Dr. Carter G. Woodson African American Museum, 2240 Ninth Ave. S.
BY TAYLOR WILLIAMS
NNB Student Reporter
ST. PETERSBURG – She spent months helping create a lush, beautiful garden out back for meetings and parties. At Christmas time, she and friends took 12 little girls to have lunch with the mayor, get their hair and nails done and spend the night at a downtown hotel. And now Terri Lipsey Scott stands by the museum fence to chat with a little boy.
For Scott, chairwoman of the Dr. Carter G. Woodson African American Museum, building community is as important as showcasing history and art. So the little building at 2240 Ninth Ave. S has become both a museum and community center.
“Museums no longer reflect what they use to,” said Scott. “They used to be stale and for just looking at art, but have evolved into a more social area.”
But some prominent people don’t share her vision for the museum.
The executive director of the St. Petersburg Housing Authority, which owns the building, has said it should be a fully functioning museum and less a social gathering place. He also said it is the “fiscal responsibility” of the Housing Authority to consider “increasing revenues or decreasing expenses” there.
This spring the authority invited St. Petersburg College to consider leasing the building and opening its own museum there.
The chairman of the college’s board of trustees, which is quadrupling the capacity of its Midtown campus, has said the school would welcome the opportunity “to embrace and enhance” the museum.
The future of the museum came to a boil in May, when Scott and colleagues on the museum board were incensed to learn that a possible change was afoot.
In the weeks and debate that ensued, the future of the museum has put a spotlight on three organizations and their leaders, who are all prominent in the city’s African-American community:
Scott, the former office administrator to the St. Petersburg City Council, said she and the museum board were blindsided. They went to a workshop thinking the issue was a possible partnership between the board and St. Petersburg College. Instead, they learned the authority was proposing to hand management of the museum to the college.
“It’s disrespect by both SPC and the Housing Authority,” Scott said, “and I will say ‘disrespect’ because no one’s talked to us.”
She said the museum has handled its limited resources well, noting that it has not gotten the sort of taxpayer support enjoyed by three downtown museums – the Dali, the St. Petersburg Museum of History and the now-defunct Florida International Museum.
Darrell Irions, the CEO of the Housing Authority, also cited money. He said the authority gets 8 cents per square foot in rent from the museum board while the tenants of “similar properties” pay rent ranging from $4.70 to $6.75 per square foot.
Although the museum board’s lease was set to expire May 31, the Housing Authority “had received no communication from the museum board about their future plans,” Irions said.
“After listening to SPC’s presentation, it appears that SPC has many more resources to offer than the current museum board does,” he said. “They mentioned investing $250,000 into building improvements and getting accreditation. This type of commitment could not be discounted.”
Deveron Gibbons, the chairman of the St. Petersburg College board of trustees, said the college was asked to submit a proposal for taking over the museum. The college already manages the Leepa-Rattner Museum on its Tarpon Springs campus, he said.
SPC president Bill Law, who seemed taken aback by the controversy, emailed Scott in late May to say the college would not pursue its proposal until the boards of the museum and the Housing Authority resolve their differences, according to the Tampa Bay Times.
Since then, both Scott and Gibbons have said they would be open to a partnership at the museum.
“At SPC, we aim to offer our students the best educational resources,” said Gibbons, an executive at Amscot Corp. and onetime candidate for mayor of St. Petersburg. “SPC has an opportunity to partner with the museum to enhance its current offerings, expand financial capacity, while increasing exposure to the rich culture and history of African-Americans to the general public and SPC’s student body of over 65,000.”
That sounds good to Scott. “Everything they (SPC) presented is what the Woodson needs. We are not disagreeable to a partnership,” she said.
The possible partnership may be discussed when the Housing Authority board meets June 26.
The museum, which opened in 2006, is in a building that used to be the rental office for the adjacent Jordan Park public housing complex.
“It was a notorious place for crime and the objective was to condense the crime,” Scott said. “The residents wanted a place to preserve African-American history.”
Legacy Garden
The Legacy Garden behind the museum was a project of the museum, the city Midtown Economic Development Initiative and the Leadership St. Pete class of 2008 at the St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce.
Transforming the area into a lush, beautiful garden was no easy task, said Scott. “It was like Baghdad out there. I spent many nights crying on the back step, but knew with every vision, there is provision.”
For Scott and the staff of the Woodson, preserving history has meant many long, volunteer hours. “It’s passion, not profession,” she said.
The Woodson museum has paid for only two of the roughly 16 exhibits that have been showcased. The rest of the exhibits came from local artists and curators who donated the pieces for a month. “Most of it has been on the backs of volunteers.” Scott said.
Information from the Tampa Bay Times and Weekly Challenger was used in this report.