Kennedy Center lays off entire orchestra hours after receiving $25 million taxpayer bailout

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It’s how the left rolls.

Kennedy Center abruptly lays off entire orchestra hours after receiving $25 million taxpayer bailout

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts informed musicians with the National Symphony Orchestra on Friday that they would be laid off next week, just hours after the Kennedy Center received a $25 million bailout from the federal government on the taxpayer dime.

By: The Blaze, March 28, 2020:

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The nearly 100 member symphony will no longer receive paychecks after April 3, an email obtained by the Washington Free Beacon said.

“The Covid-19 Advisory Committee was broadsided today during our conversation with [Kennedy Center president] Deborah Rutter,” the email said. “Ms. Rutter abruptly informed us today that the last paycheck for all musicians and librarians will be April 3 and that we will not be paid again until the Center reopens.”

“Everyone should proceed as if their last paycheck will be April 3,” the email continued. “We understand this will come [as a] shock to all of you, as it did to us.”

The email went out to members on Friday evening, shortly after President Trump signed the $2 trillion CARES Act, a stimulus package intended to provide relief to people left unemployed by the coronavirus pandemic. Congress included $25 million in taxpayer funding for the Kennedy Center, a provision that raised eyebrows from both Democrats and Republicans, but ultimately won support from President Trump.

The bailout was designed to “cover operating expenses required to ensure the continuity of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and its affiliates, including for employee compensation and benefits, grants, contracts, payments for rent or utilities, fees for artists or performers,” according to the law’s text. The arts organization decided that the relief did not extend to members of the National Symphony Orchestra, its house orchestra.

The Kennedy Center is currently scheduled to re-open on May 10. But that may not happen given COVID-19 projections. If the center is closed beyond May, the musicians would also lose their health insurance.

Ed Malaga, the union leader who represents the musicians, blasted the move as possibly illegal.

“This decision, from an organization with an endowment of nearly $100 million, is not only outrageous — coming after the musicians had expressed their willingness to discuss ways to accommodate the Kennedy Center during this challenging time — it is also blatantly illegal under the parties’ collective bargaining agreement. That agreement specifically requires that the Center provide six weeks’ notice before it can stop paying musicians for economic reasons,” he said, the Washington Post reported.

Rutter defended her decision, saying the “layoffs may seem drastic, however, we know the only way through this is for all union and non-union employees to participate in the solution.”

According to the Post, Rutter said the taxpayer bailout would “provide long-term cash flow for essential personnel to ensure that we can reopen the Center and re-employ our staff and musicians.”

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Glen Benjamin
Glen Benjamin
3 years ago

You can bet this Rutter lady is still getting a paycheck and a large one too. Plus I heard Trump and pimpernel approved more foreign workers on visas. After crisis Americans will need more jobs than ever.

AR154U☑ᵀʳᵘᵐᵖ DEPLORABLE 2020
AR154U☑ᵀʳᵘᵐᵖ DEPLORABLE 2020
3 years ago

” BRING ON THE GREAT RECESSION !! ” comment image

MuhamMUDTheFakeProphet
MuhamMUDTheFakeProphet
3 years ago

Maher, Carlin and Penn Gillette the object lessons in cowardly excremental atheist amorality.

Catskills39 .
Catskills39 .
3 years ago

The term is Edumacated – not educated — unless you are thinking like in the classic movie (The Time Machine) where the minions would just go with the flow instead of individual thinking and comprehension.

taxpayer22
taxpayer22
3 years ago

Did Pelosi get her kickback ?

cylde
cylde
3 years ago

Racist organization, i think there may be only one black in the pictured group and no Asians.

ed
ed
3 years ago

So, they needed the $25 Mill…….WHY ???

MuhamMUDTheFakeProphet
MuhamMUDTheFakeProphet
3 years ago

Just another symptom of the dying atheist West.

Alexandra Sulecki
Alexandra Sulecki
3 years ago

This is outrageous. First because democrats got this PORK added to the stimulus bill and second for the center not turning around and helping their employees. Sad and Sick.

Mathew M
Mathew M
3 years ago

You can be assured Nancy Pelosi, got Paid. This is about the most disgusting excuse for a Human Being you can find in our Government.

Catskills39 .
Catskills39 .
3 years ago

When you have the illegal ex-President and it’s manager the Iranian piece of _____ Jarrett as now running the Kennedy Center, what do you expect? Instead of Americans who knew of the Kennedys legacy and of the ongoing yearning for true art (music, dance) you will get the opposite. The last administration never cared for the American people. Only the illegals and the terrorists. Never forget Benghazi! Never forget our departed who somehow ended up voting for the illegal!

Don39
Don39
3 years ago

Make it an emergency holding facility!

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