Volunteer members of an AFTA advisory council on Friday publicly called for Lynch and his senior executives to resign, saying that after three months of working behind the scenes for reform, they realize AFTA is an “organization with no desire to change.” At the same time, current and former staff have alleged that senior leaders “created and condoned a hostile work environment . . . rife with bullying, intimidation, retaliation, and harassment,” according to an online letter posted Nov. 25. They, too, want AFTA’s senior executives to step down.
The criticism and calls for change come as the arts continue to grapple with the economic fallout of the coronavirus pandemic and the racial reckoning that has swept the arts field.
The firestorm is magnified by AFTA’s — and by extension, its chief executive’s — outsize influence in the field, where it operates as a singular — some say dominating — force of research, policymaking and political advocacy aimed at amplifying the value of the arts. Lynch, 71, has been its leader for 35 years, a key reason he is one of the few arts executives leading the presidential transition team. Some arts leaders say his track record around racial equity should disqualify him from these positions.
“They are claiming they are the voice of the arts. They can be big and large, but they don’t represent the people,” Quanice Floyd, a member of AFTA’s Arts Education Advisory Council, said in an interview with The Post. Floyd’s Nov. 11 op-ed on HyperAllergic.com threw months of private negotiations into public view.
“He absolutely should not be leading that effort. He’s hugely problematic,” said Caitlin Strokosch, president and CEO of the National Performance Network, a group of artists and organizations dedicated to racial and cultural justice. Strokosch was one of 15 people in arts and arts education representing local, national and philanthropic agencies interviewed for this story. “The urgency around his role in the transition is part of why folks are paying attention.”
Lynch is also rumored to be a top candidate to eventually take over as chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, a role held by Mary Anne Carter, who was appointed in 2019 to a four-year term. Lynch said he is not seeking the position, and an NEA spokeswoman said Carter “is committed to fulfilling her term.”
Lynch responded to the controversy in an interview with The Post on Friday.
“We place the highest value on [diversity and equity]. They are critical to our mission, and to me personally. We can always do better and always do more,” said Lynch. “We have certainly not done enough, and not communicated enough. I accept responsibility for that.”
The calls for change began in July, when arts education advisory council members began pressing AFTA’s leaders to articulate what they were doing internally and externally in support of social justice. Dissatisfied with what they viewed as AFTA’s slow response, the council members proposed several actions, including increasing the diversity of the organization’s board and staff, filling the staff position devoted to membership, and improving its transparency and accountability. Exasperated over AFTA’s inaction, Floyd set a deadline of early November; in response, AFTA executives said they needed more time.
Critics say AFTA has been tone-deaf to the suffering of artists and organizations of color who have been disproportionately harmed by recent events, and it has missed opportunities to provide relief. AFTA says its 57 employees are 40 percent diverse, although only two of 12 senior executives identify as Black, Indigenous or people of color. Board diversity is 40 percent, too. Critics also point to AFTA’s history, saying calls for equality and diversity have been ignored for years, as evidenced by the continuing relevance of its tongue-in-cheek moniker WAFTA (White Americans for the Arts).
That the wealthy organization secured one of only 846 NEA emergency grants of $50,000 from the Cares Act is further proof that it is out of touch, they say. Rather than pocketing funds that could keep another organization from going under, AFTA should be thinking about how it could use its high profile and deep resources — including a $100 million endowment — to provide relief, the critics say.
“There is a lot of power hoarded at the top of the organization, a lot of resources,” said Lauren Ruffin, co-chief executive of Fractured Atlas, a national service organization for arts and artists with a focus on equity. “What are they doing to shift power? How can that $100 million endowment be redirected during a crisis? These are questions I would ask myself. How am I deploying assets quickly to make change?”
“AFTA is not evil. They are just deficient,” said Roberto Bedoya, cultural affairs manager for the city of Oakland, Calif., who coined the term WAFTA almost a decade ago. “They have been deficient for years, and it angers me that another generation has to battle them for racial equity.”
The fruitlessness of the summer’s private efforts pushed Floyd to write her op-ed, which described AFTA’s “disheartening” response and called for artists and arts organizations of color to band together. “As a field, we’ve waited far too long for these institutions to get on board with the movement towards racial equity,” she wrote.
