Suffolk County Vanderbilt Museum

Board of Trustees

Minutes

A regular meeting of the Suffolk County Vanderbilt Museum Board of Trustees was held on November 15, 2017 in the Planetarium Lobby, Centerport, New York.

The following were in attendance: Ron Beattie – President Gretchen Oldrin Mones – 1st Vice President Jack DeMasi – 2nd Vice President Betsy Cambria – Treasurer James Kelly – Secretary Michael Mule – Trustee Terry Pearsall – Trustee Dr. Steven Gittelman – Trustee Kathleen Giamo – Trustee Anthony Guarnischelli – Trustee Stephen Melore – Trustee Lance Reinheimer – Executive Director Elizabeth Wayland-Morgan – Associate Director Sue Madlinger – Director of Development Ann Marie Pastore - Stenographer

Absent: Thomas Glascock – Trustee Clara Macri – Trustee Michelle Gegwich – Trustee

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(Mr. Beattie called the meeting to order at 7:10 p.m.)

MR. BEATTIE: Welcome to the November 2017 meeting of the Suffolk County Vanderbilt Museum and Planetarium. We will start, as usual, with the Pledge of Allegiance.

{SALUTE TO THE FLAG}

Very good. Thank you all for coming. Is there any member of the public who would like to address the Board?

Right now we do not have a quorum, so we will begin with the committee reports. We’ll start with Education and Exhibits, Gretchen.

MS. OLDRIN MONES: We’re in the holiday season now, which means that there are extra events and special activities going on in addition to the usual programs.

The mansion was decorated for the Halloween Masquerade Ball and then for the Suffragette Centennial and finally for Veterans Day Weekend.

There was a delightful article about the Halloween Masquerade in The Times of Northport and East Northport. If you haven’t read Steve Gittelman’s books or other fascinating history of the Vanderbilt, you may want to look at this newspaper account of how Alva Vanderbilt, the mother of our Willie K., outsmarted the establishment, used the media and forced her way into the top echelons of society by hosting the Vanderbilt Ball, which was the most extravagant social event ever to take place in New York City. I’ll pass around this account of Willie K.’s parent’s magnificent costume ball at their elegant new home at 660 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.

In November, one of our dedicated volunteers, Ellen Mason, dressed as a Suffragette for Election Day. People took pictures of her, and she will be featured on the League of Women Voters website. She said she was 100 years late, but she was going to vote.

For Veteran’s Day, Stephanie compiled a history of Vanderbilt family contributions to the war effort for mansion staff and visitors. The printing was sponsored by the DAR, Bristal Living and ITC Services. This is a copy of that.

Beth reports that two educators were made available to do projects with kids on our Veteran’s Day celebration on November 10.

Several workshops are being offered to celebrate the Winter Solstice. Here is the last flyer that I will pass around.

In the planetarium, new laser shows are being looked at. These include “Genesis,” Beyonce” and “Phil Collins.”

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Soon the mansion will be decorated for Christmas. In fact, Stephanie, our Director of Curatorial Affairs, held a Decorators’ Breakfast on October 23 for the Garden Clubs.

Our Education and Exhibits Committee is growing, which is wonderful. We benefit by all the different perspectives and the insights.

Roger Lederer attended our last meeting. He’s a talented educator who was instrumental in making the science bus such a success. I had the good fortune to attend one of Roger’s lessons explaining the galaxy to a group of middle school children in Wyandanch a few years ago. His interactive and enthusiastic presentation was something I will never forget.

(Dr. Gittelman & Mr. Guarnischelli entered the meeting at 7:15 p.m.)

Now that the science bus is out of commission, the committee brainstormed ways to keep this important outreach program alive. Approximately 4,000 high-needs students benefitted from this program last year, thanks to funding by National Grid.

It was wonderful to have the bus, which is unique and although oldish, kind of cool; however, it was only half of the typical 90 minute presentation. The other 45 minutes was in classrooms with our educators demonstrating complicated science concepts in easy to understand ways. We all agreed that it would be advantageous to find a way to continue this program and to dedicate ourselves to working toward that goal.

Another new participant in our Education and Exhibits meeting is Kathy Dulanto. She has been working in multiple ways to connect us to other schools and cultural institutions and to find funding.

Kathy, acting on a recommendation of donors Laura and Eric Gerde, made arrangements with Bethpage School District Superintendent, Terry Clark, to visit here with several of his senior staff to see what we are all about. After meeting with Beth, our Education Manager, and dropping in to observe a custom earth science program by Lorraine, who is our Assistant Director of Public Programming, they left with a promise to return with ideas and to send an architect at no cost to us.

The architect, John Grillo, is an expert in his field having worked to redesign over 36 school districts. He visited October 26, and we’ll follow up with his recommendations.

On November 7, at Superintendent Clark’s invitation, several people from the Vanderbilt, Beth, Dave, Elizabeth, Sue, Kathy and myself, attended Bethpage’s Professional Development Day, which had a STEM/STEAM theme.

As Kathy described it, we are looking to develop a partnership with other exemplar institutions that would benefit us and them in ways to be determined. Kathy also

3 reminds us that over 30,000 school children visit the Vanderbilt in a year making us probably the largest learning center on Long Island.

Sue Madlinger, Director of Development, and Elizabeth Wayland-Morgan, our Associate Director, also attended our meeting and provided valuable insights and answers, as always.

Staff made suggestions to improve visitor experience. Beth suggested removing extraneous, unattractive benches near the Education Center, as well as eliminating an outdated ash tray receptacle in that same area.

Everyone wanted food trucks or food in any acceptable form as an amenity for visitors.

On a positive note, the improved signage was appraised and more signage was requested near the Education Center.

Other things that Stephanie, our Director of Curatorial Affairs, reported on that happened in October are:

1.) She hosted the Huntington Leadership Group on October 5. 2.) On October 12, Tom Dunne visited to work on his Deepdale Golf Course Book. 3.) Researcher Al Velocci visited on October 18. He’s working on a book, also. 4.) Stephanie compiled a list of the number and location of fire extinguishers for the mansion and distributed the list to security and grounds. 5.) Work continued on restoring the exhibit space on the second floor of the Marine Museum.

The last new attendee at our meeting was Jim Kelly, who along with Betsy, Jack, Ron and myself, represent a strong Trustee interest and presence at the meeting.

That’s the end of the report, unless anyone has something to add or any questions.

MR. BEATTIE: Thank you, Gretchen. I want to point out that the extra people that are coming to the meetings is one of the examples of inter-committees working together. We all have to be on the same team. The extra people that were there were the Development people working with the Education and Exhibit people in terms of how we can improve the visitor experience here. Thank you, again, Gretchen.

We now have a quorum, can I have a motion to accept the minutes of the previous meeting?

MR. KELLY: So moved.

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MS. OLDRIN MONES: Second.

MR. BEATTIE: Without object? (Vote 9/0/0/6 Not Present: Mr. Mule & Mr. Melore. Absent: Mr. Glascock, Ms. Gegwich & Ms. Macri. One vacancy.)

Let’s move on to Finance Committee, Betsy.

MS. CAMBRIA: I call your attention to the legal sized Treasurer’s Report, and I’ll address the actual expenditures in September and income. The $45,000 figure under “Admissions” is considered less than it was in August, but that’s because the admissions drops at the end of the summer every year.

Otherwise, most of the income is in line with the previous months, as are the expenses, which are in line with the previous months.

We had been asked about the endowment in the previous meeting, and I checked with Lance, and he will address this in his report to you, as well, except as part of my report, I can say that at the end of October, the endowment stood at $13.6 million. Actually it was up $200,000 since the end of September. That’s quite a good number there. I’m sure Lance will address that in greater detail.

That’s the end of the Treasurer’s Report.

MR. BEATTIE: Thank you, Betsy. Any questions for Betsy?

Okay, let’s move on to Buildings and Grounds Report.

MR. PEARSALL: The only thing I have to report is that the meeting that had been cancelled to discuss the half million dollars from the endowment has now been rescheduled by the Presiding Officer. It is now scheduled for a week from this coming Tuesday at two o’clock in Hauppauge.

MR. BEATTIE: Great. Thank you.

Now on to the Development Committee.

MS. GIAMO: We are in the process of developing a strategic marketing plan for the Vanderbilt where it focuses on one of our major core points, which is that we have 35,000 children visiting this site on a yearly basis.

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We want to focus that we have educational programs on Long Island and we probably attract more children with our educational programs than any other facility.

Our Development brochure has a focus now on “Return to Traditions.” We want to bring the Vanderbilt and his history to the forefront. We want people to understand what we’re offering Long Island as a museum.

One of the things that’s of major importance now is developing resources of sponsorships. Kathy Dulanto is working very hard to attract more people, both the business community and the public.

One of the things that we want to do is that the Board voted to focus on three immediate projects to be addressed. One is the bell tower, one is the Hall of Fishes and the last is the weather vane. The weather vane, I think, is one of the hallmarks of the Vanderbilt.

The most important thing is the bell tower and the Hall of Fishes. We need to have these areas immediately repaired. I can’t stress on how important this is, the fact that we have 35,000 children coming here.

These things will be the focus of our sponsorship programs. When we put the brochure together, that will be highlighted. There will be opportunities -- those opportunities for the people who sponsor are going to have to produce reasonable expectations of when they will be completed and when they will see the results of their sponsorships. That’s something that is part of our marketing plan.

One of the things I’m also stressing is we need Board participation. Every Trustee of this Board should be in some way either giving their time, their funds or their expertise, but in some way, everybody has to get involved.

That’s my report.

(Mr. Mule entered the meeting at 7:20 p.m.)

MR. BEATTIE: Thank you, Kathy.

One other thing that may be on the Development side that I’d like someone to address is the Veterans Program that went on this Friday. We had a great turnout. My estimate is – actually, did we ever get a formal estimate? I thought it was about 250 people.

MS. MADLINGER: Over the whole weekend, there were just under 500 people, which consisted of veterans, active duty service members and their families. The day of the ceremony and at the ceremony I think there were about 250 people. That’s what we estimated.

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MR. BEATTIE: Great. We had a good turnout. Tom Suozzi came and so did Doc Spencer. It was a great event. I think just showing our support for the veterans – we wanted to do a little bit more, and we’re doing it posthumously to figure out how we can improve it even more for next year.

One of the things that we want to do is highlight more of Willie and all the Vanderbilt’s contributions during the war. We’re going to make sure that it’s in the program next time, but that was great work from our Development team.

I believe that’s the end of committee reports. Let’s move on to the Executive Director’s Report.

MR. REINHEIMER: Okay, thank you. Just picking up on the Veterans Day celebration, we honored not only veterans but active service people and their families. We recognize the sacrifice that families make for our veterans and the sacrifice that families make for active service men and women. We had free admission for all active service personnel and veterans for the whole weekend. That was Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Also participating in that program was Post 1244 from Greenlawn. They provided the Color Guard. The Huntington High School Choir sang the National Anthem and closed with God Bless America. They also had a little string quartet that played music as people entered.

We also had a representative from Governor Cuomo’s office that came and presented a proclamation to the museum, which I passed around for all of you to see.

It was a really successful day. It’s just our way of showing how much we appreciate our service people and to understand that we appreciate their sacrifices. I think it’s a great program.

I’m looking– and maybe I shouldn’t say something now but I think it’s appropriate – but I’m looking to extend this next fall for our first responders, not so much to do with ceremony, but to do a free weekend for first responders around the weekend of September 11.

We have a lot of people from Long Island – it’s a great community for volunteerism. Our volunteer firemen are probably the best equipped and best trained in our country. We have a lot of professional police and professional firemen from New York City and from Nassau and Suffolk. We want to show our appreciation for the sacrifice that they make and the sacrifice for their families. That’s something that we’re talking about doing next year.

(Mr. Melore entered the meeting at 7:25 p.m.)

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Getting back to the endowment, Betsy had talked about the endowment; $13.6 million is about the highest it’s been since before 2008. It’s going in the right direction.

It’s a slow and steady climb because the endowment is conservatively invested. In general, it’s 50/50 or 60/40 bonds and stocks – meaning 60 percent stocks/40 percent bonds at the most.

Now that interest rates are ticking up a little bit, the bond market is doing a little better, but in the past, stocks have done far better and bonds have been holding it back. It is invested conservatively.

