Shuttered nonprofit cultural organizations seek federal loan lifeline

On Friday morning, Vince Stango, the chief operating officer of the National Constitution Center, discovered what many have wanted, many have sought, but few as yet have obtained: a check from the federal government linked to the pandemic.

The Constitution Center, located on the northernmost block of Independence Mall and closed since March 14, had seen early on that there would be a need for some kind of broad federal assistance to bolster the economy, as business after business and institution after institution shut down in the face of relentless coronavirus infection.

When the government announced April 3 that it would provide $349 billion in loans from the Small Business Administration — part of a $2.2 trillion stimulus package — the center was ready.

Working with Citizens Bank, its longtime banker, the center submitted its application for a $1.1 million loan from the federal Payroll Protection Program — PPP — on April 7, as soon as the technical glitches were surmounted and Washington’s shifting loan requirements steadied.

And on Friday, actual cash money, a phrase that former Gov. Ed Rendell likes to use, arrived in the NCC’s account.

That money means that the NCC is up and running for at least eight weeks. The loans can be used to cover payroll, mortgage debt, utilities, and similar essential costs of doing business.

“We have not laid off any of our staff,” Stango said Friday. “This loan will allow us to meet our payroll needs through June 30. This at least gives us a really good cushion and ability to continue doing what we can to educate people virtually in the meantime.”

The center has been ramping up its online presence for some time, offering online study groups, talks, and virtual learning of all kinds. While this gives the NCC an online presence, it doesn’t provide the revenue stream of a functioning building.

The center has lost all of its considerable rental income. Its Town Hall talks, largely paid events, are now virtual and free. The big semipermanent exhibition on the 19th Amendment — granting women the right to vote — had been planned for a June opening. It has been postponed indefinitely.

“From an earned-revenue standpoint, this is probably the worst time of the year for the Constitution Center to be closed,” Stango said, a sentiment echoed at cultural organizations all over the region.

Over at FringeArts, which operates in normal times from a now-closed historic pumping station on Delaware Avenue, there has been no word on its loan application, no approval, no rejection — a news void be filled with all the free-floating anxiety available.

And there is plenty.

Nick Stuccio, president and producing director, at home in Narberth, is on the phone many times a day with FringeArts’ finance director, Melissa E. Bridge. The conversation spins around possible scenarios. What if? What if?

FringeArts is best known for its popular Philadelphia Fringe Festival, which unfolds in the fall.

The Get Pegged Cabaret show has been postponed already this season. The High Pressure Fire Service, an entire series of multiple new theater and performance works, which would have run throughout April and half of May, has been postponed. The historic-building tour is gone. The Scratch Night of new in-progress works has been postponed.

“All of the revenue — that went poof,” Stuccio said.

“And this came on so suddenly to all of us. It was a train wreck. We had to cancel, we had to shut down, we all left the office. We shut down all of our spring programming. All of us in the sector, we’re coming into the heart of spring programming. It’s the sweet spot of our year. All of the ticket revenue went away.”

Corporate festival sponsorship, programming gifts, building rentals, the restaurant rental — all gone.

Stuccio, Bridge and Carolyn Schlecker, senior operations adviser, realized they had to grab on to the Small Business Administration loan lifeline. Their representative from PNC — the bank they had a long relationship with — worked late into the night, April 3, adjusting the application after the SBA changed some requirements for PPP loans.

At 1 a.m. the following Saturday morning, the application was finally complete and submitted. But the worry continues. What if the feds have allocated too little money to the loan program? What if it runs out? What if big players cut into the front of the applicant line? What if the FringeArts loan for about $225,000 is not approved?

By Monday morning, Stuccio had heard nothing. What does it mean if the loan is not approved?

For one thing, the organization’s million-plus deficit would continue to grow, eating away at operations. Already there have been a handful of COVID-related furloughs. If the loan comes through, Stuccio said, “we would bring back as many as we can.”

“Right now,” he said, “cash is king and how much cash is going to determine how long we’re in business for. And so we’re trying to accumulate cash.”

The point, during the current period of rampant uncertainty, is to stay in operation and “keep our staff employed, to keep artists working as long as we possibly can so the more loans and grants that we have access to, the better we’ll be able to be to provide services to our colleagues.”

At the Please Touch Museum, approval for a $714,000 loan came late Tuesday. The museum had already furloughed 40 staff members and laid off 11 a month ago.

“My understanding is there is a certain amount of time you have to deploy the money,” said Trish Wellenbach, president and chief executive of the children’s museum in Fairmount Park’s Memorial Hall. “It’s a little complicated since our business is closed and the large portion of our employees who are on furlough are ones that actually can’t work remotely.

“Earned revenue is our lifeblood and you know we bring in our earned revenue every day,” Wellenbach said. “We’re for the most part a month-to-month business and so, particularly at this time of year, spring break, and with the potential opening of a new gallery and things like that, we had a large amount of our revenue factored into this quarter. This quarter and the next quarter are our two biggest quarters.”

“We’re running a closed business with no revenue, and so for us to achieve a PPP loan gives us also that runway, to be ready and able to open the business again.” As of Monday morning, cash had not materialized. Nevertheless, Wellenbach said that the museum is “presently working through the requirements of the loan and when and how people can come off of furlough and back to work.”

Farther south in Fairmount Park, the Philadelphia Zoo remains full of creatures, all of whom must be fed and cared for, and empty of visitors — a dichotomy that Vikram H. Dewan, zoo president and CEO, is keenly struggling with every day.

The zoo applied for a $3.4 million loan with its longtime banker, PNC. The loan was approved last week, Dewan said. The check has not arrived.

The zoo had already been forced into layoffs and staff furloughs, Dewan said.

“When you’re an organization that depends on both the animal collection that we have and the visitors, and there are no visitors, that will happen, yeah,” he said. How many have been let go? “I think that those are questions that we’ll continue to look at. There are still so many uncertainties, all of the things that affect the zoo, when do we come back, when are we able to open.”

The animals, he said, are “blissfully unaware of all of this.”

“They’re getting great care,” Dewan said. “They’ve been loving the beautiful weather. They’ve all been out and active in our Zoo 360 trails. It has been amazingly beautiful to see them out. The care of our animals is our number-one priority, always has been, and so to see that continuing, to see our essential staff here take good care of them, the best staff, and to keep our staff, it’s really quite inspiring.”