9/17/2008 8:53:00 AM Centrum primes for Fort Worden change
Kisha Palmer was hired as Centrum’s business development director in February 2008. Centrum Executive Director Thatcher Bailey plans to promote Palmer to managing director, putting her in charge of the nonprofit arts organization’s day-to-day operations. - Photo by Kathie Meyer
Each summer, Centrum attracts thousands of ticket holders to four major music festivals and a writers' conference featuring renowned performers and authors of all disciplines from throughout the world. - Submitted photo
Learn More
Read what the state Parks and Recreation Commission is being asked to approve in relation to Fort Worden State Park. Visit www.parks.wa.gov/plans/ftworden2 and see Stage Four - Preparing Final Recommendations.
Centrum is teeming with changes in anticipation of Fort Worden State Park's transformation into a lifelong learning center campus.
"At this point we're kind of calling ourselves Centrum/Fort Worden, which is emphasizing more and more our connection to Fort Worden," said Centrum Executive Director Thatcher Bailey.
As Washington State Parks oversees the transition of Fort Worden into something more than just a recreational park, there are questions about where Centrum - a mainstay since 1973 - fits in. Will Centrum as the public knows it - i.e., the four summer music festivals and writing conference - still be here in 10 years?
"I hope that Centrum as we know it will also be known for a host of other things as well," said Bailey. "At this point, those are major events here, and those are the kinds of events that we're looking to have more of."
The Fort Worden Long Range Plan that the state Parks and Recreation Commission is being asked to approve Sept. 25 charts a move that changes how everyone does business at Fort Worden. Centrum, through Bailey's involvement in the state-appointed Long Range Plan Task Force, is at the forefront of change.
Under the proposed plan, Fort Worden remains state recreational property, but the management would be restructured to become a more responsive business model, ideally managed by a nonprofit entity. While the state would still be responsible for some operations and maintenance money, the goal is for onsite operations to raise more revenue by offering more programs and attracting additional guests. The additional business is sought from October through May, as the summer months are already full.
Bailey said that Centrum is still looking for more partners to include under the lifelong learning center umbrella.
"Some of the potential partners we're having conversations with aren't arts organizations," Bailey noted.
For example, Business Development Director Kisha Palmer is in the development and discussion stage for a military veterans' residential program. She hopes to acquire funding support to bring recent veterans to the Fort Worden campus either as individuals or in a family context to focus on reintegration after their combat experience. The program would be a multi-partnership experience, "more holistic than just arts-related," Palmer said.
Changing times
Centrum - a nonprofit arts education organization - has primarily produced the Chamber Music Festival, Jazz Port Townsend, the Port Townsend Country Blues Festival, the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes and the Port Townsend Writers' Conference, in addition to hosting artist residencies and weekend workshops for all ages throughout the year.
In 2008, the organization's five major events attracted 16,529 people to witness live music and readings staged as part of the festival and conference programs, a 39 percent increase since 2004, the year Bailey was hired.
Centrum's annual budget has grown in four years from $1.8 million to $3 million, Bailey reported in April 2008.
Centrum attracts more "customers" to Fort Worden than any other campus partner. Partners are entities that lease space and operate venues such as the Port Townsend Marine Science Center, Madrona MindBody Institute, Bon Appétit, Port Townsend School of Woodworking, Friends of Fort Worden, Puget Sound Coast Artillery Museum and Olympic Hostel.
Centrum's plans
Last year Bailey was assigned to the special seven-member task force helping state-hired consultants to develop the Fort Worden Long Range Plan.
Bailey said in July that Centrum has not officially declared an interest in creating an entity that could qualify as a nonprofit manager.
However, in a letter to Centrum supporters in April, Bailey said the organization's "re-branding" to Centrum/Fort Worden underlines a "fundamental commitment to Fort Worden." He wrote then that Centrum staff and the board of directors had developed a plan that embraced the opportunity provided by the lifelong learning center.
During the public process to review the long-range plan, State Parks officials and consultants were repeatedly asked whether a local entity such as Centrum could possibly emerge as the managing entity and, if so, would that give that organization special privileges for facility reservations, etc.
State Parks Planner Peter Herzog clarified that a nonprofit managing entity, if that goal were to be approved, would need to be independent and would be tasked to treat all partners fairly.
The next step in this process is the state commission meeting Sept. 25 and whether approval is given to advertise for potential nonprofit managing entities.
Bailey said this week that Centrum would wait to see how it plays out.
"That may or may not be Centrum," he said. "We may look at what they put out there as 'this is what we want an organization to do,' and we may say we can't morph into that or that's not interesting to us or we can play a stronger role as one of the lead partners."
Bailey noted that if Centrum were to seek such a position, it would mean change. "This would not be Centrum as you see it now."
Does Bailey see himself as the head of the new entity chosen to oversee Fort Worden?
"No, not necessarily. I don't have any interest in running Fort Worden."
Bailey and Palmer
Bailey became Centrum's fourth director in 2004. His salary, as listed on the organization's 2006 tax form 990, is $77,000. Centrum's 2007 tax form is not yet available.
Recently, Bailey turned over management of Centrum's day-to-day-operations to Kisha Palmer, who was hired in February 2008 as business development director. Palmer's job is to cultivate future partnership relations and funding sources for Centrum.
"She's still director of business development, but it is very close at this point to managing director," Bailey said of Palmer's quick rise to the number two spot at Centrum.
