Fund-raising for The Children’s Museum/Museo de los Niãos has picked up steam with $7.5 million in private donations received in January, as well as two new hires to bring more community money to the once troubled project.
Signing on as the capital campaign director, La Jollan Carolyn Clark will bring local expertise as a fund-raiser and nonprofit consultant. Clark’s resume includes serving as director of development for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater San Diego and on the board of directors at the Leukemia Society of America and the La Jolla Opera Guild.
Also new to the museum staff is cellist Jeffrey Levenson, who worked for the La Jolla Music Society, the San Diego Symphony, the San Diego Chamber Orchestra and the Claremont Community School of Music before accepting his new title as director of development.
“[Clark] is an articulate, bright lady, very able to present the museum and understand what the museum is all about and be able to communicate that to the community,” said Kay Wagner, the museum’s executive director. “We are delighted to have [Clark and Levenson] and we really appreciate their experience.”
Both long-time San Diego residents will focus on acquiring additional funds needed to build the new 50,000-square-foot facility at Island and Front streets in downtown San Diego. The museum has pledged to match a $5 million donation from Joan and Irwin Jacobs in January with Clark’s community fundraising.
An additional $2.5 million from two families was anonymously given at the same time, helping the museum toward its goal of completing the project debt-free.
Recent donations included, the museum has raised $21.5 million of an estimated $25 to $28 million project. Fundraising has not been easy, but it is doable, Wagner said of the largely grassroots effort.
“We were hoping to have an edge of $28 million so that we have an endowment,” Wagner said of building expenses. “I would like for the museum to be debt-free and I would like for us to be on really sound financial footing when we open.”
On Dec. 15, 2005, the museum met a thrice-extended fund-raising deadline by securing a line of credit from Torrey Pines Bank and First National Bank. The promise of the Jacobs’ gift was also factored into the cost projection.
Wagner hopes that Clark and Levenson will garner enough community support to make loans unnecessary.
The Centre City Development Corporation (CCDC), which has been monitoring the progress of the project and setting the deadlines, entered into a land-use agreement with the museum in 2003, giving them two years to complete the project and its fundraising.
The CCDC inserted an option to buy the land back from the museum for $10. While there was some chatter last year of exercising that option, former CCDC chairman Hal Sadler said that the board was always supportive of keeping this unique venue for educational family entertainment downtown.
“During my time at the board, nobody wanted to buy that [land] back and do anything other than have a children’s museum,” said Sadler, who resigned in January. “It is a wonderful building and it will open well.”
The museum has been homeless since 2002, when it moved out of its old warehouse space on Front Street and West Island Avenue to begin renovations to the new site.
Construction on the facility’s lower levels has been all but completed, including an underground parking garage, space for the museum’s charter school, a 250-seat theater space to be shared with local performance groups and a workshop area.
“We’re just starting to go above ground level,” Wagner said. “We’re insured by the bank loans that we have it.”
Once completed, the building will serve as a link between downtown and families, in contrast to the array of tourist and entertainment opportunities.
“The Children’s Museum is a place where kids can come every day if they wanted to ” it’s inexpensive enough that parents and kids can be more involved,” Wagner said.
Designed by Rob Quigley, the museum will incorporate many environmentally friendly attri-butes, setting a precedent as downtown’s first major “green” building. Wagner emphasized the green design by selecting Quigley for his experience in that area. She hopes that the building itself will be a learning tool for children, showing them how to use renewable resources and recycle.
Among its green features, the museum will contain a solar cooling tower to trap hot or cold air and circulate it throughout the building. All windows will open and close and the Irving Gill concept of tilt-up concrete walls will allow guests to see from Front Street to Union Street.
The facility itself will be constructed from recycled building materials and utilize solar power panels and water-saving devices.
“It’s really just taking advantage of the [San Diego] climate,” Wagner said of the open design.
The museum will have many new features to draw kids in, including a double-decker bus library, a rain room, a 1-acre park across the street, three exhibition spaces for regional and touring shows, a story-telling area, a painting studio, a place for kids to display their creations, a 3-D studio for sculpting, birthday rooms, a cultural heritage series and a crawling environment for toddlers.
The first exhibits to open at the museum will feature a “transformation” theme reflective of the physical changes the building is undergoing.
The museum has also commissioned multiple artists for installations and interactive works, an aspect of children’s art that the Children’s Museum pioneered by having kids take part in the artist’s creative process.
The large truck that was painted bright colors by children everyday at the old site ” caking orange layers on top of blue on top of red ” will make a comeback. The Museum School, a charter school for grades three to six, will also take up residence in the new structure.
Both the school and the museum’s everyday education of visitors have been hindered, but not put on hold in the absence of a gathering space. The school’s 70 students have been utilizing the resources at Balboa Park from their temporary home on Maple Street, while museum staff members have been traveling to schools and street fairs with interactive art instruction in an outreach effort called “Museum Without Walls.”
The Children’s Museum began in 1983 as a small space for kids and their art in a La Jolla strip mall, moving downtown in 1993 to accommodate growing attendance.
Five years later, the museum decided to exercise its option to buy the property in a land swap with the developer of a 182-unit condominium tower. The CCDC negotiated the deal and provided a $7.5 million investment.