THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 13, 1997 TAG: 9702130002
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A20 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: 70 lines
Among the Hampton Roads arts or cultural institutions that stand to gain from the current Virginia General Assembly session are the Virginia Zoo, Chrysler Museum, Norfolk Botanical Garden, Virginia Symphony and the Virginia Sports Hall of Fame.
All are in line for funds from state government. Each has a claim on a portion of public funds because all serve the public well. And each institution is striving to enhance its appeal, usefulness and reputation.
The Senate has approved $500,000 and the House of Delegates $550,000 toward construction of the zoo's Africa exhibit and a new public-entry area. These projects are Phase 1 of a multiphase expansion and upgrading.
Phase 1 is a $15 million undertaking. The Virginia Zoological Society is out to raise a third of that. Norfolk City Hall has agreed to match the society's $5 million, leaving $5 million more to be drawn from sundry sources. An appropriation by the General Assembly of at least a half-million dollars would be a strong start on closing the projected gap.
A fall groundbreaking for the Africa display is on the calendar.
Zoos and aquariums are crowd pleasers. More than 119 million people passed through the turnstiles of American zoos and aquariums in 1995 - more than attended professional football, basketball and baseball games.
Zoos are becoming the surest instruments for saving from extinction some endangered species, such as the Siberian tiger; more than 90 percent of the mammals in North American zoos were born in captivity.
The Virginia Zoo draws 300,000 visitors annually. Many more visitors will come after the opening of the exhibit, which will add zebras, giraffes and other African mammals to the elephants and rhinos already there.
If the $150,000 approved by the Senate for the Chrysler is embraced by the reconcilers of the different House and Senate budgets, the museum will receive $621,000 for yet another year toward its $4.1 million operating budget.
The museum needs the supplement. And aid to the Chrysler is modest beside the $7 million appropriated for the state's Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond. Because the Chrysler showcases the most important collection of art in the Southeast, the General Assembly ought to be more generous toward it.
Norfolk Botanical Garden aims to become a first-rank horticultural center. Operated by the Norfolk Botanical Garden Society under contract with the city, the institution has been freed from the municipal bureaucracy. The $100,000 approved by the Senate is the same sum bestowed on the garden by the General Assembly for the current fiscal year.
The garden, which provides land and canal-and-lake tours, is seen by 200,000 people a year. The $100,000 it seems sure to get from the General Assembly will be used to teach hordes of schoolchildren.
Both House and Senate have approved $100,000 for the Virginia Symphony, which will underwrite half of the expenses for the regional orchestra's April 15 concert at Carnegie Hall.
The concert will increase the orchestra's visibility nationally and Hampton Roads' visibility too. The orchestra is working with Forward Hampton Roads, the economic-development arm of the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce. The top brass of companies considering investing in Hampton Roads will be in the Carnegie Hall audience.
The Virginia Sports Hall of Fame in Portsmouth gets $50,000 a year from the state toward its $150,000 operating budget. Both House and Senate have approved another $50,000 to study what Virginia could do to make its Sports Hall of Fame competitive with similar institutions in other states.
Occupying cramped quarters in the 1846 courthouse at High and Court streets, the three-decades-old institution honors 155 Virginia sports stars and will honor more at its annual spring banquet. The Sports Hall of Fame counts 30,000 visitors a year and sponsors an annual celebrity golf tournament to build its endowment.
The General Assembly should appropriate the funds needed to maintain and improve these important cultural amenities, which also are effective economic-development assets.