Logo

Mayor Bill de Blasio’s minions are vowing to escalate his culture war — the one on city museums and other artistic institutions.

On Tuesday, Tom Finkelpearl, head of the city’s Department of Cultural Affairs, admitted that the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall and other city treasures aren’t meeting the mayor’s de-facto quotas for their workforces.

In all, 33 cultural nonprofits get $117.2 million a year in taxpayer money. Any institution that falls short is supposed to see a 10% cut.

According to a July report by SMU DataArts, prepared at City Hall’s behest, roughly two-thirds of staffers employed at city-funded museums, theaters, zoos and so on are white. De Blasio’s been demanding more “diversity” for years.

And never mind the composition of the art world’s hiring pool, nor the fact that it “overachieves” when it comes to hiring gays and women.

Nor the complete lack of evidence that any of these outfits discriminates in hiring.

But now they’ll have to change their staff, or the city will start cutting the funds it gives them. “The next threshold will be next spring,” Finkelpearl warned.

It’s hard to think of more outrageous abuse of city funds: Start judging people on the color of their skin, or else.

Comments
anonymous profile image
Powered by RoundtableBuilt on infrastructure designed for real-time media. Learn more at RTB.io.© Roundtable 2026. By using this site you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy