The Mission Cultural Center for the Latino Arts could be reopening\u2013 at least in part\u2013\u00a0 as early as this summer after closing abruptly last January.\u00a0<\/p>\n
To reopen,\u00a0the new board must comply with a list of guidelines that would allow the center to access a previously-approved special grant and its regular operational grants from the city\u2019s Arts Commission, city officials said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI first want to say thank you to all of you,\u201d said Susana Rojas, executive director of Calle 24<\/a>, to a crowd of about 30 people gathered at the center on Tuesday evening. \u201cI might get emotional because when we first came here, the future of MCCLA looked very, very dark.\u201d<\/p>\n In an effort to bridge gaps, Rojas also posted a GoFundMe<\/a> campaign Tuesday to \u201cSave MCCLA,\u201d with a goal of $24,000.\u00a0<\/p>\n News broke in January<\/a> that the center was to close indefinitely amidst a financial crisis that left the center with virtually no employees and only $400 in the bank as of Dec. 31 last year. The dire situation led the Arts Commission, which manages the center\u2019s city-funded grants, to take control of the building.<\/p>\n The center has offered classes, art shows and printing workshops since its founding in 1977. It closed for the holidays and never reopened. Instead, on Jan. 14, board member Rob Sanchez and then interim executive director Derek Jentzsch sent an email informing the Arts Commission that the center had run out of money and desperately needed an advance payment to continue operating.<\/p>\n With no advanced funds, the center would need to either declare bankruptcy, merge with other nonprofits, restructure the organization or work under the fiscal sponsorship of another mission-aligned organization.\u00a0<\/p>\n For three months, the center has remained closed with no signs of re-opening.<\/p>\n But as of today, Rojas said, the center now has a new fiscal sponsor: The San Francisco Study Center, Incorporated <\/a>\u2014 the same sponsor as Calle 24. Donations<\/a> are tax exempt.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe, among many others, really thought that we were closing our beloved center. I\u2019m standing here today with a lot of hope and a lot of good news and a lot of work that has happened behind doors that have us in a position to celebrate,\u201d Rojas said.<\/p>\n Amongst the good news, the center could access $122,500 in reimbursable funds from a previously-approved special grant \u2014 meant to help archive the center\u2019s art pieces during a planned renovation of the building, Rojas shared. The center\u2019s leadership already toured two locations on Mission St. between 20th and 23rd streets for a new home during construction.<\/p>\n Rojas said on Tuesday that they are working on a memorandum of understanding with the city to receive the funds. The center already submitted a required proposal detailing the timeline and scope of work. If everything goes well, the archival process could start next month.<\/p>\n In an update in front of arts commissioners on Monday, Art Commission deputy director Sarah Hollenbeck confirmed the negotiations with the center\u2019s new board of directors and Calle 24, with plans to allocate monthly reimbursements to the center between May and December.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rojas said she also received an email today in which the commission said it was open to resuming the center\u2019s annual operational grant, with conditions. The Mission Cultural Center would need to submit a quarterly fiscal report for the last operational quarter. In the meantime, the Arts Commission has picked up the tab for utilities and insurance payments.<\/p>\n Rojas\u2019 hope is to finalize all the reports required to resume the center\u2019s operational grant, $759,164 annually, soon. An initial payment of about $160,000 would allow the center to reopen in June, she said, albeit with reduced programming. If all goes well, another payment would be made in the fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n In the meantime, the volunteers and new board members are hoping to raise enough money to pay off an outstanding line of credit of about $90,000 and another $26,000 to cover all the accounting services.The center has already received some smaller donations and a $5,000 loan, Rojas said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Mission Cultural Center for the Latino Arts could be reopening\u2013 at least in part\u2013\u00a0 as early as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":258202,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[76398,582,101,7599,103,102,104,106,105],"class_list":{"0":"post-258201","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco","8":"tag-mccla","9":"tag-mission-street","10":"tag-san-francisco","11":"tag-san-francisco-arts-commission","12":"tag-san-francisco-headlines","13":"tag-san-francisco-news","14":"tag-sf","15":"tag-sf-headlines","16":"tag-sf-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=258201"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/258201\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/258202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=258201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=258201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=258201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}