Suffolk County is in the process of adopting their 2018 budget. In that budget is the revenue from the Hotel/Motel Tax. As amended by the Legislature last week, the proposed or the amended version provides $1,158,127 for the museum. That’s an increase of $108,000 over this current year.

The Legislature did reduce what the County Executive proposed by $143,681. We’re in the adopted or the amended budget as it probably will be adopted at 9 percent distribution of the Hotel/Motel Tax. It’s a little bit less than we were hoping, but we’ll have to make it work. It is an increase over this past year, so that’s a good thing.

Events that we had during this past month, October 26, Elizabeth and I attended the Employers Recognition Trade Show at Northport High School.

One of our interns that works in admissions in the planetarium, Abby Gifford, is in a program at Northport High School for interns. There were probably 75 employers from this area that had interns. One of them was from Steve Melore’s firm. We spoke to the representative there. Our auditors, AVZ, were there. I think who’s who in this community was there supporting Northport High School and their interns.

They were very happy to have the Vanderbilt participate. They’re excited. They’d like to expand to more interns over time. To see probably 150 juniors and seniors participate in this program and the experience that they got from law firms, realtors, accounting firms, financial investors and the work that they’re doing renews your faith in our youth and the education that they’re getting. These students were just excellent. It was a real positive event that we went to.

We already talked about Friday, November 10, our Veterans Recognition Day. Also on October 23, we hosted the Museum Association of New York. They had their monthly meeting here at the museum.

They also toured, as part of their meeting, the mansion. Stephanie gave them a wonderful tour. There were about 25 to 35 people here. They just had nothing but

8 great things to say about the museum. It’s an honor when we have our own colleagues schedule meetings here and are excited about what they see. Upcoming events, Monday, December 4, we’re hosting Long Island Museum Association’s annual meeting and roundtable discussion, which is open to Trustees, too. The discussion is going to be how museums can benefit from the business of tourism.

It’s going to be held here at the museum at 9 a.m. There will be registration and breakfast until 12 p.m., and then they will have their annual meeting at 12 p.m. If anyone is interested, please let me know and we can register you. So that’s December 4, a Monday.

Saturday, November 25 is our annual tree lighting this year. Each year we have more and more people come. It’s a real fun time. We have hot chocolate, cookies, Santa and Mrs. Claus, as well as the Northport Choral who will be singing. We’re also going to have the Carriage House Players sing. It’s a great time, if any of you want to come down. This is free to the community.

Saturday, December 2, is our annual Holiday Dinner, which is sold out. It sold out like overnight. We raised the price to $135 for non-members and $125 for members.

December 27 and 28, which is Wednesday and Thursday, we have our annual Twilight Tours of the Mansion. Generally, 650 to 700 people come through in those two nights.

Capital Program, I know Terry addressed the upcoming meeting. We did have some storm damage. We had a tree fall on one of our columns and knocked it down. We had the tree removed. We’re working to find – Stephanie is working to find a company to reinstall and fix the damaged column. Luckily the column itself did not break. The top part did come off, and of course it needs to be reinstalled on to the base. But the column to the far right, as you’re looking at the water, was struck by the tree and tumbled down. That was the October 30 storm that we had.

We’re working on the lights. As you can see, the lights are very bright here in the planetary. We had a problem with the lobby lights. They were a pretty sophisticated installation. They were all wirelessly connected to a computer that dimmed and turned on the lights, but with power fluctuations, and that system blew out. So through the County, they hired electricians to rewire the lights and to install manual dimmer switches.

We just finished installing new LED lights in the fall in the Habitat Room. I just finished that yesterday. I saw it before it was completed. It looks great. There are 80 lights. The total wattage is 1,500 watts, when before it was 80,000 watts. There is no heat from these lights. They give off a beautiful light through the floor. The blue floor washes the ceiling in blue and the whale-shark.

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We have had problems with that shorting out over the years. We can now take that off our list as something that we completed.

Today I appeared before the Legislative Parks Committee Meeting regarding three capital resolutions. One of them is ongoing funds for ADA building modifications.

The second one was for planning funds to start the planning for the restoration of the seawall that was damaged during Hurricane Irene and Superstorm Sandy and continues to be damaged from the storms and high water that we have, especially going through the thawing and freezing that we have. It’s damaging the original granite seawall that was built in the 1930’s.

Then the third resolution is to provide additional funds for the snowplow and dump truck that we are getting through the Capital Program after the bids came in. We didn’t have enough funds appropriated, so we need to appropriate more funds in order to get that truck.

We are in the process of doing staff evaluations. We’ll finish those up by the middle of December.

We’re also purchasing – I distributed a picture of a bucket truck. It has a 60 foot bucket. It’s a 2001 truck with, I think, 58,000 miles. It has very low hours on it. We’re purchasing that by the end of this week, along with a pick-up truck with a snowplow.

Also, I spoke to Consuelo Vanderbilt the other day, and she had a speaking engagement tonight. She was going to try to make it here but couldn’t. She plans to make the December meeting.

That’s my report. If anybody has any questions about any of my report or any other questions, I’ll be happy to take questions.

MR. BEATTIE: Thank you, Lance.

MR. PEARSALL: The three resolutions got out of committee?

MR. REINHEIMER: I’m glad you asked that question because not only did they get out of committee, but they informed me that I only had three minutes to speak and I was able to do it in less than three minutes. I talked about all three resolutions.

It’s the first time in many years that they had no questions for me. When they came to consider the resolutions, there were no questions for the resolutions and everyone on the committee voted for them. I was very happy that they seemed to be supporting all the work that we’re doing. Some of the Legislators that have been

10 here recently are impressed with the grounds and some of the work that we’re doing. I think we’ve got good support in the Legislature.

MR. BEATTIE: Very good. Thank you, Lance.

Now for the President’s Report. As I threatened last time, we’re going to discuss the Economic Sustainability Plan. Because of what Lance was talking about with the lights, it’s a little washed out on the screen, but many of you were on the Board when we unanimously approved this about five years ago. It was probably about five years ago this time of year, too.

I had a conversation with Steve Gittelman a couple months ago – actually, a month ago. He suggested that we revisit it because it’s one of those things that in my opinion, it’s a now or never thing.

With all the capital project work that we’re talking about, the only foreseeable way for us to be able to fix our infrastructure here and achieve economic sustainability is to move ahead with this plan. The time is now.

