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Q&A
DCLA oversight of Brooklyn Museum finances
0:16:46
ยท
3 min
Council Member De La Rosa inquires about DCLA's oversight of the Brooklyn Museum's finances. Commissioner Cumbo explains the process:
- The museum submits an obligation plan outlining how they intend to allocate their subsidy.
- Monthly payment requests and detailed expense reports are required.
- A year-end final report, including audited financials, is submitted.
- There are no strict restrictions, but the funding is typically used for front-facing and essential support staff positions.
- The city funding is often used for positions that are harder to fundraise for, such as security and maintenance.
- DCLA also provides $80 million in capital support for various city-funded projects at the museum.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
0:16:46
Are there any restrictions or guidelines within the Brooklyn Museum's contract about how expense fund the can be used for staffing?
Laurie Cumbo
0:16:55
We don't provide a guideline in the sense of saying this is a rule that the funding has to be spent in this way.
0:17:05
What we typically do, we have we give them an obligation plan.
0:17:11
Mhmm.
0:17:12
And we work within that obligation plan.
0:17:16
And I would say that it's typically used to cover front facing and essential support staff positions, security, maintenance, as it is typically easier to fundraise for program related staff and expenses.
0:17:31
So I would say that there are not restrictions, but at the top of the fiscal year, SIG submit a completed obligation plan, which outlines for the year how they intend to allocate their subsidy across organization expenses.
0:17:46
The city subsidy is paid out monthly, and SIG submit a monthly payment request for the upcoming month and a detailed expense report for the previous month.
0:17:57
The agency also requires a year end final report which includes a previous year of audited financials.
0:18:05
So I say that to say that it's more that they submit to us a monthly expense report in terms of how they're spending the money.
0:18:15
And then at the end, they have to do a final report.
0:18:19
And that final report outlines how they are spending money.
0:18:23
And Lance, did you wanna add to that?
Lance Polivy
0:18:25
We also just wanted to add that we currently are providing $80,000,000 in capital support to the Brooklyn Museum for various city funded capital projects.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
0:18:35
Okay.
0:18:36
I guess a follow-up.
0:18:37
What oversight does DCLA conduct over the Brooklyn Museum's finances, like all of the finances, before approving funding?
Laurie Cumbo
0:18:45
That would be the plan that I just outlined, which is the obligation plan.
Henry Garrido
0:18:49
Okay.
Laurie Cumbo
0:18:50
The obligation plan outlines how they intend to allocate their subsidy across the organization expenses.
0:18:57
But what organizations typically do is that they utilize that funding for the positions that are the hardest to fundraise for, security, maintenance, operations.
0:19:08
Foundations and corporations typically don't want to fund those types of salaried positions.
0:19:13
So many organizations utilize city subsidy for those very specific purposes, and then they would use a a portion of their budget for more programmatic expenses where they can fundraise for those.
0:19:26
Sometimes those do come under the city subsidy, but very rarely.
0:19:31
Because part of it also goes to the fact that for museums such as the Brooklyn Museum, it's very difficult to fundraise for the non sexy things that we say in the cultural world.
0:19:45
But also the challenge becomes on so many levels is that foundations, corporations, individuals, they like to give to a museum or a cultural institution that they feel is very successful, that they have something exciting going on.
0:20:01
So this circumstance that the Brooklyn Museum and many other institutions find themselves in is that when they have to do layoffs, when they have to downsize, that's really not the momentum that many organizations want to function from.
0:20:16
They wanna function from a place of high energy, great programming.
0:20:21
So this is a really precarious situation for the museum and certainly not one that they want to be in nor do we as an agency want to see this happen.
Carmen N. De La Rosa
0:20:31
Mhmm.