Performing Arts Venues Workgroup

The role of the Performing Arts Venues Workgroup

On October 31, 2024, Portland City Council unanimously adopted Resolution #37684 to establish a Performing Arts Venues Workgroup to evaluate management of Portland’5 Centers for the Arts. On the same day, Oregon Metro adopted a complementary resolution.

The Performing Arts Venues Workgroup was tasked with evaluating the operations, maintenance, and long-term planning of City-owned Portland’5 venues: Antoinette Hatfield Hall (housing the Brunish, Newmark, and Winningstad Theatres), Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, and Keller Auditorium. The workgroup examined operational challenges and opportunities, with a focus on aligning management and operations with regional economic and cultural goals. Contracted subject matter experts conducted a business model and governance analysis to explore alternative operating models and recommend optimal solutions. 

The 19-member workgroup made its recommendations, which are outlined below, to the Deputy City Administrator of Vibrant Communities Sonia Schmanski and Metro General Manager of Visitor Venues Craig Stroud for consideration.  

Informed by the workgroup's findings, the Deputy City Administrator for Vibrant Communities and Metro General Manager for Visitor Venues Craig Stroud drafted a joint letter on June 25, 2025 addressed to City Administrator Jordan, Metro Council President Petersen, and Metro Councilors. The letter covered recommendations on short-term challenges and opportunities, as well as significant conditions that require potential renegotiations of the IGAs.

Workgroup timeline

The workgroup met bi-weekly between January and May 2025. Milestones during that time, as well as steps taken after the finalization of the workgroup's recommendations, include:

Performing Arts Venues Workgroup final recommendations 

Introduction from the workgroup

The Portland’5 venues¹ are among the most visible and impactful cultural assets in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. As a coalition of community stakeholders and arts leaders, the workgroup has developed values and guiding principles to help shape a resilient, responsible, and community-rooted vision for the future stewardship of the venues.

Arts and culture are moral imperatives to a healthy society and serve as galvanizing forces within society. The purpose of Portland'5 venues is to support the ecosystem for the greater Portland metro area, and all Oregonians.

Our goal is to ensure these venues remain drivers of cultural vitality, economic health, and civic engagement. These principles prioritize public value, service, community engagement, financial and operational sustainability, and access to the arts for all.

Short-term recommendations

Improvements within the Existing Model: The workgroup recognized the limited opportunities for immediate improvements within the existing operating model, due to limited time and the desire for more information, but identified the following short-term actions:

• Increase revenues: The current operator should expand efforts to increase revenue by maximizing venue usage (reducing “dark days”) and invigorating food and beverage options.
• Improve relations with local arts organizations: The current operator should engage more frequently with local arts organizations to solicit feedback on operations, support, and coordination, and commit to actionable solutions.
• Improve booking policies: The current operator should develop transparent booking policies, to improve client understanding of booking options and increase use of the venues.

Capital Planning and Funding: Significant risks and liabilities impede Portland’5’s ability to operate efficiently and effectively, including the backlog of deferred maintenance and necessary building modernization upgrades and future replacement. The workgroup recommends prioritizing the following actions:

• Do not fund capital with operations: A national scan of best practices conducted by AMS Consulting indicated that performing arts centers across North America do not fund capital maintenance with operations, as Portland’5 currently does.
• Begin capital planning immediately: Work should begin immediately to initiate capital planning and identify capital funding sources.
• Complete facility condition assessments: These should be completed so that needed capital improvements and estimated costs are known and investments prioritized.

Accountable Entity: This workgroup is the beginning of a process to identify the most effective operating model for Portland’5, and a single entity must lead the vision and drive change. As the owner of the buildings, the City of Portland is expected to lead the investigation, analysis, and public engagement process.

Change to Operating Model: The workgroup felt that the two-government model, with the City owning the buildings and Metro managing them, is not their preferred operating model. The workgroup recommends that the City and Metro begin preparing a plan for the dissolution of the intergovernmental agreement while the City works with stakeholders to continue assessing options to identify a new long-term operating model.²

Long-term recommendations

Given the complexity of factors that influence the success of operating models, and the limited time afforded the workgroup, more analysis and consideration are required to recommend a future operating model. However, the workgroup identified multiple plausible scenarios, tensions that should be considered, and values and guiding principles to drive future operating model analysis.

Scenarios: The workgroup considered numerous operating model scenarios for further investigation (below). All scenarios assume continued City ownership of the P’5 venues. Members did not reach agreement on a specific operating model scenario to recommend, but there was discussion of possible operating scenarios:

• Non-profit: Either an existing or newly formed non-profit organization manages operations. Example: A new organization co-led by existing arts groups to manage operations.
• For-profit: A local or national for-profit venue operator, either existing or new, manages operations.
• University: A Portland-based university with an interest in programming manages operations.
• City: The City of Portland manages operations.
• Multiple venue operators: Separate out the venues under different operators. Example: an existing non-profit manages operations at the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, an existing for-profit manages operations at Keller Auditorium, and the City manages operations at all three theatres within Hatfield Hall.

See the meeting summaries and slide decks from the April 16 and April 30 meetings in the Appendices for more details about the risks, benefits, and open questions the workgroup discussed about the various scenarios. AMS Consulting’s materials in the Appendices also provide analysis of each scenario.

