Met Admissions Policy Raises $2.8M For City Cultural Institutions

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — It has been one year since the Metropolitan Museum of Art enacted its new admissions policy mandating out-of-town visitors pay set entrance fees, and city officials announced that the new policy raised $2.8 million for cultural institutions in the city of New York.

More than 175 cultural organizations will have access to the funds through the city's revenue sharing agreement with the Upper East Side museum, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Monday. The city and museum entered the agreement in early 2018 and mandatory entrance fees took effect at The Met's three campuses in March 2018.

"New York is the cultural capital of the world not only because of our hallmark institutions, but because of the smaller museums, shows, and organizations throughout the five boroughs," de Blasio said in a statement. "They deserve meaningful investment too. This agreement has allowed The Met to thrive while giving us a unique opportunity to increase cultural investment in our underserved communities."

Of the $2.8 million raised by the revenue sharing agreement, half is earmarked for Cultural Development Fund recipients and the other half will be allocated to members of New York City's Cultural Institutions Group, city officials said.

More than 160 organizations received Cultural Development Fund grant increases from $1,000 to $40,000, city officials said. The 16 members of the Cultural Institutions Group received a larger chunk of the revenue, with funding increases ranging from $25,000 to $175,000.

The agreement between The Met and the city Department of Cultural Affairs also calls on the museum's annual subsidy to be permanently lowered based on admissions revenue. The funding cut from The Met's subsidy will be diverted to cultural organizations in underserved neighborhoods, city officials said.

"New York invests more in its cultural institutions than any other city in America," Cultural Affairs Commissioner Tom Finkelpearl said in a statement. "While the returns on this investment are nothing short of transformative for communities across the city, we’ve looked for ways to address historical lack of cultural assets and investments in underserved communities."

Visitors who are not residents of New York or students from New Jersey or Connecticut are required to pay entrances fees of $25 for adults, $17 for seniors and $12 for students under The Met's new admissions policy. Children younger than 12 are allowed to enter the museum for free.

The museum's long-standing pay-as-you-wish policy still applies to New Yorkers and students from the Tri-State area.

Museum officials said Thursday that the new admissions policy is both a win for the city and for the Met.

"The admissions policy is performing precisely as we hoped it would – our Museum is welcoming record levels of visitors, the increased revenue is supporting our always ambitious exhibition and education programming, and New Yorkers are continuing to enjoy pay-as-you-wish pricing. It is wonderful to see how the partnership that New York City and The Met began 149 years ago is bringing to our City even more support of arts and culture," Daniel Weiss, President and CEO at The Met, said in a statement.