With only a month until the first scheduled concert of the season, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra has stopped paying its musicians and the Woodruff Arts Center has locked them out of the symphony facilities.
In a sharp exchange of prepared statements Tuesday, the two sides agreed on only one thing: a fight over $1.2 million in payments to musicians is what stands in the way of a new, two-year contract between the ASO and its players.
In a lengthy press release, the musicians’ union revealed that on Aug. 24, just as the players’ contract expired, they offered to take $2 million a year in cuts for two years — for a total of $4 million — as long as management agreed to make equal cuts in administrative salaries.
But the Woodruff and the ASO stood by what they termed “our last, best, and final offer”: $2.6 million a year in cuts from the musicians, with no corresponding reductions in management salaries. Administrative personnel have already taken cuts, the orchestra’s press release said, while the average musician’s pay has increased by 23.6 percent since 2006.
In the version of events painted by the union’s statement, many orchestra staff and board members were pleased with the musicians’ offer, but the board of the Woodruff — the parent organization of the ASO — refused to budge.
“We offered up an unprecedented amount of concessions, and ASO management was in agreement that we were doing our share,” said Joel Dallow a spokesman for the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Players Association. “The Woodruff executive board does not believe that $4 million over two years is enough.”
But Stanley Romanstein, president of the ASO said in a statement Tuesday that the musicians are trying to drive a wedge between the ASO and the Woodruff. In fact, he said, the orchestra and the arts center agree on the tough cuts that have to be made to keep the symphony afloat.
“We cannot settle at this [$4 million] amount if we are to ensure the long-term health of the orchestra,” Romanstein said. “We have presented the musicians’ union with our last, best, and final offer — they have yet to respond.”
Since March, the ASO and its 93 musicians have been trying to come up with a collective bargaining agreement that would have replaced the recently expired one.
Dallow said that as of Aug. 31, with informal talks continuing, the Woodruff cancelled the musicians’ paychecks and health, dental, and disability insurance policies and barred them from entering Symphony Hall and the parking decks.
Romanstein’s response: “It is true that the musicians allowed their contract to expire … despite an offer on the negotiating table, so they are no longer being paid a salary. The musicians are now inactive employees, and therefore ineligible for benefits.
“It is unfortunate, but this is not news to ASOPA — whether this was fully shared with the players they represent is something we cannot confirm.”
According to Romanstein, the average compensation of the musicians is $131,000, including free health and dental coverage, free instrument insurance, pension benefits and eight weeks of paid vacation.
Dallow said that because the symphony has not issued formal letters of separation to musicians, it is unclear whether they will qualify for unemployment benefits.
Darrell Edwards, a symphony orchestra consultant and executive director of Orchestra Kentucky, said the musician’s $2 million a year offer is “more than what most musicians would be willing to do.”
Edwards said he would not be surprised if some musicians started looking elsewhere for work.
“When you tell a person that they cannot come to work, and by the way you have no health insurance, it seems pretty draconian,” said Edwards.
The latest round of negotiations took place in the shadow of a $20 million debt the ASO is projected to face by the end of next year. Last year, while the orchestra brought in $40 million in revenue, it spent $45 million.
“This deficit is expected to trend even higher in 2013,” Romanstein said.
He said that, to help curb costs, the ASO has asked its 68 staff members to forgo raises, endure layoffs, accept mandatory furloughs, and to contribute between 17 and 31 percent to their own health care plans. The orchestra has also raised ticket prices and asked donors to give more.
Chicago-based consultant and arts blogger Drew McManus, who has been following the Atlanta dispute, said that at this point, “both sides seem ready for a real, heavy-duty showdown.” He said said it sounds like extreme voices on both sides are driving the negotiations.
The center’s board may be willing to sacrifice some public goodwill to win this fight, he said, because it can lose some symphony concerts and still have revenue coming in from the Alliance Theatre and the High Museum of Art. “It’s not as though they’re not making any money,” McManus said.
Vicki Palefsky said the symphony was a major factor in her family’s decision to move to Atlanta in 2006, and she and her husband have attended about 10 performances a year since then. Her husband, Howard, is on the symphony board, but she said she has not taken a side in the contract dispute. She just wants to symphony to continue.
“I don’t have a side and I don’t have an answer,” said Palefsky, a former board member herself. “There’s always two sides and these are complicated situations.”
With the violin superstar Midori scheduled to perform with the ASO on Oct. 4, Palefsky said she is hoping for a “reasonable, timely resolution.”
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