City Council Member Laurie Cumbo may have brought home the bacon for the arts community in her district last week, but it wasn’t so kosher for the Jewish Children’s Museum.
That after the JCM was not included in the $17 million she doled out as the legislative point person along with the New York City Council, Mayor de Blasio, and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams to arts and cultural institutions big and small.
The JCM, 792 Eastern Parkway, is in the Crown Heights portion of Cumbo’s district, which also includes Fort Greene, Clinton Hill and parts of Prospect Heights and Bedford-Stuyvesant.
“I’m shocked. Laurie knows the needs of our institution. She knows how many children we serve in this and the surrounding communities. She should have been an ardent supporter,” said JCM spokesperson Devorah Halberstam.
Halberstam said she put in for about $150,000 for programing to Cumbo and the city, and was surprised she didn’t even get the $20,000 Cultural After-School Adventures (CASA) money that traditionally goes to arts organizations such as hers that gears programing for local kids.
Among the organizations that did get the CASA allocation included The Brooklyn Music School, Girl Be Heard Institute, Scenarios USA; Irondale Productions, Inc., the Noel Pointer Foundation, NY Writer’s Coalition, The Brooklyn Steppers, Inc.; and the University Settlement Society of New York, Inc.
What Halberstam found even more galling in the slight is that she mentored Cumbo for several years and has always been supportive of the Museum of Contemporary African Diaspora Art (MoCADA), which Cumbo founded, and served as its executive director until stepping down from the museum to serve in the city council.
Since Cumbo took office, MoCADA has received $5.5 million in capital funding, including $3.5 million this year, to move into the BAM cultural district. But Halberstam feels no ill will toward MoCADA or the institution receiving the city money.
“I think MoCADA is fabulous. The art work in her place is magnificent. But there should be enough to go around for everybody, not only the black community. The whole purpose of Crown Heights is that blacks and Jews should get along together. It just baffles me that there isn’t tremendous support for us coming from Laurie,” she said.
Halberstam said after KCP inquired about the slight, Cumbo called her and told her that she will get $25,000 through City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito’s office. The two will also meet about the JCM getting more funding after Labor Day, she said.
City Council Member Laurie Cumbo’s Response:
“Recently, my office announced that through a three-way partnership with Mayor de Blasio, Borough President Eric Adams and my office we were able to secure $17.1 million for capital and expense funding for the arts in the District. Unfortunately Stephen Witt, the writer of this article who I once had a great deal of respect for, decided that rather than celebrate and report this major victory for the District, he decided to strategically call only one institution, the Jewish Children’s Museum, to find out how its founder, Devorah Halberstam felt about not receiving capital dollars despite the fact that the Museum had not applied for capital dollars. My office was instrumental in securing for the second year in a row, $25,000 in expense funding for the Jewish Children’s Museum in partnership with Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito. In addition, Mr. Witt wanted to draw to the attention of Mrs. Halberstam that the Museum I founded 15 years ago, MoCADA received $3.5 million in capital. To bring clarity to this issue, $3 million was allocated by Mayor de Blasio and $500,000 by Borough President Eric Adams. My office did not contribute capital funding toward this total. In an effort to instigate controversy and to stir race relations within the Crown Heights community to attract advertising dollars and readership for his blog, Mr. Witt has resorted to the type of tactics that are akin to instigating a fight in the school yard at 3pm. It is unfortunate that Mr. Witt and so many reporters resort to this type of “journalism” under the guise of being watchdogs for City government. I am confident Mr. Witt will not print this quote in its entirety.”
