Crowley, Nicholson Sign Museum Deal
Deal commits county to $45 million in funding support for public museum replacement.
![Back row, left to right, Sup. Sheldon Wasserman, Dr. Ellen Censky, Sup. Felesia Martin, Sup. Jason Haas. Front row, left to right, County Exectuve David Crowley, Chairwoman Marcelia Nicholson. Photo by Graham Kilmer.](https://urbanmilwaukee.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/L1060404-1024x768.jpg)
Back row, left to right, Sup. Sheldon Wasserman, Dr. Ellen Censky, Sup. Felesia Martin, Sup. Jason Haas. Front row, left to right, County Exectuve David Crowley, Chairwoman Marcelia Nicholson. Photo by Graham Kilmer.
County officials gathered at the Milwaukee Public Museum Monday morning for the ceremonial signing of legislation that commits the county to borrowing $45 million to help pay for the public museum’s replacement.
Or, as Sup. Jason Haas put it at the signing, “what will be our next museum.”
This is putting the museum collections at risk, and it caused a national museum accrediting organization to pause the museum’s accreditation until a plan was formulated to secure the safety of the collections. Without accreditation, the museum would lose access to major sources of funding and likely go down a path to eventual closure, according to MPM and county officials.
That plan is a $240 million project to build a new 230,000-square-foot facility at the northeast corner of W. McKinley Ave. and N. 6th St. MPM officials recently said this facility will be called the Milwaukee Museum Complex, and it will house the Betty Brinn Children’s Museum and the future Wisconsin Museum of Nature and Culture, or what is currently known as the Milwaukee Public Museum.
The county’s $45 million will go toward the estimated $190 million construction cost for the new facility, which will no longer be publicly owned and will instead be owned by a new private entity incorporated to operate the museum. The county board approved the funding deal a week before the signing ceremony.
Dr. Ellen Censky, president and CEO of MPM Inc., said the deal between her organization and the county, inked Monday by County Executive David Crowley and County Board Chairwoman Marcelia Nicholson ensures the preservation of the county-owned collections entrusted to MPM Inc. and exhibited in the museum while also ensuring it remains an accredited institution.
County Executive Crowley said, “I believe that this museum is not only crucial to being an educational resource to everyone in this community and all of our residents, but it is a significant piece of our county’s cultural identity.”
“And I speak to that personally from the impact this museum has had on me as a young person,” Crowley said, adding that he thinks it’s important that his own daughters, and future generations, can continue to experience the museum.
“Milwaukee Public Museum is special to me,” she said, “as a little girl growing up in the 53206 zip code, it was a place where I could open my eyes and expand my horizons and see that there was more than this small community that I grew up in.”
Sup. Haas, chair of the board’s finance committee, said, “This institution is being renewed and reimagined and reenvisioned for future generations of Milwaukee and Wisconsin.”
More about the New Natural History Museum
- MKE County: What Will Be Done With Existing Public Museum Building? - Graham Kilmer - Aug 7th, 2024
- Indigenous Artist Creating Art Installation For New Public Museum - Graham Kilmer - Aug 1st, 2024
- MPM Holds Groundbreaking for $240 Million Museum - Graham Kilmer - May 7th, 2024
- Construction of New Museum Scheduled for Summer - Graham Kilmer - Mar 12th, 2024
- Museum Begins Epic Task Packing Collections - Graham Kilmer - Feb 27th, 2024
- New Federal Rules May Require Public Museum to Remove Some Exhibits - Graham Kilmer - Feb 2nd, 2024
- MKE County: Public Museum Experiencing Frequent Maintenance Issues - Graham Kilmer - Dec 14th, 2023
- MKE County: MPM Needs $35 Million To Begin New Museum Construction - Graham Kilmer - Dec 12th, 2023
- Public Museum Gets New $2 Million Donation - Graham Kilmer - Oct 17th, 2023
- Eyes on Milwaukee: After $15-Per-Hour Pledge, Museum Gets Zoning Change - Jeramey Jannene - Jul 31st, 2023
Read more about New Natural History Museum here
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