The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Met changes admissions policy: Non-New Yorkers must pay
Out-of-staters will have to pay fee of $25 effective March 1.
NEW YORK — For the first time in half a century, visitors to the world’s largest cultural institution, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, will have to pay a mandatory admission fee of $25 if they do not live in New York state under a new policy that begins March 1.
The change reflects the Met’s efforts to establish a reliable, annual revenue stream after a period of financial turbulence and leadership turmoil, particularly given what the Met describes as a sharp decline in people willing to pay the current “suggested” admission price, also $25. But the move could provoke objections from suburbanites and tourists as well as outcry from those who believe a taxpayerfunded institution should be free to the public.
“What we’re trying to do is find the right balance in generating revenue to support this enterprise and admissions income has fallen behind,” Daniel Weiss, the Met’s president and chief executive officer, said in an interview. “Everybody who benefits from this institution is being asked to contribute to its well-being because we are fundamentally a community resource.”
The Met’s pay-as-you-wish tradition will continue for state residents, but they will be required, for the first time, to show address identification; those without it will be asked to bring it next time (but not turned away). There will be no separate check-in desk or screening process for non-New Yorkers. “We can always make the rules more strict,” Weiss said, “but I’m hoping we don’t have to.”
The required fee was borne of economic necessity, Weiss said, and is related to a planned decline in New York City funds to the institution.
The Met is among the most prestigious institutions in the world, on par with the Louvre, the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim, but has long been distinguished from those museums for not charging a mandatory admission fee. Instead, it has sustained itself through private donations and public dollars; the city contributes operating support every year, because it owns the Met’s Fifth Avenue building.
Over the last 13 years, even as Met attendance has soared from 4.7 million visitors to 7 million, the museum has seen a steep decline in the proportion of visitors who pay the full suggested amount, from 63 percent to 17 percent.