0.8 Chapter six: attempting a turnaround, 1988-1992  (Page 15/19)

Although the loan solved the Society's immediate cash problem, it did not begin to address the long-term structural financial problems Debs had first dis­cussed in her 1989 year-end report. Debs was further handicapped in her efforts to correct the Society's financial situation by the fact that she had been unable to replace her financial vice president, who resigned in September 1990. The Soci­ety was unable to find a qualified candidate willing to take the position at a salary level the Society could afford to pay.

By March 1991, the treasurer reported that the Society had incurred an operating deficit of nearly $2.5 million over the first eight months of the fiscal year and "that the forecast for the final three months .. . was still bleak." To make mat­ters worse, the Society learned that the National Endowment for the Humani­ties had declined its application for a major challenge grant. The Society had been optimistic about its chances of being awarded the grant, and the news was an enormous disappointment to Society leadership. In addition, there was no reason to be optimistic about receiving operating support from the city. With the passage of time, fewer and fewer options remained for the Society to dig its way out of its financial predicament. The combination of continuing operating deficits and the addition of $1 million of debt forced the board to question the Society's long-term viability as an independent institution. Under the cover of strict confidentiality, the focus of the Society's leadership shifted from overseeing the implementation of the bridge plan to investigating whether a more radical solution might be fea­sible. Some ideas under consideration included merging with another cultural entity, affiliating with an educational institution, moving the Society to a less expensive location, and closing the Society.

As the board focused on assessing long-term options, the Society's staff con­tinued to implement the programmatic initiatives laid out in the bridge plan. Major work continued on the comprehensive collections management plan, especially for the Society's museum collections. The Society's collections of paintings and drawings, sculptures, decorative arts, and silver had been surveyed, cataloged, and had undergone conservation treatment. Work continued on the architectural draw­ings, especially the Cass Gilbert collection, and on the monumental task of sur­veying, cataloging, and storing hundreds of thousands of prints and photographs. Library staff was in the process of preparing a five-year conservation plan based on the results of a general library collections survey conducted by Hendrik Edelman of Rutgers University.

By gaining control of its collections, the Society hoped to be better positioned to offer exhibitions and educational programs. An example of this strategy was the Luman Reed Gallery. Five years in the making, this gallery was "the first in a planned series of interpretive re-installations of the permanent collections, inte­grating Museum and Library materials according to carefully conceptualized, hu­manistic themes." Using period furniture and other objects from the decorative arts collection, along with books and manuscripts from the library, and of course, the paintings from Luman Reed's collection, the gallery was a re-creation of the private gallery that Reed maintained in his home on Greenwich Street in 1832.