"One of the reasons why we haven't made that switch over to that title is that a lot of times the managing director ends up only looking at the day-to-day as opposed to keeping an eye trained toward the horizon, and that's really what I came on board for," explained Palmer.
Palmer is listed as the managing director in Centrum's listing on Theatre Puget Sound's website at tpsonline.org.
Raised in Seattle, Palmer, in her late 30s, graduated from Vassar College with a bachelor's degree in Latin American Studies in 1992. Prior to moving to Port Townsend to work for Centrum, she worked from 2005 to 2008 as a program manager for adolescent health programming for Kaiser Permanente Educational Theatre Programs in Los Angeles. Kaiser Permanente is a nonprofit, prepaid, group practice health maintenance organization, or HMO.
In addition to her Kaiser position, Palmer's résumé lists only one other job: bilingual product specialist manager for the auto show division of Toyota Scion from 2001 to 2005.
Initially, Bailey and Palmer said she wasn't looking for a job at all. Thinking she would take a year's sabbatical to transition from working in California to relocating back to Washington, she was planning to spend her time developing her fiction and playwriting. Since she had once attended a Centrum program while in high school, she looked at Centrum's website to see what it could offer her as an adult writer. When she saw a posting for a development director in early 2007, she decided to send in her résumé. A development director is primarily responsible for fundraising.
While she was not considered a viable candidate for the development director position, after a couple of interviews, "It became clear that there was a different possible skill set and opportunity here" for Palmer, said Bailey.
Grant funding
Around the same time, Centrum had applied to the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation for funding support to continue formulating plans regarding its future growth and how to work with the park in a different way.
"It became clear that what we needed was the position that we developed, which was [that of business development director]. Meanwhile, we found Tom [Scharf] as a development director, so it all kind of worked," Bailey said.
Palmer's position is funded by a grant from the Allen foundation, which allocates Centrum $225,000 over three years (2008-2010) to help the arts and education organization take a lead in turning Fort Worden State Park into a lifelong learning center. Palmer would not disclose her salary.
Grant money is also called "soft money" because it eventually runs out. After these three years, Bailey said, "we should have developed some business [in order to continue paying Palmer's salary]. We will replace that funding with revenue streams and new programs and those kinds of things."
According to her résumé, Palmer is charged with increasing annual programming activity by 100 percent, from $1.8 million to $3.6 million, over the next three years. Under Bailey's supervision from 2004 to 2007, programming activity increased from $1,097,687 to $1,606,044, a 46 percent increase.
That increase necessitates attracting new partnerships, said Bailey.
"That is one of the growth strategies. The largest growth is going to come through partner development, not program development," he said.
With no sign of relief from the nation's tough economic times in immediate sight, Bailey admitted that expectations might have to be recalibrated.
"It may work brilliantly or it may not work at all. Or somewhere in between," he said.
Bailey does not seem concerned that the core group of volunteers and donors will back off when Centrum takes on non-arts-related programs.
"Obviously we're having conversations about what it would mean to apply when the state puts out requests for letters of interest, [but] I can't imagine taking something on that would change the nature of this organization."
Citing past Centrum programs that were non-arts-related, Bailey said: "I think Centrum is opening [itself] back up to a bigger view of what residential education can mean. That's within our mission.
"If we had a hue and cry from that, I can't imagine that we wouldn't pay attention," he said.
Centrum staffing
New positions have been added and job titles and descriptions have changed at Centrum in order to meet new criteria that target the park's new focus.
When Bailey was hired in 2004, the Centrum in-house staff totaled around 14. Today, the in-house staff totals 16, said Palmer. Some of that staff is part-time or seasonal.
"We've raised salaries over time, more than we have numbers of people," said Bailey
Many of Centrum's longtime employees are no longer with the organization. Involuntary and voluntary turnover at the organization is as high as 11 in the past two years. Presently, Centrum is advertising for two positions: a technical director and production associate. Previously, duties for both positions were the sole responsibility of the technical director, a position that has been held by three different employees in two years.
Centrum's board of directors is not directly involved with personnel or organizational changes, said President Libby Reid of Port Townsend. "As an executive director, that's really in [Thatcher's] realm. Big organizational changes do go before the board. He's in charge of personnel and hiring and firing."
The board has, however, recently changed the organization's bylaws and articles of incorporation.
"We were just trying to update them," said Reid. "It was all just technicalities."
Keven Elliff
Keven Elliff, who once held the title of managing director, has become community development director.
"For him, community development means, in part, looking at the fort as a community," said Bailey.
"I see Keven as being a major player" in the fort's new direction, said Bailey. "He and Tim Lawson [of the Port Townsend Woodworking School] are working really closely together with developing the [computerized] calendar and what it means to market this place."
These new duties are similar to the anticipated "milestone activities" that the proposed nonprofit management entity would need to accomplish. Such milestones will quite likely be tasks such as bringing in three mission-appropriate partners, developing a communications plan, and acquiring market support, said Bailey.
Bailey said that the fact that Elliff's new duties match up so well to the milestones are because "the milestone tasks are something all of the partners are going to have to participate in to make the fort successful.
"What we need to be doing to be successful as an organization and what we need to be doing to be successful as the fort are the same set of tasks," Bailey said.
(Staff writer Patrick J. Sullivan contributed to this story.)
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