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Q&A
Council member discusses union concerns and potential solutions with Henry Garrido
1:06:09
ยท
4 min
Council Member Carmen N. De La Rosa engages in a Q&A session with Henry Garrido, discussing union concerns about the Brooklyn Museum layoffs and exploring potential solutions. They cover topics such as increased workload, job insecurity, and safety concerns for remaining staff.
- De La Rosa inquires about the museum's financial transparency and the union's efforts to prevent layoffs
- Garrido emphasizes the need for exhausting all options before resorting to layoffs
- Discussion includes potential alternatives like furloughs, voluntary contributions, and creative scheduling
Carmen N. De La Rosa
1:06:09
Have remaining union members raised concerns about increased workload or job insecurity following the layoffs?
1:06:15
How's the morale?
Henry Garrido
1:06:16
Oh, absolutely.
1:06:17
Not only that.
1:06:18
About safety.
1:06:19
Look.
1:06:19
The one of the issues that we are facing now, like, in the past is increased concerns about safety in the museum, Especially when you have those concerts and events that I mentioned that were part that were not part of it.
1:06:31
So now you not only have to cover a door, you have to cover two doors.
1:06:35
Now you have to clean more spaces that you're not gonna be able to do.
1:06:40
Now you're gonna be able to slow curation of exhibits.
1:06:44
So absolutely, right?
1:06:47
You know, you often hear the depression you gotta do more with less.
1:06:50
This is doing less with less.
1:06:51
Like, there's no question about it.
1:06:54
But safety is one of the paramount concerns.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
1:06:57
That makes a lot of sense.
1:06:58
Has the museum shared detailed financial records with the union to justify the layoffs that the layoffs are unavoidable at this point?
Henry Garrido
1:07:07
No.
1:07:08
They've shown us numbers.
1:07:10
They throw numbers at us.
1:07:12
But as you heard from the commissioner herself, the city's contribution has increased.
1:07:18
We know expenses have increased.
1:07:20
We know that, you know, we're not per bit, you know, we're not blind to the idea that inflation has hit all of us increasingly.
1:07:30
But it wasn't like the workers got a million dollars in races.
1:07:34
You know what I'm saying?
1:07:35
Is if you look at the rate of inflation, what we got was significantly less than the rate of inflation by way of increases.
1:07:43
So and somehow the workers always kept playing for this.
1:07:48
So no, we haven't that would be something that we would be using.
1:07:52
Hopefully, cooler heads prevail, and we're going we're going to try to work something out.
1:07:59
Mhmm.
1:08:00
But we have not seen any written financial statements that go back.
1:08:04
They did said to us that the deficit that they've been facing goes back to 02/2015.
1:08:12
And that every year, they've had a mounting deficit until we re hitched '8 '16, where we're able to balance it for a couple of years through those actions, and then it went back up.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
1:08:23
Do you believe well, obviously, you believe that there could be further cuts in the future.
1:08:28
What protections are in place to to prevent impact on staff?
Henry Garrido
1:08:33
Well, you know, one of the things I'm gonna question is when we did this layout, this collective bargaining agreement, we had an understanding there would be no layoffs in that process.
1:08:43
And that goes to the administration and to the mayor himself.
1:08:47
So we're gonna be reminding him of that.
1:08:49
Now this is not a city agency, so they would probably take the position that doesn't apply, and that's probably true.
1:08:55
But I think there's there's also there's also a responsibility by city in the city hall to say the Brooklyn Museum is servicing our constituency.
1:09:06
Right?
1:09:06
So they can't get away with saying, well, things are going up in expenses.
1:09:10
Because I think that's gonna happen in other museums.
1:09:12
We hear in Guggenheim may face this.
1:09:15
We went through this with the Brooklyn Academy of Music to your question and we worked through that.
1:09:21
We have furloughs there.
1:09:22
We did some cuts.
1:09:24
We were able to figure out.
1:09:26
They offer workers a buyout.
1:09:28
They were able to bring in new people at a lower wage.
1:09:30
There are alternatives to layoffs.
1:09:32
And not just to say we're informing you within thirty day notice.
1:09:35
This is it.
1:09:36
No matter what happens, no matter what the city council does, we're just gonna lay them off.
1:09:41
So there are there are opportunities to work around this.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
1:09:45
And what about, I mean, it's been brought up in this hearing a few times about the
Laurie Cumbo
1:09:49
other SIGs.
1:09:50
Are you all is The I'm sorry.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
1:09:52
Can The other SIGs, the other cultural institutions, the members of the other cultural institution groups?
Henry Garrido
1:09:57
We've worked out with the others to prevent the idea of layoffs as well.
1:10:01
Okay.
1:10:01
The Museum of Natural History, for instance.
1:10:03
We worked to minimize the cost of pension, for instance, on CIRS.
1:10:07
With the MET, we had a discussion and changed the way in bargaining, the way we there are ways you can do it if you approach it from us with the perspective of the union being partners.
1:10:17
Mhmm.
1:10:18
Not somebody you telling what's gonna happen.
1:10:22
We need the museum to do the same, and we need the administration to be part of that process.