Prepared Remarks of Laura L. Lott
President and CEO, American Alliance of Museums

Welcome session from Museums Advocacy Day 2023

February 27, 2023

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Hello, museum advocates, welcome to Museums Advocacy Day 2023!

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As many of you know, this is my favorite week of the year and I’m so thrilled we’re able to be together in person this year after two years of virtual advocacy. I don’t think there’s anything more empowering than walking the actual halls of Congress and making your voices heard. When hundreds of us come together to descend on Capitol Hill and make the case for museums, we can really see and feel the power of our alliance. No matter where you’re from, the type or size of your museum, or your political beliefs, this week we are united around one truth: museums are essential.

And we have one mission: make sure every Congressional office knows museums are essential to their communities, and they must be supported.

Museums are vital to their local economies and support jobs. Museums are vital to our struggling education system. And museums are vital to our communities’ welfare as people continue to recover from the past few years of pandemic isolation and loss, a deepening reckoning with social injustice, and deep divisions. Thank you for taking the time to make the case for museums. You are not only supporting your own institution and colleagues. Your work is helping museums all across the country.

The quote “80% of success is showing up” is attributed to Woody Allen. I find, increasingly, it’s really true. Thank you for “showing up” this week.It’s important that Congress hears from us, especially now. And it is truly amazing what we can accomplish when we come together.

 

Since this is our first in-person meeting since 2020, I wanted to provide a three-year recap in about three minutes. Since the start of the pandemic and our last in-person Advocacy Day, together, we secured over $3 BILLION in federal relief funding for museums.  This would not have happened without our efforts.

By ensuring museums were eligible for Shuttered Venues Operator Grants from the Small Business Administration and programs like the Paycheck Protection Program (none of which was a given during the pandemic), thousands of museum jobs were saved, countless education programs for school children and beyond were saved; and frankly, many people have told me it saved their museum from closing altogether.

Then, there was the funding through IMLS, NEA, NEH, economic development funds, and the Employee Retention Tax Credit (which some museums are just taking advantage of now).

In short, we saw unprecedented support from government leaders for our museums. But this support is not guaranteed without our collective efforts.

It is the persistent telling of our stories, sharing of our data, using our voices…showing up for Museums Advocacy Day, showing up in our calls and over 60,000 emails over the past few years responding to AAM’s Advocacy Alerts, and showing up in legislators’ offices back at home. That’s what led to unprecedented support when we needed it most.

The amount of financial support we received was historic — and mind-blowing. But it’s not just the relief funding.

In addition, the Office of Museum Services at IMLS has seen an 80% increase in its annual appropriations over the last decade. For the first time in history, OMS is funded at over $50 million. Our efforts are also evident in President Biden’s Executive Order (EO) last fall regarding “the significance of the arts, humanities, and museums and libraries to our nation.”

The President stated that they are “essential to the well-being, health, vitality, and democracy of our Nation.” He went on to say “They are the soul of America, reflecting our multicultural and democratic experience. They further help us strive to be the more perfect Union to which generation after generation of Americans have aspired. They inspire us; provide livelihoods; sustain, anchor, and bring cohesion within diverse communities across our Nation; stimulate creativity and innovation; help us understand and communicate our values as a people; compel us to wrestle with our history and enable us to imagine our future; invigorate and strengthen our democracy; and point the way toward progress.” This beautifully captures the power of museums and directly reflect the talking points we as a field have continued to reiterate. If these sentiments are not taken straight out of our field’s playbook about museum impact, I don’t know what is.

Echoing the Social & Community Impact priority in AAM’s Strategic Framework, the Administration called for museums to be integrated into strategies, policies, and programs across the government – health and wellbeing, education, tackling the climate crisis, lifting up and reflecting a greater diversity of voices and experiences, and all the most pressing issues our country faces.

The Executive Order also reestablished the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities, inside the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), raising IMLS’ profile significantly.

Our advocacy that museums have much to offer and a critical role to play in rebuilding our nation is being heard and it’s because we collectively as a field – have been showing up for 15 years…every year, and year-round!

You continue to make the case that museums aren’t just nice to have, they are essential. They aren’t just recipients of government and philanthropic dollars, they are economic engines contributing $12 billion in taxes annually and $50 billion to the US economy, pre-pandemic. The public isn’t ambivalent about museums – 96 percent of the public supports federal funding for museums! What else does 96% of the public agree on?!

It is the years of inviting legislators to show up at your museums–not just for the galas but to see them at work. It’s your persistent and active advocacy – consistently showing up – that has led to unprecedented support for museums. But we are not done. We cannot rest on our laurels for a single minute.

You have showed up here in Washington, D.C. at an important time – for our field and for our country. We are living in an age of anxiety, division, and contradictions. It’s more important than ever to use your voice and be heard. A few weeks ago, 81 new members were sworn into Congress. The 118th Congress is the most racially and ethnically diverse in history. The number of women in Congress is at an all-time high. Generation Z is now represented.

We have a divided Congress in every way. Congress is under pressure to show fiscal restraint after several years of pandemic spending. They desperately need to find some common ground. What percentage of the public did I say supports federal funding for museums?

Right – 96%!

