Donation boosts museum

The Presidential Museum Board of Directors has accepted a large financial donation from local businessman John Bushman to pay off the museum’s debt and reopen sometime soon — perhaps in February.

Museum board members voted to take the money at a meeting Wednesday, but the decision is coupled with a move to pursue a long-term endowment of roughly $3 million. Interim board president Juan Alcantar said negotiations with UTPB for a complete transfer of museum operations and ownership to the school will continue and are not impacted by Bushman’s donation.

Alcantar said the endowment will be used exclusively for long-term operating costs in transferring the museum to the university, and donations are being sought from the public. The endowment is set up at Txbank and is called the Dorothy Croft Endowment Fund.

In the short term, Bushman’s donation will allow for the museum to open again. Alcantar said he hopes the number of museum memberships will increase as well, adding other revenue.

He said all members of the current board approved the motion to accept Bushman’s offer. The board’s makeup has constantly evolved since financial difficulties emerged a couple years ago, with current members including Alcantar, Gary Edmiston and Jack Westerfeldt. Alcantar said he hopes to grow the board beyond the legal minimum of three board members set by the secretary of state’s office.

“We are also interviewing for another member,” Alcantar said.

The museum will still negotiate to eventually turn over ownership to the university, which would operate the museum through the endowment and not from any taxpayer funding. UTPB is not legally allowed to use state funds to operate a museum and would have to instead turn it into an archive or similar institution that has less access for members of the public.

“We wanted to keep the collection intact and available to the public, and the major issue for both sides is how to do that instead of having it just be a collection of materials while allowing control by the university,” Alcantar said.

He said the move toward the university would mean staffing changes. Executive Director Lettie England has decided to retire, and advisory board member Charles Cotten has agreed to step in as a paid interim director starting in February. He said the current board would not remain if UTPB agrees to take over the institution, but some sort of advisory council would likely exist.

For his part, Bushman said he has agreed to supply the museum with debt repayment and operational funds in the amount of a “couple hundred thousand dollars.”

“My role is to help both sides here, to bridge the gap until there is a finalization of an agreement between the university and the museum,” Bushman said.

He said the funding won’t be a blank check and is intended only to provide enough financing to operate for the necessary time to raise the endowment and turn over the facility as an intact museum to UTPB.

UTPB President David Watts said he doesn’t know much about Bushman’s offer because it doesn’t directly involve the university, but he spoke with Alcantar late Thursday afternoon and was impressed with the decision to pursue an endowment outside university negotiations.

“It’s very intriguing, proposing an endowment that’s definitely needed. I can’t use state funds to operate a museum, but I can use non-state funds to do so,” he said.

Watts said having the university operate a museum is somewhat different from the original letter of intent between the school and the museum signed last fall, but negotiations will continue between both sides as a permanent solution is sought.

“Originally the thought was to operate it as an archive, so this is different. But, I look forward to discussing it more in detail,” he said. “I am certainly pleased at this news.”

Two-phase plan

The Presidential Museum is pursuing a two-phase plan to restart museum operations:

>> First, museum board members have accepted an unspecified amount of funding from local businessman John Bushman to both pay off debt and allow the museum to operate for what museum board president Juan Alcantar says may be a year or two, but hopefully a shorter time frame.

>> Second, in order for the museum to become self-sustaining, the museum will work to raise a $3 million endowment for the specific purpose of turning over operations and ownership to UTPB, cutting staffing costs in the process. The university still must sign off on any final proposal but has expressed interest in the idea.