Support needed for history and the arts

By Brian Sheridan

The Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) recently made headlines by announcing it is not bringing in enough revenue to cover operating expenses, resulting in a significant decline in its endowment from $36 million to $20 million. Subsequently, Eli Broad announced that Los Angeles philanthropists need to “step up” and match $30 million he’s put on the table to help save the museum. Heritage Square has a connection to this institution, as Blake Ferris, our former office manager, left us to take an exciting position with MOCA.

The troubles at MOCA are not unique, nor are they new. Non-profit organizations across the board are struggling, particularly to pay operating costs. In particular, historical societies and museums seem to have difficulties raising those hard-earned donations. This is one of the reasons we established the LA Heritage Alliance (laheritage.blogspot.com) at the first LA Heritage Day in March. The Alliance works to promote, teach and share information among historical organizations to make them stronger, well rounded and relevant to the communities in which they call home. The truth is that the vast majority of historical organizations lack the capacity to hire even one staff person – not because they don’t want to, but because they lack the fundraising acumen to make it happen.

Heritage Square Museum is not so different. Unlike many of our associates, we are “in the black”…but just barely. Like many of our associates, when we receive grants and large donations, they are almost always for special projects and programs, yet we struggle to pay our operating costs. This is why your memberships and donations are so important to us, be they $50, $500 or $5,000.

Our goal for our end of year campaign is to raise $25,000. For many organizations, this is a very modest sum, but for us, it is a mighty challenge. Not an arbitrary number, you may have noticed that we have not filled the vacancy left by Blake. If we can meet this goal, we can again hire an additional person, an essential objective for our 40th Anniversary. This will give us the capacity to do many things, not the least of which is celebrate our 40th Anniversary with 40 events and exhibits!

We ask you to make a gift today and help make 2009 a banner year for Heritage Square Museum!