Monty's Inn escapes budget axe.
Montgomery's Inn and three other city museums have been spared from budget cuts this year after concerns the buildings would be shut down. Here, people showed up at a press conference held in support of Mongomery's Inn last fall.
File photo/ IAN KELSO
With the 2012 budget now set in stone, Montgomery's Inn and three other city museums rumoured to have been on the mayor's chopping block are officially safe - for now.
"It's actually a very complicated situation," said Janice Etter, chair of the Montgomery's INNovators - a nine-month-old, membership-based, non-profit organization supporting the Inn. "It's far from over and it's not all just about the budget."
Back in November, St. Paul's West Councillor Joe Mihevc and heritage supporters like Etter led the charge in protest against the closure of Etobicoke's Montgomery's Inn, along with Gibson House and Zion Schoolhouse in North York, and the Market Gallery in downtown Toronto.
More than 200 heritage supporters formed a protective human chain around Monty's Inn on Nov. 13 after Mihevc announced city plans to shutter the four museums in an effort to trim $1 million from the budget.
That threat, however, never materialized. Instead, a motion was quietly passed during the budget process, deferring any decision on the fate of museums until the 2013 budget.
Etobicoke Centre Councillor Gloria Lindsay Luby - herself an INNovator - said supporters will now be tasked with the challenge of coming up with new and innovative fundraising mechanisms.
"We've saved Montgomery's Inn for this year, and I'm happy about that. I have no problem with looking at ways to be more entrepreneurial and bring in some additional revenue," she said, suggesting the Inn begin to market itself as an ideal site for weddings and anniversary parties. "We've just got to start thinking outside the box...I think that people will be very anxious to do that because, like me, they don't want to see Montgomery's become a development site. The Inn is too precious to the history of Etobicoke."
But the solution for Montgomery's Inn won't be as simple as that, contends Etter. The fight is far from over, she said, noting that the museum is facing a number of both long- and short-term hurdles to its survival.
Now that the 2012 budget has been approved, the first of those challenges is a series of three reviews the city's manager and general manager of Economic Development and Culture will undertake in regards to the museum issue.
The first of those reviews will examine the possibility of divesting the museums to Heritage Toronto; the second will look into operational efficiencies and opportunities to increase fundraising at the museums; and the final review will explore alternate models of service delivery.
The results of those reviews are due to report back to the city's Executive Committee by the end of June 2012, although Etter said it is not yet known if or how a possible labour disruption might impact that deadline.
If Montgomery's Inn is to be saved, though, Etter said the city needs to look for new measures of performance to base their conclusion of community museums on.
"As long as we're (classified as) a tourist attractions like Fort York and Spadina, the threat will continue to hang over us that the measure of performance that will be used to evaluate us is attendance numbers that really are quite irrelevant to what we do and how we function," she said.
"Ideally, the best thing that could happen is that these reviews would be done well enough that they would recognize that the city's community museums (Monty's Inn, Gibson House, Zion Schoolhouse, Tormorden Mills, Scarborough Historical Museum, and Colborne Lodge) have to move out from under the jurisdiction of the economic development division and go some place else, where they could really function as the community hubs that they are."
To achieve those ends, Etter said the INNovators plan to 'advocate, advocate, advocate.'
The 350-strong - and growing - group also plan to build its membership even more, get involved with the upcoming reviews, use income from their famous home-baked bread sales to strengthen its programming, and support new marketing initiatives to promote Montgomery's Inn.
Anyone wishing to help out is encouraged to become an INNovator, to volunteer or take a tour at the Inn, buy some bread, or sign up for one of the many special events and programs at Monty's Inn.
For more information, go to the Montgomery's Inn website at www.montgomerysinn.com