
{"id":22107,"date":"2011-11-23T12:26:03","date_gmt":"2011-11-23T17:26:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.carrborocitizen.com\/main\/?p=22107"},"modified":"2011-11-23T12:26:03","modified_gmt":"2011-11-23T17:26:03","slug":"the-artscenter-cuts-deficit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/2011\/11\/23\/the-artscenter-cuts-deficit\/","title":{"rendered":"The ArtsCenter cuts deficit"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Caroline Corrigan <\/strong><br \/>\n<em>Staff Writer<\/em><br \/>\nThe ArtsCenter has made a tremendous financial turnaround since January, when the community arts organization was facing a deficit of $265,000. <\/p>\n<p>Since January, The ArtsCenter has taken several strategic measures to improve its financial situation, like eliminating the executive director and Youth Performing Arts Conservatory director positions, reducing the work week for some positions from 40 to 30 hours and cutting The ArtsCenter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s membership in several organizations.<\/p>\n<p>Jay Miller, The ArtsCenter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s interim director, said that the organization\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s initial financial struggle was due to its delayed reaction to the national economic downturn.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Things were really slowing down, but we still had all the expenses we had ever had,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said, adding that the organization didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make any real changes until about eight months ago. <\/p>\n<p>By spring, The ArtsCenter had managed to cut the deficit almost in half, to $130,000. The debt was further reduced in July when The ArtsCenter received confirmation of a $100,000 grant from the Nicholson Foundation. Shortly afterwards, an anonymous donor presented The ArtsCenter with a new financial challenge. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The donor told us that, if we could raise $15,000 from the community over a course of three months, then \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcI will match it,\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Julie Tomkovick, development director for The ArtsCenter. <\/p>\n<p>Tomkovick said this \u00e2\u20ac\u015315K challenge\u00e2\u20ac\u009d helped draw a lot of public attention to The ArtsCenter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s needs. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153We got in touch with our members and attendees by email to talk about the proposition,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Our goal was to raise $5,000 every month, and every month we came in a little bit ahead of our goal.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>The ArtsCenter ended up raising $21,000 by the end of the summer, which was matched by $20,000 from the donor for a grand total of $41,000. With the help of the community, The ArtsCenter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s staff and board successfully dug the organization out of the deficit it had faced at the beginning of the year. <\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was one of those things where, once we got the momentum rolling, everyone wanted to be a part of it,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Tomkovick said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It was something that people could really visualize as being successful.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n<p>Miller said in order to help ensure The ArtsCenter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s prosperity in the future, the budget will be downsized from $1.6 million to $1.2 million. Additionally, a search for a permanent executive director will begin in January. <\/p>\n<p>Overall, Miller said he is optimistic about The ArtsCenter\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s future.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a great organization with a great, hardworking staff,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Morale is higher than it has ever been. We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re on the right track.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ArtsCenter has made a tremendous financial turnaround since January, when the community arts organization was facing a deficit of $265,000. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[275,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-economy","category-community"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22107"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22108,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22107\/revisions\/22108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibiblio.org\/carrborocitizen\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}