For those of you who weren’t on the Board then, basically what this project is, is a vision plan for economic sustainability at the Vanderbilt. We haven’t produced a plan for sustainability. We were actually required by the Legislature to do that when we accepted public money seven years ago. Is that correct, Terry?

MR. PEARSALL: Approximately.

MR. BEATTIE: So where we are is we are a crumbling and dependent entity. I don’t mean to be gloomy, but the more we hear from Buildings and Grounds, water getting into everywhere in the building and the freeze/thaw cycle, our infrastructure is in disrepair.

But we do have some good news. The planetarium project is now complete.

The lease of Normandy, we’re back a little bit because we need to repair that again.

We did have the sale of non-accessioned items, which went to the collections.

We have gotten grants.

Our greatest asset is our prime waterfront.

At the time when we did this, the Hotel/Motel Tax was expiring. We since have gotten extensions, but I don’t think any of us really feel comfortable with going hat in hand all the time and trying to get that renewed. We’re much better off if we are economically sustainable.

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For long-term economic sustainability, what we need to do is be independent from the doles of Suffolk County. We want to create conditions so that we can thrive and restore the Vanderbilt to its past grandeur because we are a vibrant and independent jewel of Suffolk County.

Here’s the thing, the big problems that we have require big solutions. That’s why we came up with the Economic Sustainability Plan that we did.

We need to create new venues through public/private partnerships -- public/private partnerships because we know we can’t count on public funds to be able to sustain us.

Each venue creates a synergy with the other. In the vision of this, we wanted to make sure that we were sensitive to the historic nature of the property.

Everything that we’re going to talk about here, in terms of the proposed venues, are built into hillsides so that, for example, if you look out from the back of the mansion toward Northport Harbor, you don’t see a catering facility there. You will still see the great lawn, but there will be a catering facility built underneath it. That’s just one example. Everything will be built into the hillside.

When we build all these things, the idea is to have shared costs with the infrastructure. We’re obviously going to have to have a sewage treatment plant in if we’re going to add these new vendors. That would be shared by all the vendors.

This graphic just shows the different venues that we would be creating. In yellow is the catering, which I mentioned would be built in underneath the great lawn. In the hillside behind the columns that we were just talking about would be an amphitheater. Behind this planetarium would be a conference center/resort built ala Gurney’s, if people are familiar with that, into the hillside so it would be terraced down to the water. The seaplane hangar would become a destination restaurant.

By the way, tying everything together in blue is waterfront esplanade that’s long been planned and never built but would tie everything together.

In addition to that would be building an education center. We don’t have space for temporary exhibits here at the Vanderbilt. We would build that in and some other educational venues.

A number was bandied about in our Development Committee that I think it’s something that we, as Trustees, need to promote a lot more and not just for this. I think we hit on it just a little bit before. There are no institutions on Long Island that have 35,000 children visiting it. We are the regional education center here.

The other benefit of raising awareness and making the Vanderbilt a destination is the fact that we’re in the shadow of the economic capital of the world. We have

12 venues. We need to create venues so that we can do corporate off sites here. We have a planetarium, can do power point presentations, a conference center/resort so that people can stay here and a catering facility so that they can have conferences here.

Along with that, if you really think about it, I went to a conference probably about seven months ago. There really is no place to hold a major conference on Long Island. It was held up the street, and there were people on top of each other. There were people giving talks in rooms that were separately basically by vinyl sheets, so everybody was interfering. That’s the potential that we have here.

Eventually, I think we’d also want to create – and I don’t know if anyone remembers the Long Island Automotive Museum out in Southampton. We would recreate that and have a venue to bring back the Vanderbilt Cup, which is right now sitting in a closet at the Smithsonian. We could create all these venues to make us a destination.

This is just showing the synergies again and how the catering facility integrates with the William and Molly Rogers waterfront and the conference center at the amphitheater. All these things have synergies to each other.

Other benefits are creating jobs, creating tax revenues for local governments, obviously sales tax, etc. We have other potential partners that we can potentially look into. For example, the Long Island Philharmonic doesn’t have a home. These are the types of things that we can see if we can partner with other people and other groups on Long Island.

The recognition of the potential problems - septic, as well as parking are big problems and the road. The fact is it’s a narrow road that we come up to. We need to address those issues. I’m not thinking that in a perfect world we’re going to have 500 cars coming up here an hour. We have to address those issues.

Again, the year round catering facility built into the hillside under the lawn. I won’t go through all these things again. The amphitheater will be built into the gully, as well as the conference center/resort behind the planetarium.

Also, as part of that educational center, we would create a galleria on this side so that – one thing that we don’t have and it’s very frustrating here in terms of the visitor experience that you guys know I keep pounding on in the past couple months – is that most museums when you go to a museum, you go in and there’s a welcome center. You’ll go through a sequence of what videos, for example, of what they can find here or a history of Willie. We don’t have a place or a central location that people would go to. This would create that along with the other venues.

The seaplane hangar would preserve a historic structure and create a two-deck restaurant with stunning views of the harbor, outdoor dining, boat access and again the synergies with the others.

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The waterfront esplanade would tie everything together and the grounds. We used to have hiking trails here. We don’t have hiking trails anymore. Again, we’re thinking of the visitor’s experience.

We’ll include ferry and water taxi service. The grounds would be open to the public. Instead of having a separate fee for the grounds, we would let people just come in and enjoy the facility and then allow them to buy tickets for some of the other venues that we have here.

The educational center, some of the ideas that were passed around before includes even a NASA Space Lab Camp, which somebody suggested in our last strategic plan.

With the automotive museum, hopefully we can bring back the Vanderbilt Cup. By the way, we have the perfect place to house all that because if you take a look at what we use in Buildings and Grounds, all those garage areas, I’m even thinking that we can have a live car restoration going on all the time and streamed on the web and people can see a car being restored as we go along.

The Legislature has been waiting for a plan from us. They have it now, but we haven’t acted on it. It requires no investment by the Vanderbilt. It requires no capital from Suffolk County. We need to start the ball rolling.

I don’t have to ask for a motion because we already did, but in essence that’s the Economic Sustainability Plan revisited. What I’d really like to do is to have 2018 be the time that we really spend working on this.

