My cousin & non-profit management expert Scott Chamberlain continues to express astonishment at the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s Board of Trustee’s management style – or lack thereof:
“Some trustees say that prudence requires them to hold onto the $60 million endowment in case it’s needed to bankroll a future replacement orchestra. ‘The endowment trust was created to support the BSO or its accredited successor,’ Chris Bartlett, chairman of the Baltimore Symphony Endowment Trust, wrote in an email. (The emphasis on ‘or’ was Bartlett’s.)”
Wow. So that’s where the money is going. The trustees looking ahead to funding a newer, different orchestra.
Or to clarify, the trustees are choosing to withhold much-needed funds from a respected, venerable, 103-year old orchestra—choosing to actually force financial hardship on an organization they are charged with protecting—and when it folds, they’ll maybe support some sort of new orchestra that arises from the ashes.
This is monstrous.
Again, I don’t dispute that trustees have to take the long view. But they are supposed to take the long view of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra—the entity the endowment was created to support. Not the long view of some hypothetical group that may or may not exist in the future.
There are so many things wrong with this picture. Let’s start with the most basic, obvious questions:
- Would a new orchestra actually arise from the ashes? Isn’t that a hugegamble to take? Back during the Minnesota Orchestra lockout, many folks asked the musicians why they didn’t just create a new orchestra of their own? The answer was made clear again and again—it is supremely hard to create an orchestra from scratch. It requires a significant staff to get it up and running. It needs a place to rehearse and perform. It needs HR expertise to hire musicians. It needs significant capital to pay salaries, healthcare right from the start… or no one will come to work for it. And so forth. Why go through all that time, trouble, and expense when… there’s already an organization that has all these things?
I wonder if management is made up of conservatives matching the new definition of conservatives, and if the musicians are all liberals?
If you have an interest in symphony orchestras or non-profits in general, Scott is an excellent resource.
