{"id":2501,"date":"2025-09-04T23:51:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-04T23:51:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/2501\/"},"modified":"2025-09-04T23:51:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-04T23:51:08","slug":"auckland-museum-proposes-to-cut-up-to-30-jobs-after-visitor-numbers-fall-and-venue-hit-by-asbestos-fix-costs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/2501\/","title":{"rendered":"Auckland Museum proposes to cut up to 30 jobs after visitor numbers fall and venue hit by asbestos fix costs"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cIt\u2019s important that we respond to the situation, and make sure we are in a position to recover well when conditions improve.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a very difficult time for our people, and we are committed to supporting them throughout this process.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ll be seeking input from our staff over the coming weeks. Their feedback will be carefully considered before any decisions are finalised,\u201d Reeves said.<\/p>\n

\u2018No longer sustainable\u2019<\/p>\n

The museum expects revenue to be $5.8m lower than budget over the next three years, while the cost of fixing its asbestos issues could be over $10m. <\/p>\n

The tourist hotspot was forced to close on May 10<\/a> after asbestos dust was detected in the museum\u2019s original 1929 building and its Grand Foyer. More asbestos was later identified<\/a> in \u201cadditional areas of the building\u201d.<\/p>\n

The museum reopened in stages 24 days after working with WorkSafe New Zealand and Auckland Council, and receiving clearance from a licensed asbestos assessor but sections of the building still remain closed off.<\/p>\n

\"AucklandAuckland Museum was closed for 24 days after the discovery of asbestos dust. Photo \/ File<\/p>\n

Reeves said \u201dthe unplanned closure of the museum due to the discovery of asbestos earlier this year has resulted in decreased income, to a level that is no longer sustainable. We also face significant and ongoing costs for asbestos remediation\u201d.<\/p>\n

The discovery and remediation of \u201casbestos has disrupted public engagement activities and access to key galleries\u201d, the museum said.<\/p>\n

The museum was also impacted by lower international visitors – a trend that has hurt similar venues across the country. <\/p>\n

Visitor numbers and income were behind budgets – and the museum said that \u201cvisitation forecasts\u201d for 2025\/26 financial year were 10% behind target, which was expected to lead to a $2m hit to revenue.<\/p>\n

Sign up to The Daily H<\/a>, a free newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s important that we respond to the situation, and make sure we are in a position to recover…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2502,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[3589,74,95,3596,51,138,3595,802,3588,77,3602,3592,3597,3594,232,1132,3586,111,139,3591,69,3601,3587,3598,335,3599,1961,61,810,3593,3590,102,3600,379],"class_list":["post-2501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-3589","tag-after","tag-and","tag-asbestos","tag-auckland","tag-business","tag-by","tag-costs","tag-cut","tag-detected","tag-earlier","tag-fall","tag-fix","tag-hit","tag-jobs","tag-million","tag-museum","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-numbers","tag-nz","tag-plunging","tag-proposes","tag-proposing","tag-remediation","tag-roles","tag-this","tag-to","tag-up","tag-venue","tag-visitor","tag-with","tag-wrestles","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2501"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2501\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}