The one thing that’s prevented us is that it’s an enormous project and somebody’s got to manage it. We really haven’t acted on it until now, but as Steve Gittelman suggested last month, is that we do revisit it, talk about it and see how you guys feel about moving forward.

DR. GITTELMAN: I would ask before we talk about moving forward, it’s been five years. Has there been – what have we done with it in those five years? What meetings, what interest, has anything been done?

MR. BEATTIE: No, we basically it hit the wall because we were in between in terms of what we’re authorized to work on. We had the one side show of the catering agreement that the County wanted us to enter into. That paused us a little bit.

Quite frankly, I didn’t have the time or the energy to put together a series of RFP’s that are required to bring people to the table. We just didn’t have the in-house expertise to be able to do that.

At this point, I think there is no better time than now. We know that we’re not going to get help from the County to fix our infrastructure. We need to create a

14 public/private partnership so that we can fix – instead of repairing what we have, we can restore what we have and then create a preventative maintenance plan so that we don’t get into the same position again.

The only way I can see to do it is to bring in public dollars.

Anybody else?

MS. CAMBRIA: Public dollars?

MR. BEATTIE: I meant private dollars in the way of a public/private partnership. DR. GITTELMAN: Well, the museum was originally funded with an endowment that came from Mr. Vanderbilt. The endowment was known to be insufficient. The county took the responsibility, none the less, after the federal government and the state rejected it because of that insufficiency. The county is still obligated to fulfill its promise to Mr. Vanderbilt, according to once they took the asset, they have to maintain it.

An aggressive posture to get the county to do that is very difficult. We all know that, but I don’t think we’ve been trying that hard in the past seven or eight years. I think that we basically accepted whatever we were given and protested mildly. We left a lot of money on the table. I think that that still remains as an alternative strategy. I don’t think that we’ve been aggressively pursuing it.

Here’s where I’m at. My big fear is that ten years from now we’ll be in the same place. My big fear is that if we look and we’re fair to each other and we look back ten years and we look at today’s Treasurer’s Report, we are reliant on the county to the tune of $1,050,000. We were reliant to the county ten years ago to the tune of $1,050,000. It was a million some years and it was a million two other years but it was a million, fifty on average.

We lived eight, nine, ten years ago with the promise that the waterfront would carry us forward. That was the thrust. We had funds appropriated to the tune of, I think, over $20 million at that point. There was some large number. Please don’t take me to task if I’m off by five or ten million. What’s the difference? It’s really not money that ever came about, okay?

We did abandon that money. Is the county in better shape to give us funds? I don’t think that looking at the county’s position is our responsibility. I think our responsibility is to look at the promise the county made to the museum and the county’s failure to deliver it.

I think that by saying that, I’m fearful that another ten years – and I’m looking back ten years from 2007 to 2017 when I was leading -- to today and saying that we’re in the same spot today but worse. How worse? We don’t have – we were looking forward to the restoration of the planetarium. That happened. You now

15 lived with the benefit of that having happened. But we are not actively pursuing a plan that will pull this institution out of this problem with the County.

Now this plan five years later has gone nowhere, and I fear that it will go nowhere and five or ten years from now we’ll be looking back and saying that we’re still reliant, and what if the Hotel/Motel Tax isn’t here?

Folks, that would be the biggest failure that we could deliver to this institution if we allow this to be our history. You have to look at what progress we’re making. If you bet on this, you better deliver it because that’s how we will be judged. We will be the Board that watched Rome burn, because we have done absolutely nothing to save this institution. We have maintained it, but we haven’t saved it.

MS. GIAMO: I have a question.

DR. GITTELMAN: Yes.

MS. GIAMO: What would you suggest that we do to compel the County to make the repairs and give us what they said they would give? How do we compel them to do it?

DR. GITTELMAN: Take it to a different forum. The courts.

MS. GIAMO: We don’t have the funds to operate the museum. How would we have the funds to take it to the courts?

DR. GITTELMAN: I’m only saying to you that if we, as Trustees, are watching the institution move ahead on a year-by-year noose, and we know that the institution – again, this Board has acted in good faith for the entire time that I have been on it. I mean, I’m telling you. I have no apologies for this group of people right here tonight. You’re a good Board.

Sooner or later, you have to stand there and say, “Look, as Trustees, we have a fiduciary responsibility not to the County but to this institution. If the County, as a governing body, will not deliver and we view them as being remiss, then we should consider suing the County for specific performance. I’m not a lawyer, but I’m not crazy either. They have an obligation, and we should consider holding them to it.

Before we offer them this as, “Here is our plan,” and have them joyously accept it and then find out that no one will let us do it, you will be destroying the institution while you’re dreaming of helping it. The Hotel/Motel Tax may not be here five years from now. When it’s gone and if you don’t have that in place, we have used five years waiting, and I’m not blaming anybody, but if we allow another five years

16 to pass, I think we will be making the biggest mistake this institution has ever made.

If you bet on this, you better deliver it because I don’t know where it will be in five years. I know the politics behind the Hotel/Motel Tax, and it is not a sure thing.

Please, if you want to review where we’ve been and what we’ve done, we’ve done a great job as custodians, but we haven’t fix the problem. If it requires us to use the County of Suffolk, then we should continue that.

Before we say this is the plan for the future, I think we should look at other revenues.

MR. BEATTIE: My view on that is that first of all, there is no better time, based on the fact that we know that the county doesn’t have it, whether we want to sue them or not.

By the way, this thing doesn’t preclude us from getting the capital money for the projects that are already in the works. I’m not saying that at all. I’m not saying that we’re not going to go back and ask the county for some of the capital money that we need to get this done.

But I think if we didn’t act on this, and I’m not saying that this is the panacea and I’m not saying that we go to the county and say, “We have all the problems solved. Here it is,” but I’m saying we work in conjunction with them to do that.

Personally, I think if we start some kind of lawsuit thing going forward with the county, we’re going to spend five years and really not be guaranteed any solution to it, at this point. First of all, they don’t have it.

DR. GITTELMAN: Wait a second. I know that I will be condemned for having said this, but they’re not having it is not our responsibility. They’re not delivering it is our responsibility. If we don’t stand firm as a Board and say, “We have to protect this institution or we don’t belong here,” then that’s our mistake.

