A Regional Cultural Institution in Crisis

HOME PAGE ... https://qvmag2021.blogspot.com/
CONTEXT ... https://qvmag2021.blogspot.com/p/review-context.html
GOVERNACE ... https://qvmag2021.blogspot.com/p/governance-options.html 

Arriving somewhere that is to be 'home' for a while, maybe, a long while, places like the Queen Victoria Museum and Art Gallery (QVMAG) offer great promise in the 21st C. If you are hungry for history, or you are trying to get a fix on a place, the local museum is usually an OK place to go. 

In my case, the QVMAG's reputation that preceded my 'translocation', my first visit and the reality of being there, it is hard not to feel that this place is on some sort of downhill slide. It might even be a slippery slope? The reasons for it being so are quite probably to do with a whole lot of factors with COVID-19 being but one no doubt.

The LCC network's review obviously comes with a lot of history and the perspective that talks about "the paucity of governance" is worth a think. However, the atmosphere of antagonism that one is confronted with when "the QVMAG" comes up in conversation with ex-staffers is just a little alarming. It becomes more so when it's an ex-staff is antagonistic and in some cases prone to expound conspiracy theories. This is not healthy! This is bad people management!

In a 130 years this somewhat iconic institution has built what is reputed to be one of Australia's important 'cultural collections' and one that is reputedly valued at something like $230Million. A great many people have a great deal invested in the QVMAG and its collections. When one telephones the city council you are told that the council "proudly owns and operates" this museum. Should this cohort of councillors be proud of their work? I do not think so.

For people who think and read about this kind of thing they might have come across a story about America's  Detroit museum selling off its art in 2014 to get out of a financial hole. The story goes that not too long ago a General Manager in Launceston entertained that sort of thing but back then was put off by the prospect of community outrage. 

Interestingly, Launceston is in 'financial hole' right now. Basil Fitch, a longtime 'council watcher and critic', and ex-councillor, estimates that the City of Launceston is: 

• $32Million in debt and the prospect of it growing significantly must be considered as a looming threat; and
• That this debt transferred to the people of Launceston equals a $1K plus debt for each and every household and business premise in the city; and that
• Ratepayers' face a 4% general rate increase 2021; and that
• Fees and charges are likely to grow to an even greater extent consequent to executive salary demands and rampant bureaucracy growth; and that
• Consequent to all this, the threat of compounding and exponential rate rises for a decade ahead is a real prospect; and that
• Additional to all that, there is the very real prospect of general rate increases as a consequence of 'extraordinary property value creep' given current market circumstances. 

Some ratepayers may be able to accommodated the consequences of the city's burgeoning financial crisis and the changes at work in the Australian'Tasmanian economy, but so many will not. The ability to do so is largely dependent upon the social outcomes and the 'value' delivered upon by Council and councillors.

Against the debt background that the current cohort of councillors have contributed to in a very real way, most likely they would probably look away if any community asset was sold off if it could be achieved under the cover of administrative shadows and the commercial in confidence mantra. Likewise, if the assets were 'intangible cultural treasures' or 'irreplaceable scientific specimens', given their track record they would be equally likely to look away and be beastly careless in the end. Their legacy already looms over the city and it is already etched into its history.

When one digs deep into the QVMAG's institutional status one finds that over the years, Ray Norman's description of the QVMAG as a 'cost centre'  – AKA financial sinkholes – has certainly stifled this museum's ability to change and adapt to the 21st C context. In the way museums like it all over the world have changed – and had to – this one stands out as an exemplar of what 19th C museums used to be like. 

Launceston's Council, on the evidence, is populated with yesterday's people. The Council's administrative hierarchy has no idea, it seems, about what kind of people museums need to 'care for' cultural collections or indeed any idea about the 'value' invested in the collections. Unlike, regional museums and art galleries elsewhere in Australia, and elsewhere per se, the institution is not governed well away from their funding bodies – here the City of Launceston – with expert 'Trustees' at the helm accountable to their 'patrons'. 

In France Launceston's councillors would surely be seen as members of the 'petite bourgeoisie' and as dilettante. One learns quite quickly in Australia that in the vernacular there are less kind characterisations in the lexicon. In the Royal Wootton Bassett Academy in the village of my childhood there are similar 'put downs' shared around dinner tables and the like. 

Somewhat extraordinarily, Launceston's ratepayers invest annually in the institution and for the most part they do so willingly if not always knowingly. The bitter pill here is that, talking to ratepayers, friends of the institution, et al, the institution each year, is in recent years, falling away. These people are saying that despite their rather generous funding the QVMAG has been delivering less and less. The community's legitimate expectations seem to be given scant regard. And, that is with some ratepayers apparently contributing to a hidden levy in the order of almost 10% of their rate demand. In crisis terms this seems to be just the tip of the iceberg!

The unsolicited review assembled by the Concerned Citizen's Network, and linked to here, delves into the issues impacting upon the QVMAG's performance and it offers some strategic options for a way forward in regard to the institution's governance, management and funding. As a blow-in, and a Johny-come-lately sniffing around, it seems that the likelihood of the Good Burgers of Launceston being in anyway influenced by the review looks to be highly unlikely – and it shares all the prospects of a snowflake in hell by all accounts.   

The review draws on decades of focused research carried out by Ray Norman [1]-[2] and it is well known that he in particular has been lent a deaf ear. The Concerned Citizen's Network review delves into the issues impacting upon the institution's performance and it offers some options for a way forward for the institution's governance, management and funding. However, it seems that, collectively, the people who have been entrusted with an enormous number of cultural assets have abdicated that trust. They have gone AWOL, not to put too fine a point on it. 

Listening to anecdotal reports and rumours from 'QVMAG people', one will hear:

• That the recently departed, and somewhat newish Director was probably encouraged to apply for alternative employment;

• There has been a steady exit of key staff members like conservators, preparators, science collection managers and curators et al over time;

• That the manager of knowledge and content has, or is about to, resign; and

• That the place is a hollow version of its former self.

If this does not alarm a community that has been investing cash, cultural treasures and their histories in a place one has to seriously consider what might, that is short of self-immolation.

On its current administrative trajectory the QVMAG runs a real risk that it may well need to close its doors and and have its collections dispersed. How can ratepayers, or taxpayers for that matter, keep on paying to maintain an institution that shows all the symptoms of rudderless-ness and purposeless-ness for a minute longer? 

If you are a blow-in from another world, and you see an institution that has arrived at point where its future is dimming unless there is real change it is time to ring the fire bell perhaps.

Two decades into the 21st Century at the time of an institution's 130th Anniversary, and with all that has gone before, and what now seems plain to see, somehow ringing the alarm seems to be at the same time, a bit audacious, rude even, and quite probably pointless looking in from the sidelines as blow-ins do.

Luther Blissett 2021