Slog Comments
Pratt Fine Arts Center Struggles and Needs a Change
3
The sad truth is that Pratt has been mismanaged over the past several years, and that is the reason why their fundraisers have plummeted far more this year than the economy has.
I love Pratt's mission and have taken several classes a year there since I moved to Seattle longer ago than I care to admit. I want Pratt to succeed, but I don't know if they can without confronting their skeletons. They expanded their facilities beyond their means during a recession which limited their ability to deal with setbacks. And their last set of leaders, who have all departed within the past year, left behind a huge financial mess - not least the fact that they employed many people to run their open studio days without pay.
Pratt's new leadership would benefit by being transparent about their finances and their compliance with labor laws, as a non-profit should be. A lot of their donors have been reluctant to re-up until these issues are addressed. Dig a little deeper into why so many of Pratt's program directors have quit recently - it will be more enlightening than these liberally-quoted press releases.
I love Pratt's mission and have taken several classes a year there since I moved to Seattle longer ago than I care to admit. I want Pratt to succeed, but I don't know if they can without confronting their skeletons. They expanded their facilities beyond their means during a recession which limited their ability to deal with setbacks. And their last set of leaders, who have all departed within the past year, left behind a huge financial mess - not least the fact that they employed many people to run their open studio days without pay.
Pratt's new leadership would benefit by being transparent about their finances and their compliance with labor laws, as a non-profit should be. A lot of their donors have been reluctant to re-up until these issues are addressed. Dig a little deeper into why so many of Pratt's program directors have quit recently - it will be more enlightening than these liberally-quoted press releases.
Comments (3) RSS