“AFTA is not ready to adapt. They are comfortable being at the top, being the gatekeeper,” Floyd said in an interview with The Post after the piece published. “It’s all about power.”
The op-ed swept through arts circles, generating supporting statements from organizations and colleagues across the country, including the National Performance Network. “It’s no secret that AFTA is racist, sexist and capitalistic,” said Strokosch, the organization’s leader. “AFTA has no interest in understanding needs of communities of color. [Quanice Floyd] has done the labor . . . to identify what needs to change and it still hasn’t changed.”
AFTA responded to the op-ed with a broad statement, posted to its website Nov. 16, that outlined its achievements in diversity and equity. The posting asserted that its board is 48 percent diverse — a figure it later admitted was inflated, or “forward-looking to 2021, when the board will be made up of 26 people, of which 12 will be BIPOC.” The posting also reaffirmed its 2106 cultural equity statement. A second posting, on Dec. 3, responded directly to the charges leveled by Floyd and AFTA employees.
Lynch promised to review the critique, but he rejected the council’s criticism that AFTA responded only after Floyd’s comments generated a public backlash.
“Did nothing happen until there was criticism? Absolutely not. You don’t get to board representation of 40 percent overnight,” Lynch said. “There are different ways of dealing with an issue. Sometimes people want it their way.”
Two weeks after Floyd’s call to action, former employees Jeff M. Poulin, Kate McClanahan and Bridget Woodbury signed the public letter that says it speaks for 10 former and current employees, describes incidents of workplace harassment and calls for Lynch to step down. Poulin says he was forced out after filing a formal complaint about sexual harassment. Woodbury says a promised promotion was withdrawn following her speaking out about witnessing employee intimidation and retaliation. She later resigned.
The employees felt a responsibility to share their stories, said Poulin, whose legal case with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission remains open.
“This was not a one incident happenstance, but rather a coordinated effort to intentionally harm any employee, volunteer or constituent who threatened their positional power, clout, wealth or ability to gate-keep,” he told The Post. “We stand with the volunteer leaders and wish to amplify their calls for new leadership at Americans for the Arts while encouraging the Americans for the Arts’ board and members to take swift and decisive action.”
The larger field took note of the allegations. “There is a lack of accountability and that is mirrored in the HR practices,” said Ashraf Hasham, the youth arts manager at the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture and a member of the arts advisory council. “You can’t unsee that connection anymore. You have to connect the dots.”
Lynch said AFTA will examine the workplace issues raised by the employees, but he pushed back on the description of AFTA as a hostile place to work.
“I would say it’s a demanding place to work. AFTA produces a lot. We aim to get the highest quality of staff,” he said.
AFTA has high staff retention and low turnover rates compared with industry standards, Lynch said, and its salaries and benefits are above industry standards. Many staff have served for 10 and 25 years.
“They wouldn’t stay at a workplace that is negative for them. They are high producers,” said Lynch, who has led the organization for 35 years and earned $922,560 in 2019, according to that year’s tax return.
The former employees said they worked for change for years before making their public statements. “We’re advocates for the arts, we know how to advocate for ourselves. We worked internally for many years,” McClanahan, who left AFTA in 2018, said in an interview.
Poulin said he approached several board members with his story, and one member took it to Lynch. The board member, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation, told Lynch the allegations would be raised at the next meeting. The board member never got the chance to raise the issue because the following week, the board chair informed that board member that the member’s two-year term would not be renewed. Lynch said he was not familiar with the incident.
Abel Lopez, AFTA’s immediate past board chairman, said he did not know about the staff allegations of harassment and retaliation, and he expressed remorse that the staff did not feel they could bring their stories to him.
“I am sorry that we haven’t formed a more formal relationship, that people felt we didn’t welcome their interaction,” said Lopez, who remains on the board.
Lopez will lead a task force of outside experts, board members and staff to review the organization’s work on diversity and equity, and report directly to the board about any proposed strategies.
“It is a useful exercise. It provides an opportunity not to make a statement that we think we’re doing a terrific job, but to tell us how to improve,” Lopez said.
Lynch does not support the idea of replacing people before they finish their work to make room for others.
“Earlier in my career, my board pushed me for better retention,” he said. “I believe good work should be rewarded by loyalty.
“I serve at the pleasure of the board of directors of this organization,” he added, promising that whenever he plans to step down, “they will be the first to know.”