I think that this, because it’s five years and nothing has come of it, I have less confidence in it than I did five years ago because then there was not five years of non-performance.

I don’t see this as a solution because I look at it and I go, I don’t see a solution. I don’t see it. I don’t see any progress. I don’t see where we had this meeting and we had three people who were interested or three companies who were interested. We don’t have anything.

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All we’re saying is we have five years of non-performance and we’re going to take another gamble for – when are we going to draw the line and say, “If we don’t have something in a year or two or three or whatever, what are we going to set as performance objectives here?”

At the same time during those five years, the county has withdrawn from funding capital projects in a big way.

We have lost ground. We are now in far worse shape, even if we sit here and we say that we will rely on the goodwill of the county. They don’t even have us on the docket. They’re not funding us anymore.

When you say there is no better time, we have been brought a challenge. The county has walked out of the door. They are not funding us.

Now look, in the past, every Director I was ever confronted with said, “You’re wrong, Steve, because we still have this much on the books. We’re still in line for millions of dollars. You can’t risk that by attacking the county.”

Now I say to you, what have we got to lose? They’re not funding us anymore. They have cut us free. We’re either here to drown – if that Hotel/Motel Tax disappears, we’re finished.

I think that you now have to go and look at the swing of the pendulum. Do you really have the right as a Board to ignore that set of circumstances where the county that took the responsibility simply says, “We’re not going to do it. You sit there and come up with something else.”

That’s not the way it goes. We have to make them responsible. We have to argue the case. If we can come up with an alternative solution while we’re doing that, I’m all for it, but at this point to say that this is our road and that we’re not – you’re saying that we still could – no, I’m saying that should be our focus. We should go to them and say, “You have an obligation to fix what’s broken and the buildings are broken. We can’t fix that from this. Not for ten or fifteen years.”

MR. BEATTIE: Well, I don’t think this is a ten or fifteen year plan, but the other thing is we are doing that. Terry set the meeting up on the 28th.

DR. GITTELMAN: So that you could take $500,000 from our endowment.

MR. BEATTIE: Yes that is part of that discussion.

MR. PEARSALL: That, plus all of the problems we have with DPW and the delays of getting very much needed work done.

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DR. GITTELMAN: I have no problem with you going and meeting with the county again and again and again. But we have failed at getting results. Having you on the team is a God send. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t discuss what I’ve said with a single person on this Board on or off. This is not Steve pulling some bull shit. This is just straight out talking.

We have not performed well. We are not showing improvement compared to the basic numbers. We are as reliant as we ever were. We have been stable in our continued slide into Armageddon. This is not going to do it. If you fail on this, you’re betting too much on something that you have absolutely nothing to say -- “Look, Board, I made this progress. You’ve got to stick with me on it.” I have the same slide show that I had five years ago, and nothing else.

MR. GUARNISCHELLI: If the County has no money, why are they pouring curbs and sidewalks where nobody walks? Millions of dollars are being wasted. I think I saw Terry mixing cement on Ellwood Road.

{LAUGHTER}

MR. PEARSALL: Those days are gone forever with me.

{LAUGHTER}

MR. GUARNISCHELLI: If they have money to waste on sidewalks, why not put it to good use? They can’t cry we don’t have money when they’re wasting millions on sidewalks where nobody walks.

MR. PEARSALL: We are constantly buying open space, which is a wonderful program, but we’re ignoring our current park system and not doing anything to keep them up. Every park has the same kind of problems we have here in Suffolk County. I spent three years as a Trustee, and FOR 40 years they have been waiting to redo Third House in Montauk.

MR. GUARNISCHELLI: I agree with Steve. They are responsible. Maybe you can’t threaten them, but you have to go up there with a big stick. We’re letting it crumble.

DR. GITTELMAN: I don’t think saying, “You’re letting it crumble” will be news to these folks. They know it.

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MR. PEARSALL: Yes, they know it. DR. GITTELMAN: Now we have to go up there, and as I said, there are three branches of government, and we may have to avail ourselves of the third.

MR. BEATTIE: And this proposal is to be more proactive and work both tracks to try to achieve the same thing in working with them.

MR. MULE: Can I ask a question?

MR. BEATTIE: Sure.

MR. MULE: The question is, you mentioned a series of RFP’s, which this institution doesn’t have the wherewithal to send out. Was it your expectation or would it be your expectation that Suffolk County would generate that series of RFP’s?

MR. BEATTIE: In conjunction with them was the expectation, but let’s talk about what we’ve done to build our Board so that we can get the expertise so that we can do it in-house. We can’t count on that. That’s the problem. We can’t count on anybody but ourselves to fix this. That’s why I brought on Kathy Giamo, who is experienced in development. We were fortunate to have a guy like Terry on board that we can have the expertise here in-house. Because we just can’t count on anybody else to help us.

MR. GUARNISCHELLI: But if we’re spending our money, why can’t you get out of that prevailing wage nonsense? I can see putting it out to bid, but why do you have to pay them ridiculous prevailing wage?

MR. BEATTIE: I don’t think this Board can start –

MR. PEARSALL: It’s state law.

MR. BEATTIE: I don’t think this board can start talking about how contracts are dealt with in this state. That’s just a reality that we have to deal with. In a lot of ways it’s been negative, and it adds tremendously to the cost. Again, public/private partnership, to me, is the way for us to fix this.

DR. GITTELMAN:

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Why? Would that take us out of the prevailing wage?

MR. BEATTIE: No, I’m not saying that.

MR. GUARNISCHELLI: Where does it start that you have to put it out to a bid? Is there a money point where it starts?

MR. PEARSALL: What is it now, $50,000?

MR. REINHEIMER: I’m not sure for construction. I think that’s for legislative contracts or for other contracts. I’m not sure, as far as Public Works goes. They have a whole vetting process to have annual contractors. I thought the threshold was $100,000, that you could use what they call an annual contractor, which is somebody that is on their list that they vetted previously, that they don’t have to go through an RFP process as long as it’s under $150,000 or $200,000. But you still have to pay prevailing wage. It’s municipal property. That’s part of it.

MR. MULE: So this brings us back that it’s a municipal property. I fully agree with what Steve has said here. The issue that I think we have, as an institution and that all of us as Board Members have, is that there is an obligation that was undertaken by the county for the capital improvements and for the necessary maintenance of the artifacts here and the structures, particularly. That promise has not been kept.