Three of the four leaders of the appropriations committees we must work with are new this year. They have a lot to learn … and they are looking for trusted sources of information. As we know, there are few institutions more trusted than museums! So, we are not just making our voices heard. We are not just making asks. We are providing important and relevant information for our legislators to know as they begin a challenging term and make really tough decisions. Be a resource for your Congressional delegation – tomorrow and in the months ahead.

We know the pandemic has inflicted profound damage on US museums, the vast majority of which are 501(c)(3) nonprofit charitable organizations. It will take years for many museums to recover to pre-pandemic levels of staffing, revenue, and attendance. They need continued support. And yet, despite the tremendous financial and other stress over the last few years, museum professionals continue to demonstrate the critical role museums play in our country’s infrastructure, and many have deepened their museums’ community impact.

Tell your legislators how you served your communities in new and meaningful ways during the pandemic; how you’re bringing communities together and bridging divides; how you’re addressing mental health and learning loss and environmental sustainability and myriad other issues. Find out what your legislator is passionate about – and tell them how your museum is relevant.

Museums are vital to the nation’s recovery and to the rebuilding of communities, big and small, urban and rural, all across the country.

 

So, what are our asks for our members of Congress? Rule #1 of advocacy is to be sure you know your asks and you have two!

First, IMLS is the primary federal agency that serves museums. Its Office of Museum Services supports museums of every type by awarding grants that help us educate students, care for our collections, and connect with our communities.

Even at historically unprecedented funding levels, they cannot meet the demand from the field, funding only a small fraction of the highly rated grant applications it receives. We are asking for at least $65.5 million in FY 2024 funding for the IMLS Office of Museum Services (a much needed increase of at least $10 million) accounting for inflation and public need for museum services.

Ask your legislators to sign the OMS funding letter.

Second, on tax policy, legislators don’t always recognize that museums are part of the broader community of 501(c)(3) charities – and that charitable giving accounts for about one-third of museums’ operating funds, on average. Maintaining and increasing tax incentives for giving is therefore essential to the museum field.

The major tax incentive for giving is the tax deduction for charitable gifts, but it’s accessible to only about 10 percent of taxpayers because most people don’t itemize deductions. Bipartisan bills are expected to be introduced in both the House and the Senate to renew and expand the universal charitable deduction which expired at the end of 2021, leading to a marked drop in small donations.

Ask your legislators to be on the lookout for charitable giving legislation which would renew and expand the charitable tax deduction for taxpayers who do not itemize deductions.

My colleagues will go into far more detail on these “asks.” And you have your draft script. Given Congress’ focus on budget cuts this year, we’re keeping it simple – and focused on maintaining and growing the increased budget we’ve achieved for OMS over the past half a dozen years.

 

There are a few people I have to thank for our legislative successes to date – and for making sure we’re all prepared for tomorrow – and the year ahead. Please join me in thanking the amazing staff at AAM, led by the dynamic duo of Barry Szczesny, Government Relations & Public Policy Director, and Ember Farber, our Director of Advocacy. They work with government relations folks across the field and with all our partners and supporters of Museums Advocacy Day year-round to monitor and address issues of concern to museums. They make sure our voices are heard, not just on the OMS funding and tax issues we’re talking about this week, but on issues like NAGPRA and ensuring museums’ eligibility for earmarks…just to name two that AAM has been active in over the last few weeks alone.

And thank you to our corporate sponsors, Blackbaud and Flying Fish; our 43 partner organizations – especially the Association of Science Museum Directors as our co-convener; and the founding members of our Museum Leadership Circle. Their financial support to offset the expenses for this week, their input and advice, and their presence here are hugely appreciated and vital to making this all happen.

Finally, I’m grateful to all of you – especially those advocates who have been participating in Museums Advocacy Day for 5 years (raise your hand!) or 10 years (where are you?) or all 15 years (who has been showing up since the beginning?!)! I’m grateful to all of you for showing up – and for all the letters you sent and the calls you made. You clearly make a difference.

There are a few advocates in particular I’m pleased to recognize today…four 2023 Advocacy Leadership Awardees. Each year, these awards are presented to advocates who have demonstrated exemplary leadership in their advocacy for the museum field.

Please rise as I call your name:

• Vedet Coleman-Robinson, Executive Director of the Association of African American Museums
• Charity Counts, Executive Director of the Association of Midwest Museums
• Jason Jones, Executive Director of the Western Museums Association, and
• Bonnie Styles, Executive Director of our co-convener, the Association of Science Museum Directors

We are (and I am personally) honored to call them partners and friends to AAM and true champions for museums. I hope you will take the opportunity throughout these few days to congratulate these leaders and thank them for their dedicated advocacy for museums.

 

In closing, I want to leave you with two tips:

First, there are a lot of very contentious and very important issues facing our federal government these days, and there is great divide across our political landscape. But it is critical that, today, we focus on making the case for museums. The moment we start talking about other issues, we lose our chance to make the case for museums during Museums Advocacy Day.

Second, I know that this audience is not shy … I know you all love to talk about your own work and your own institutions. Please personalize and localize your stories as much as possible. AAM is constantly sharing information with decision-makers, and we’ll be working to secure support for those OMS budget increases long after tomorrow.

What we can’t do … what only you can do … is tell the local stories about your museums and why they matter to your communities.

Thank you for prioritizing and showing up to participate this week – and please don’t stop speaking up for museums when Museums Advocacy Day is over.

Together, we are a force! And there is no Alliance without you.