We recently heard that someone had donated $60,000 toward the rehab of #3. Can anyone substantiate that? If true, is that sum reflected in what has been spent, and what is left?
It sounds as if MNG got a virtually new boiler for their #3 at the expense of the SR&RL Group. If the latter organization cannot pay for the work, then does that break the lease? If so, SR&RL will have gone bankrupt for no product.
Surely it must have been suspected that the #3 would require more than just a retubing. It sounds as if the whole project became a "tar baby" from which the more you struggled, the deeper in you got. I'm not sure that folks will want to take a chance on tossing more money into this situation with no guarantee that all the problems will be overcome.
All museums are feeling the pinch of the economic downturn. The further out on the fringes, the worse the effect. Even if conditions turn around, we are hearing from historical groups that the public has become spoiled by electronics and sophisticated entertainment, to the point that old house museums, historical societies, and small special interest museums will have trouble maintaining their operations in a new era.
Perhaps the SR&RL Group needs to sit down and take a long breath and rethink
their future in realistic terms before asking for even more money.
