The Jacksonville Area Museum operations appear to be running out of funds.
Rabbi Rob Thomas, president of the Jacksonville Museum Foundation, came before the Jacksonville City Council last night to discuss whether the city could assist with the museum’s operations cost and take on ownership of the old Post Office building.
Thomas acknowledged that a previous presentation by Alan Worrell and David Blanchette had surprised the city council with the request in November: “The history of the museum is a curious one. I know that a couple people from the museum board came before you and said ‘Hey, we have an ask.’ It was a surprise. It was a surprise to you. In fairness to them, it was a bit of a surprise to them. The museum has always been a city property. The building is owned by the Historical [sic] Society, but the museum itself, which means all of the assets of the museum – the historical bits – have always been city property for many, many years. That means again, that the board is a city function. The people that work at the museum. There is usually one there. It is paid under the city and gets city benefits. But, the city has not had to pay the rent, so to speak, because the Historical Society made a very generous decision some time ago: we have a pile of cash; we have no outlet for the cash; so, what we would like to do is we’ll buy the building, The Post Office, and we will pay the bills until such time that the money runs out.”
Thomas says that there was a lack of oversight on everyone’s part involved in the trust fund paying the museum’s bills because it was a gift from the Morgan County Historical Society to the museum: As a result, the Historical Society’s Fund is down to $2,461. That gives the museum 1.96 months, as of about four weeks ago, of operating cash. At that point, once that cash is depleted in a little less than two months, then the lights will go out. There will be no paying for the [natural] gas; there will be no paying for the electricity; there will be no paying for any of the incidentals that come with running a building. Remember, they are not paying for the construction. They are not paying for the renovations and the displays. This is just to keep the lights on. At that point, the City of Jacksonville will have a significant liability because you will be left with all of the artifacts, you’ll be left with all of the history and the stewardship of that history, and no operating capital to keep it safe. There will be no light. Once the lights go out, of course, the construction in there will stop. Everything will stop, and all of those items that have been collected over the years will sit in an unheated basement or ground floor. I would like to avoid this outcome.”
Thomas and his wife Lauren have proposed a generous cost-share program over the next three years with the city government to split the museum’s annual operation cost of $15,000. The Thomases said they would split the bills 50-50 in Year One, 60-40 in Year Two, and 75-25 in Year Three. According to Thomas’ proposal, their donation would then stop by the fourth year, and the city would then propose its own 100% funding mechanism.
City Attorney Dan Beard says that the city’s ownership of the building would boil down to exterior maintenance, utilities for the building, and insurance. A previous ask for a full-time manager of the museum to be open for more hours was a “want” but not a need in the initial proposal: “If you recall the discussions that we had when the Historical Society first came to the city with this offer, part of the advantage of [owning the building] there was thought that the city’s insurance policy could take over at perhaps at a lower cost than what’s out there now. It’s a city building. The city would insure it. The city would be responsible then for a fairly minor expense, but the outside maintenance – the yard work, snow removal, and so forth. Those are things, if the city would take ownership – granted it’s your building. If there is no money to pay for something, then the Foundation would have to decide whether if they were going to be able to pay for it or not. It was always I think the understanding that the Foundation was covering those major repairs and maintenance. It’s only the utilities and the outside maintenance and insurance that they were looking to you – the city council.”
The request appeared as a simple presentation before the city council with no expected action on Monday night. There was no indication by the council that further action would be taking place within the next month on the matter.