City's help needed for Museum On Main City's help needed for Museum On Main (February 03, 2006)

by Jeb Bing

T here’s no shortage of enthusiasm among the 100 volunteers and 20 members of the board of directors of the Museum On Main, but unless the city or some generous corporations come forward with financial support, this caretaker of Pleasanton's history could be forced to close sometime next year. Founded in 1963 as the Amador-Livermore Valley Historical Society, the first museum was located on the Fairgrounds. In 1984, the city of Pleasanton offered the society its old City Hall and Police Station at 603 Main St. for the museum. Two years ago, after the city of Dublin decided to fund its own museum and the Livermore interests also left, the ALVHS, a cumbersome name to start with, decided it was primarily Pleasanton focused and renamed the landmark building it occupied the Museum On Main.

In recent years, with a new board and a full-time director, Terry Berry, the museum has become much more aggressive and diversified in its public activities, exhibits and presentations. Its two highly-popular "Udder" events raised tens of thousands of dollars for the Alviso Adobe restoration off Foothill Road, money given to the city for a project yet to be built. Two stellar events drew record crowds: the Phoebe Apperson Hearst exhibit and a private collection of Ansel Adams photos. Other events also have been attracting the public. They have included: "Those Who Serve," a military exhibit about what families did while their loved ones were off at war, ghost walks and presentations each year by historian Charles Huff, and sold-out Ed Kinney Memorial Lectures almost every month. That sounds like a museum on a roll, but quite the opposite is true.

The grim news is that despite these events, costs are rapidly eating into income with a projected deficit this year of $19,500. There's not enough money in reserves or revenue projections to replace Berry, who has worked for just $21,000 a year on a temporary basis and will leave Dec. 31. A full-time qualified museum director would cost a minimum of $50,000 a year plus benefits. At a strategic planning session last week, Berry and Board President Jim Allen talked about cutting back on events to one a year and even renting out one of two large exhibit rooms in the museum building to the Pleasanton Parks and Community Services Department for community classrooms. Those aren't steps forward that will draw new members or raise needed revenue.

Since the early 1990s, the city government has provided an education grant of $12,000 to help the museum cover the cost of hosting Pleasanton school children, a program that now sees nearly 3,000 students a year come through the museum for Pleasanton history lessons. The museum needs more than that now, and it's time for the city to step to the plate, as Dublin has done, to recognize the value of a museum in town and pay more of its costs. One suggestion would be for the city to apply the $18,000 in direct funding it paid to the Tri-Valley Convention and Visitors Bureau, a city expense no longer needed since it and the cities of Dublin, Livermore and San Ramon approved a hotel room tax to make the CVB financially self-sufficient. A tax is an option the Museum On Main doesn't have, which is why it needs the city's support to stay open.

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