Tensions: The workgroup identified several areas of tension that require careful consideration and balance, including:

• Continued co-management or separation of the venues: Some workgroup members foresee potential improvements by separating the venues, including more innovation, nimbler operations, and streamlined decision making, while others expect increased costs as well as losses in living-wage jobs, efficiencies of scale and calendar coordination.
• Expansion of philanthropy: While all workgroup members concur that philanthropic investment is crucial to a healthy performing arts ecosystem, some workgroup members believe Portland’5 needs to dramatically expand contributed revenue beyond government support, while others worried that it could divert a significant portion of the region's arts funding capacity to the detriment of other arts organizations.
• Cost pressures: The workgroup recognizes that pressure to increase fees and revenues for operational sustainability might have adverse impacts on commercial and nonprofit users of the facilities. Further exploration of new revenue streams and/or different business models is therefore warranted.

Values and guiding principles

Additional analysis should be driven by the following values and guiding principles established by the workgroup. 

Values statement

The workgroup affirms that:

• Arts and culture are essential to a healthy, thriving society.
• Public venues must serve the public good, with transparency and accountability.
• Access to creative expression is a civic right, not a privilege.
• Community voice must inform institutional direction, decision-making, and resource allocation.
• Sustainability—financial, cultural, and ecological—is a shared responsibility and a strategic imperative.
• The Portland’5 venues must be a home for all, reflecting and amplifying the full spectrum of people, perspectives, and creative practices that make up our cultural identity.

Guiding principles

1. Recognition of Portland’5 in the arts & culture ecosystem

Arts and culture are moral imperatives for a healthy society. They are vital to the wellbeing of Oregonians and serve as galvanizing forces for connection, creativity, and civic identity. The Portland’5 venues exist to support and strengthen the arts ecosystem across the Portland Metro area and throughout Oregon.

2. Public value

Local access to the performing arts must remain relevant and responsive to the needs of the community. As public venues, Portland’5 venue management is tasked with stewarding public value by ensuring that the venues:

• Establish a mission and vision that centers service to the Portland community in collaboration with stakeholders.
• Are well-kept and maintained at the level of world-class cultural spaces.
• Are welcoming and inclusive of all Portlanders—audiences, artists, organizations, renters, and community members.
• Serve as cultural destinations and creative engines that generate and attract resources for our local arts ecosystem and broader economy.
• Actively support local arts organizations and artists by working in collaboration with the community to ensure spaces and operations remain relevant, responsive, accessible, and community centered.
• Understand public value as the act of strengthening and building community—with the community—which in turn generates long-term cultural and economic vitality.

3. Capacity (functions, resources, capabilities)

To ensure a resilient, transparent, and community-focused financial and operational model, Portland’5 venue management must:

• Maintain clear, consistent, and open communication with its stakeholders—local artists, renters, audiences, and community members.
• Operate with sustainable, adaptable practices through a diversified infrastructure that can withstand market fluctuations and evolving community needs.
• Re-evaluate and strengthen an active advisory body composed of local stakeholders to guide strategic direction and hold Portland’5 venue management accountable to these guiding principles.
• Maximize venue activation by appealing to traditional and non-traditional uses.
• Uplift local artists and organizations by leveraging the venues’ collective reputation and infrastructure.

4. Support (external resources and community contributions)

To ensure Portland’5 venues function as a generative force within the community, the Portland’5 venue management must:

• Leverage public and private partnerships to uplift local organizations, expand community engagement, and build sustainable support for Portland’5 venue management and its mission.
• Develop strategies (short- and long-term) to fund deferred maintenance, capital improvements, and emergency contingencies in a manner consistent with the operation of world-class venues.
• Deepen and optimize the relationship between the venues and the communities they serve, fostering loyalty, financial stability for the communities and the venues, and marketing access for local organizations and events.
• Expand volunteer and engagement opportunities for community members to actively contribute to the life and stewardship of the venues.

Performing Arts Venues Workgroup meeting materials

Grounding 

Models and options

Workgroup recommendations

Members of the Performing Arts Venues Workgroup

Workgroup members brought a depth of experience in relevant areas including arts and culture, venue management, business, finance, labor, development, and government. They also represented small, medium, and large arts organizations as well as local, regional, and national perspectives. 

Brian Moore Prosper Portland

Chris Oxley Metropolitan Exposition and Recreation Commission (MERC)

Dana Rokosny  Musicians Union AFM Local 99

David Peterson Oregon Repertory Singers and Portland Gay Men’s Chorus

Diana Scoggins Metropolitan Youth Symphony

Donald Forsythe Portland State University

Dwana Smallwood Vibrant Communities/City of Portland

Isaac Thompson Oregon Symphony

Jeff Miller Travel Portland

Jim Brunberg Portland’5 Advisory Committee and Portland’5 Foundation 

Karen Whitman Halprin Landscape Conservancy

Michelle David Multnomah County Cultural Coalition

Prentice Onayemi Grains of Salt

Rich Jaffe Broadway Across America

Rose Etta Venetucci IATSE Local 28

Ruby White Portland’5 Culture and Community/Metro

Ruth Wikler Clark College

Samuel Hobbs push/FOLD and Union PDX

Susan Dixon Portland Opera

Related documents

Footnotes

¹ “Portland’5 Centers for the Arts” is the current operating name for the management of the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Keller Auditorium, and Antoinette Hatfield Hall, which includes the Brunish, Newmark, and Winningstad Theatres. Its usage in this document refers solely to these venues and does not constitute an endorsement of, nor an objection to, the current or any future management or organizational model.

² One member explicitly disagreed with this recommendation.