It’s not for us to judge whether there is an ability of the principle, the county, to actually come through on that obligation or not. But our obligation is to do what we can for this museum.

While I don’t disagree that perhaps the remedy ultimately is to get some type of public/private partnership where there is a benefit to both the private sector and the public sector.

At this point, the obligation is solely in the hands of the public sector of the owner of this facility. I think we really do have to consider what is necessary to make sure that we take and fulfill our fiduciary obligations.

That being said, there has been five years that have gone by. There was this Economic Sustainability Plan, which sounds good, it’s theoretical but there hasn’t been the goals that you want for specific measurable, attainable, relevant timely goals that have been met.

Five years have gone by, and we don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel. Because of that, I think we may have to really consider, as a Board, whether it

21 makes sense to put this to another body to say, “Hey, is there an obligation here or not?” If there is, then be that as it may. We brought that forward.

If that third party determines that there is not, well, we brought that forward. It’s something that I think we should consider, as a Board.

MR. BEATTIE: First of all, let me reiterate, none of what’s in the Economic Sustainability Plan precludes us from asking for capital money again, whether we’re not doing it forcefully enough or not, that certainly is something that we have to take a look at.

If we’re looking at, okay, do we not go ahead with the Economic Sustainability Plan, which is a proactive way to fix the problem that we’re in or do we sue?

MR. MULE: Let me just correct – I am not suggesting that we don’t go on a dual track. What I am suggesting, though, is that we’re all experienced enough to know that people don’t move unless they want to move or they are compelled by some reason to move.

No one likes change. We are asking for a change in the way from business-as- usual, which is basically, okay, give us something and we basically accept whatever we get. That’s business-as-usual, and we’re still in the same position and the same cycle where we’re at a million plus structural deficit each year.

In order to break that cycle, we have to do something different. One of the things that has come to the floor is the very fact that there is this obligation. It’s been there, and it just hasn’t been acted upon.

Yes, maybe we pursue that on the one hand, and then on the other hand, yes, of course, we go forward. Maybe there’s an incentive there for the county to actually start preparing these series of RFP’s, but that hasn’t been done. Something has to be a motivating factor.

MS. GIAMO: I would like to add to that.

MR. BEATTIE: Yes, Kathy.

MS. GIAMO: The Economic Sustainability Plan is something which was approved by the Board years before I came on the Board. I do think that the Sustainability Plan, at some point, could be realistic.

However, from the development community point of view, the development community, given the opportunity to develop this project independent of county, could be very successful.

22

Having been in the development community for many years, the history of a development going forward with the county in terms of having to do the bidding and the planning, a developer was not going to put up a lot of their money in conjunction with the county. It doesn’t make economic sense for them.

I agree with you, that the county should be compelled now to live up to their responsibility to do the repairs to this property because if they do not do the repairs, there is no sustainability plan in the world that’s going to be able to stop the deterioration that’s going on now.

In my opinion, the next thing that will happen, if they don’t, they could have a serious incident here with all of the children that are coming through this, which this museum is a major institution to the schools. The programs are major, as Ron alluded to before.

The fact is, no other facility has 35,000 children coming through. That responsibility as a county is really in the forefront. If one child is injured by a brick or something falling off that bell tower, that then will absolutely take priority to all of this.

I think that we do have to do something to make them respond now. As a Board and a Trustee, I feel a responsibility to say that. The county has got to act and act soon on this.

MR. BEATTIE: I understand where everybody is coming from in terms of nothing has happened in the five years. Kathy hit on – in our discussion earlier – one of the reasons why is because the economy just wasn’t in the right shape at that time. That’s number one.

Number two is the most important part, and what Kathy just brought up, is when you approach and when we have approached people in the way it is set up right now, developers are not willing to go into partnership with the county.

We have to create our own process and our own procedures in-house to be able to let these contracts out ourselves as a Board and not through county institutions. That’s a conversation that we’re having.

The only way that you’re going to get a private developer to come in here is to know that they have a willing partner that is going to allow them to operate freely and not in all sorts of restrictive ways. It’s a simple fact.

MR, KELLY: Getting back to a name that I mentioned once or twice before, perhaps we could speak to Castro who did that very successfully during the Pataki administration where there was an awful lot of corporate money put into parks throughout the State of New York. We know if can be done, but we just don’t know how.

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DR. GITTELMAN: I’m fearful that we will split our minimal resources, that we will now go after the sustainable plan -- I will say that if we were to take the lion by its tail, we will have our hands full.

I think, as a Board, we go in one unified direction and we have a chance at being effective. I think if we split ourselves, we will have much less of a chance. No developer is going to want to walk into this until, if you will, the lawsuit is clear and settled and it may be some time.

Understand that when I came here, their excuse was not the economy. It was that the Board was inferior and did not perform well. It was the Director was a hack. It was that this was a politically controlled institution with a President who was getting paid. It was an institution where the President had an office on the grounds in Mrs. Vanderbilt’s bedroom where holes were cut in the carpet and the library so he could have a plug go through it.

When he died, he took $900,000 as a death benefit, and that was in the checkbook. Those were their excuses then.

Then when we came along, we couldn’t keep a Director. We went through three Directors in five years. Nobody wanted to be here because they saw that this was a pressure cooker. We are a gold fish bowl with a wall around it.

We now have gone decades. I am proud that we got ourselves accredited. I am proud that we have a Director who is here and loves it. I am proud that we have a Board that shows up and doesn’t run for the hills every time there is a meeting. When I came here, there were only three Trustees.

What I’m saying to you is their excuse now is, “I don’t have the money.” Well, that’s not our problem. They can make it our problem. We have to be in agreement that it’s time. The place has decayed on my watch, 28 years. I can tell you, I am watching the place fall down around my ears, and I don’t like the feeling. We will have nothing to protect five or ten years from now because the erosion is accelerated. All you need do is really look. You can take home a bag of Vanderbilt anytime you want.

We have to stop it. We have to bring the county and make them realize that it’s their responsibility. Blame whoever it was who signed the paperwork in 1950 or whenever it was, but it’s your problem now. If we have to do some restructuring about the governance of this place, if they want to fire all of us because I said what I just said tonight, well then that’s what they can do.

