a scaled-down version of the fair returned to Fry Street, and this year, the fair was held at the North Texas State Fairgrounds in Denton.

This year, Fry Street Fair actually lost money, Kaastad said.

“It’s at the point where it keeps us from doing what we’re meant to do, and that is give to charity,” he said.

Before zoning restrictions forced the fair out of Fry Street, the event would typically garner up to $25,000 for local charities, said Doug Cox, chairman of the Delta Lodge board of directors.

“All of our money went straight to people in Denton, but relocating the festival and losing money from it has made us reaffirm what we’re all about,” Cox said.

The Fry Street Fair and the Delta Lodge house used to be connected, literally.

“At the first fair, we ran extension cords up to our house to power the concert,” Kaastad said. “The house and the fair were fused together.”

City officials said the news surprised them, even though they’d heard the fair lost money in recent years.

“It’s part of Denton. It’s part of the thing that makes Denton what it is,” Mayor Perry McNeill said. “If that’s really true [about the festival ending] I hate that, but I can understand. That’s a really difficult activity to put on and make a profit out of.”

McNeill added that officials with United Equities had expressed interest last year in working with the lodge on future fairs.

City Council member Jack Thomson, whose district includes Fry Street, said he regretted that festival organizers couldn’t make money after the size of the event was restricted.

“I think it’s been a unique kind of event,” Thomson said. “Unfortunately, there have been some opportunities for young people to go overboard on drinking at these events, but I like the idea of having these events ... and I’m sorry if it is going to go by the board.”

Kaastad added that finding a new fundraiser could help breathe new life into the coed organization that doesn’t want to be pigeonholed into the “fraternity” category.

“We’re putting our house on the market, which could be the next charity promotion for us, but we won’t just sell it to anyone,” said Kaastad, who also cited the impending development of Fry Street as a catalyst for their recent call for change.

“The development did dry up a lot of the enthusiasm we have for our organization, because Fry Street was a lot different when we decided to rebuild the house three years ago,” Kaastad said, referring to the aftermath of the 1995 fire that burned down the former Delta Lodge house.

The current three-story house is valued at $435,994, according to a report from the Denton Central Appraisal District Web site. The 6,239-square-foot house, built in 2001, includes an open living space on the first floor with a commercial-size kitchen. The remaining two floors contain mostly bedrooms.

Kaastad also said that although the Delta Lodge will sell only if it receives the right price, the buyer will have to fit the mold as well.

“We’ve worked for 30 years to build up this house and this cause, so we’re not just going to move off our spot and have it be replaced by someone that’s pure profiteering. I’d really like to see it go to a student organization,” Kaastad said.

Cox said he feels the same way.

“I don’t want to see a cool building turn into a parking garage, seeing how we’ve spent so long building up good relationships with the neighbors,” he said.

Chris Flemmons, a musician and longtime Denton resident who joined Save Fry Street, said he drove past the building this week, wondering why the interior was “pitch black.”

After learning the news of the lodge’s departure from Fry Street, Flemmons said he was sad to see them leave.

“Obviously, there’s a whole big sea change going on in the Fry Street area,” he said.

Gene Hartman, owner of Campus Barbershop on Fry Street, said his Delta Lodge neighbors — known for their nighttime parties as much as for the annual fair — really didn’t bother him.

“I’m usually gone by then,” he said.

Hartman said he hopes someone will buy it and perhaps put a restaurant on the bottom floor. Whatever happens, Hartman said, it won’t be the same.

“It’ll be kind of different,” he said.

Brook Ray, who has produced music events including the WakeUp Festival in 2004 and 2005, blames city officials and populace in general for the demise of the Fry Street Fair.

“I understand how Denton wants to be up and coming, and thriving with business with all those new developers, and that’s great,” said Ray, a business owner. “But if you lose your sense of identity, as far as your grassroots movements, you become nothing more than a suburb without any character.”

Delta Lodge did make some mistakes in its operation of Fry Street Fair, she said.

“They’re kids, and putting on a festival takes an incredible amount of work,” she said.

But in fairness to the Delta Lodge, the city made it tougher, not easier, for them to put on the event, she said.

“The city, to me, doesn’t see any value in alternative music,” Ray said. “They don’t understand the thriving music scene going on at Secret Headquarters and Rubber Gloves,” two music venues in Denton.

“My heart goes out to the friends and alumni of the Delta Lodge,” she said. “But maybe something else is on the horizon for them.”

Both Cox and Kaastad believe that another house is in Delta Lodge’s future, but only for the right reasons.

“Should our organization not be able to give contributions to charity, then we will cash in our asset — that house — and give it all to charity,” Kaastad said. “It’s not a frat mansion for frat boys, and it never will be.”

Staff writers Dawn Cobb, Lowell Brown and Annette Fuller contributed to this report.

ANDREW BARGE can be reached at 940-566-6912. His e-mail address is abarge@dentonrc.com