Just a few months ago, everything seemed to be coming up roses for NIMBY despite a fire that forced the arts collective out of its longtime space on 28th Street in West Oakland. The industrial art performance collective carted off colossal metal sculptures, shipping containers, torches and all to East Oakland in January.

The new 64,000-square-foot warehouse in an industrial zone off 85th Avenue was bigger and better, and Oakland rolled out the red carpet to help the collective relocate. Burning Man devotees and industrial artists everywhere could celebrate the support that one of their own received from a municipality.

But not for long, providing once again an example of how surprisingly hostile bureaucracy can be to the weirder species of the art world spawned by Burning Man.

Now NIMBY is passing the hat, so to speak, while the group navigates the maze of city permits for its new space — a process that has cost about $30,000 so far with only a glimmer of light in the far distance.

"We can't do this without support from the greater community that appreciates the art we make," said NIMBY business manager Rachael Norman. "We need money. We are pushed to the end of the line."

The shift from honeymoon to hair pulling began before NIMBY hosted the East Bay Rats' annual "Fight Night" without a permit. They were told incorrectly that they could not apply for one. The event is rowdy but harmless, just like the East Bay Rats

But it was big and noisy and a little too well-publicized, drawing in city officials and the police. So much for underground.

NIMBY held the Fight Night fundraiser because the organization was hemorrhaging money by the second — the move cost $65,000 — and the permitting process was moving at a glacial pace. After nine months, the group still has not been able to get the certificate of occupancy required for every business operating in Oakland.

The first step, a fire inspection, took six months alone. In the meantime, keeping the lights on and the doors open costs $20,000 monthly. NIMBY relies on donations and rent from tenants.

Now NIMBY is caught like a hamster in a bureaucratic Habitrail.

Every time the group clears one hurdle, the city throws up another one, founder Michael Snook said. "If you answer one thing, it triggers another question," he said.

Norman compared the process to Sisyphus. Except NIMBY is rolling the boulders of multiple city departments up the mountain — only to have them roll down again in all different directions.

One of the most intractable hurdles is how to define NIMBY and what it does. Choose door No. 1 for cultural; door No. 2 for entertainment, education or sports.

NIMBY's "Mad Max meets the mad professor on stilts playing a flaming accordion" aesthetic is hard to pigeonhole. Artists like Feng Jin work there, pounding sheets of metal into sensuous three-dimensional sculptures. Others create custom-made golf carts for Burning Man.

Yet while still in West Oakland, NIMBY was host to "Spike's Vampire Bar," "Lost Vegas" and Interpretive Arson's "Dance Dance Immolation." (Imagine playing Dance Dance Revolution with shooting flames.)

City officials demanded NIMBY prove that all its activities would be limited to cultural or else pay a steep price for permits that would allow them to walk through door No. 2. But no one would provide a definition of what cultural is, Norman said.

Well, here is the definition: Art is OK, but parties like Fight Night are not.

Large-scale events are not welcome in that part of East Oakland because they are seen as a disruption to neighbors and a distraction to the overloaded Police Department, according to city officials.

The NIMBY warehouse is zoned for industrial uses, but that zone butts up against new and planned housing developments and a future library. NIMBY and the city discussed these issues before they signed the 10-year lease. But NIMBY's performance-art profile is running smack into plans to revive a troubled district.

Given the collective's name, it's ironic that NIMBY is getting a "not in my back yard" treatment, especially when they could help improve the area.

This is a tough one. The city is changing, as are cultural aesthetics. Oakland has to think about how to keep Oakland a real city, one that is lively and dynamic, instead of squeezing the weird and wild out of the city.

"If we prevail," Norman said, "we'll pave the way for others and make Oakland a better place for the arts."