MS. CAMBRIA: Who’s they?

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DR. GITTELMAN: The Legislature.

MS. CAMBRIA: Eighteen people?

DR. GITTELMAN: What they do is they don’t reappoint you.

MS. CAMBRIA: Good.

{LAUGHTER}

DR. GITTELMAN: But my point to you is, this may be the time for us to say, “No more. We have done it your way. We have run this institution. We have gotten it accredited. We have great programs. We service 35,000 children. We are stand-up members of the community. Now treat us as such.” MS. CAMBRIA: What exactly is the – could you just in a few words tell me the obligation of Suffolk County to this institution? It’s to maintain it, right?

DR. GITTELMAN: Right.

MS. CAMBRIA: They don’t have to construct anything. They just have to keep it running.

DR. GITTELMAN: I think that we should – and I would recommend that we have a committee to review the documents at hand and come back to this Board. I would prefer that it would be the lawyers. We have great lawyers among us. Can the lawyers who are on this Board take a look at this and tell us – am I just nuts?

MS. CAMBRIA: No, I think you’re –

DR. GITTELMAN: And I would prefer that it come from the lawyers that are on the committee. My recollection is that there was a commitment to govern the place for the benefit of the people of this county and to maintain it.

MS. CAMBRIA: Yes, to maintain it. And you would say the whole thing should be maintained and that includes the buildings that are crumbling by the water?

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DR. GITTELMAN: Absolutely. I would say that it goes to the fact beyond this, that the state said this was not enough money. It was halfway there. They wouldn’t take it on because there were insufficient funds. The federal government had another reason. They had just taken on a Vanderbilt home, but they wouldn’t touch this place because the funds were insufficient. They predicted that this place would be in trouble in a couple of years. By 1980 we were in trouble. Now we’re 30 years later, or 27 years later. I’m telling you, we need to act now. It’s unfortunate that the county is not rolling in dough, but what am I going to tell you?

MR. BEATTIE: All I’m looking to do is to have a two-pronged proactive approach to the problem. If we just go down a lawsuit road, to me, that’s going to be five years of watching this place slide into nothing.

Once we start down this road, even the paltry funds that we know aren’t enough are going to wind up being cut off, and we’re going to get to the end of that road and hopefully we win in a lawsuit. That, to me, is a bigger gamble than doing a two-pronged approach and at least saying, let’s be proactive and let’s try to fix what we can and take what matters into – what we’re trying to do is take matters into our own hands. This relationship is not working right now. We have acknowledged that.

DR. GITTELMAN: What you’re saying is you want to take it into your own hands, but the structure in existence refutes that. You can’t take it into your own hands because the County owns it. They have the responsibility for it. It’s their asset, and they won’t let it go so easily and they won’t fix it.

MR. BEATTIE: Well, we don’t know unless we try, and we’re trying.

DR. GITTELMAN: Trying to do what?

MR. KELLY: I don’t think that Ron was trying to say that we want to take title to the property, just eliminate the paperwork trail and let us do it by ourselves and eliminate two years it takes to get a nickel out of these guys.

MR. BEATTIE: Three.

MR. KELLY: Three years. For instance, we were talking about bringing in an architectural engineer to tell us what it’s going to cost to restore the bell tower to its original condition.

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DR. GITTELMAN: Might I suggest to let them do that as a way of settling a lawsuit.

MR. KELLY: Okay.

DR. GITTELMAN: In thirty days we could have an opinion from our colleagues at the next meeting.

MR. BEATTIE: If they don’t mind. Okay, we’ll do that. We do have a December meeting, so I don’t think we need a motion on that to have our lawyers –

MR. PEARSALL: You can appoint a special committee.

DR. GITTELMAN: Yes, please appoint a committee.

MR. BEATTIE: Okay, there is a motion to create a committee to analyze the legal requirements from the county. I guess the committee would be Michael Mule and Steve Melore.

MS. CAMBRIA: What about Tom Glascock?

MR. BEATTIE: Well, I can’t appoint him. He’s not here.

MS. CAMBRIA: Yes you can.

MR. MELORE: He’s the Chairman of the Committee now.

{LAUGHTER}

MR. KELLY: Second.

MR. BEATTIE: I didn’t get the motion.

DR. GITTELMAN: I move that.

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MR. BEATTIE: Okay, great. (Vote: 10/0/0/5 Not Present: Ms. Oldrin Mones. Absent: Mr. Glascock, Ms. Gegwich & Ms. Macri. One vacancy.)

We can now move on. Yes, Betsy.

MS. CAMBRIA: You mentioned the December meeting. Does it really have to be December 20?

MR. BEATTIE: No. Before we do that, though, let’s talk about another committee that we need to form in terms of new business, and that’s the Nominating Committee for 2018 Officers. Jack?

MR. DEMASI: I’ll take it.

MR. BEATTIE: Anybody else want to be on that committee?

MR. GUARNISCHELLI: Sure.

MR. BEATTIE: Very good.

The third week in December is the 20th. I think the concern is that it’s just too close to Christmas. Does anybody have a problem with the 13th, which is the second Wednesday of the month?

MR. KELLY: Does that conflict with the Jewish holiday?

MR. BEATTIE: I don’t know.

MS. WAYLAND-MORGAN: Chanukah begins sunset on December 12.

DR. GITTELMAN: But it’s eight days. I’m Jewish and I will volunteer that – well, it’s not on the first day. If it’s okay with anybody else, I’m agreeable to having it on the 12th.

MR. MELORE: I can’t be here that night. I have a partners’ meeting.

MR. BEATTIE:

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Unless we want to continue with just doing it on the 20th. I don’t have a problem with the meeting being that close to Christmas. Okay, let’s just leave it on the 20th.

That’s all the new business I had. Does anybody have any additional new business? Any old business? Can I have a motion to adjourn? Tony.

MS. GIAMO: Second.

MR. BEATTIE: We are adjourned. Thank you all. (Vote: 10/0/0/5 Not Present: Ms. Oldrin Mones. Absent: Mr. Glascock, Ms. Gegwich & Ms. Macri. One vacancy.)

(Mr. Beattie adjourned the meeting at 8:25 p.m.)

RB:ap Attachments

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