Walker Art Center has dismissed nine staff members as part of a strategic plan to balance its budget. The layoffs -- effective immediately -- include people who have served for more than a decade and represent a 6 percent cut, from 163 people to 154.
Ryan French, spokesman for the Minneapolis organization, said the strategic plan preserves the Walker's mission to "present art in an innovative way," but declined to say how it dictated specific cuts. "Reductions were made in a number of departments across the institution and everyone was impacted," he said.
E-mails from departing staff members flew around town Wednesday, most wishing the Walker well in bittersweet prose even as the writers fretted about their job prospects in a tough economy. Art installer Phil Docken, who was let go after 17 years, felt as though he'd been ejected from a close-knit family. "I have given so much of myself to that place and identified with its welfare so much that I feel powerless when I can no longer exercise my devotion to it," Docken wrote.
In the next fiscal year, starting July 1, the Walker plans to trim 8 percent from its operating budget, to $17.6 million. That knocks five years off the budget, taking it below the 2005-06 season when the Walker opened a new wing and ran up $18.9 million in operating costs.
The cuts follow two difficult years in which budget woes compelled the organization to suspend plans to expand its sculpture garden, eliminate staff through attrition, slim programs and freeze or reduce salaries.
It attributed the new cutbacks to the country's economic uncertainty, saying that, as with nonprofit organizations elsewhere, the Walker's endowment, earned income and charitable contributions "remain flat or have experienced a decline." French said the institution could not disclose those numbers until they have been audited after the fiscal year ends.
The Walker relies heavily on income from endowment investments and contributions from corporations, foundations and individuals. In fiscal 2008-09, for example, it derived 78 percent of its operating funds from the endowment and contributions. The rest was earned income from programs, gallery admissions, restaurant and shop operations.
Walker director Olga Viso will take a 10 percent cut in salary and benefits, her third in a row after a 7 percent cut this year. In fiscal 2009 she earned $393,000, according to Walker tax documents.
Three additional senior managers will lose 3 percent of their salaries. Salaries and benefits will be frozen for other staff.
Mary Abbe • 612-673-4431