San Francisco’s Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) is the latest in a wave of major local arts organizations forced to make sweeping cuts as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Chief Executive Officer Deborah Cullinan said she had to let go 27 of her 71 employees, roughly one third of YBCA’s staff, on Tuesday. She said most of the layoffs are for full-time positions, with a few part-timers in the mix, and the majority of the losses are in the event-production field.
“The positions that we are losing are those associated with being able to open our spaces and produce meetings and conferences and performances,” Cullinan said in an interview with KQED.
Dependent on live event ticket sales, space rentals and grants, YBCA lost $3.5 million in gross revenue this past fiscal year, and anticipates almost twice as much of a shortfall in the coming year.
“This announcement reveals the impossible choices YBCA and other organizations are facing,” said Emiko Ono, performing arts program director for the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, one of YBCA’s funders.
