1 week Ago
Children’s Museum and Theatre of Maine executive director Julie Butcher Pezzino on Friday, in Portland. Daryn Slover/Portland Press Herald The Trump administration has terminated a nearly $250,000 grant the Children’s Museum and Theatre of Maine was using for programs about Wabanaki culture and history. The Portland museum was awarded the money last year from the Institute of Museum and Library Services and was already deep in the process of developing a project that includes programs for schoolchildren and other visitors, curriculum support for teachers and a play adapted from a children’s book.
Then an email arrived late Wednesday night notifying Executive Director Julie Butcher Pezzino that the grant has been terminated, casting uncertainty on how the nonprofit organization will pay for the project. “It sort of feels like the rug was pulled out from under us in the middle of an important project,” she said. “It’s pretty brutal.
It’s a big loss in promised funds for an organization like ours.” The children’s museum is among the many museums, libraries and other organizations across the country that are now scrambling to deal with the loss of funding they depended on to operate. President Donald Trump signed an executive order declaring the Institute of Museum and Library Services, the primary federal support for U.
S. libraries and museums, “unnecessary” and vowing to eliminate or nearly eliminate it. Weeks later, he placed the federal agency’s entire staff on a 90-day leave.
This week, the Maine State Library laid off 13 staff members — nearly one-third of its staff — and closed for two weeks to restructure its operations because its funding from IMLS is indefinitely suspended, according to State Librarian Lori Fisher. Maine is among more than 20 states suing the federal government over its attempt to shutter IMLS. That suit also challenges Trump’s targeting of the Minority Business Development Agency and the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service.
The IMLS last year awarded $266.7 million in grants, research and policy development to museums, libraries and related organizations. Ayla Johnston and her brother, Jace Johnston, play a drum Friday at the Children’s Museum and Theatre of Maine’s Wabanaki Storytelling Through Art and Traditions playground at the Portland museum.
The Johnston family is visiting from Franklin, Massachusetts. The Wabanaki exhibit opened on Indigenous Peoples’ Day in 2023. Daryn Slover/Portland Press Herald The children’s museum was awarded the $224,143 Museums for America grant in August, the first time in two decades it had received a grant from the IMLS.
The museum had already received a $40,000 reimbursement from the grant funding and had requested another $15,000 reimbursement. But that second reimbursement never came and with Trump’s comments about eliminating the agency, the museum staff and board were worried about the funding even before it was canceled. “We had some concerns and suspicions, given the news and the termination of all the staff members at IMLS,” Butcher Pezzino said.
“That didn’t feel like it would bode well.” The museum had expected another $170,000 to $175,000 for the project, Butcher Pezzino said. A considerable amount of work had gone into preparing the funding request even before the grant was awarded, Butcher Pezzino said.
Since then, the museum has been developing a multi-faceted project including visits by artists and others from the Wabanaki confederacy to work with museum visitors, including school groups. The museum also planned to use the grant to offer professional development for teachers on Wabanaki studies curricula. Butcher Pezzino said there has been a lot of excitement around adapting a children’s book into an original theater production — a first for the museum.
The plan was to allow that script to be used by other museums around the U.S. The museum was in talks with a publisher and author and had hoped to start working with a playwright soon.
“This kind of learning is so critical to children’s healthy development, particularly making connections to our diverse and varied community members, including members of the Wabanaki confederacy, our new American families and the broad swatch of Americans that make up Maine,” Butcher Pezzino said. As it applies for other grant funding and fundraising opportunities, the museum intends to go ahead with some events already planned for this spring. That includes a program with Chris Newell, a Passamaquoddy educator and musician who creates an interactive mix of stories and traditional music for the audience, and Passamaquoddy storytelling with Dwayne Tomah.
“Even though the rug has been pulled out from under us, we’re not going to turn around and do that to other people,” she said. The museum has been in touch with Maine’s congressional delegation, all of whom oppose the termination of the grant and would like see it reinstated, Butcher Pezzino said. “Losing these dollars feels like a real loss of enriching education for our children.
It feels entirely unnecessary and unfair, particularly considering these funds were approved by Congress,” she said. “It feels almost unbelievable that we would suddenly be told we don’t have them anymore and our project has to stop immediately.” Children’s museum receives over $200,000 to advance ethnic studies Maine cultural organizations reeling from canceled grants, threats to funding Maine State Library lays off 13 workers, will restructure after losing federal funds We believe it’s important to offer commenting on certain stories as a benefit to our readers.
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