layoffs @ the met

03/12/2009
Layoffs In Store For Metropolitan Art Museum
By: Ty Chandler


Hundreds of museum workers will soon be out of work as the Metropolitan Museum of Art tightens its belt in the face of tough economic times. NY1's Ty Chandler filed the following report.

Museum patrons with deep pockets arrived for a gala benefiting the Metropolitan Museum of Art Thursday evening -- but not even those donations will be enough.

"The Met's been compelled to take some very unpleasant steps to get its budgetary house in order," said Harold Holzer, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Those steps include layoffs with the first round coming next week.

"We are going to have to keep up our service to the public with a leaner staff operation," said Holzer.

"It's going to be very unfortunate that the NGO's and the private sector and organizations that promote the art are going to hurt quite a bit," said Fred Ameri, a museum patron.

"Coming to the Met every Sunday is one of my personal favorite hobbies. However, sometimes you have do what you have to do to make ends meet," said Jonathan Yaraghi, a museum patron.

The Met's retail shops will be hardest hit. The South Street Seaport Store is already closed and more stores around the country will soon follow.

About 74 jobs from the merchandizing division will go with those stores. This spring, 10 percent of the Met's 2,000 remaining employees will also be out of a job.

Holzer says after the Met lost $800 million of its nearly $3 billion endowment last year and with more losses already in 2009, they had no choice but to cut back.

"This bad market will be felt in the budget and appear in the budget for years to come," said Holzer.

Holzer says the twists and turns of the financial markets still won't wipe away the richness inside the Met.

"In the end we are sort of impermanent. The art and the institution are forever and I think we are all, in a way, consoled by that," said Holzer.