A Report for Supporters of the SSO and MOSSO
The SSO Board Management Committee has refused
musicians’ offer to drop all NLRB charges.
The SSO musicians have unanimously voted no confidence in the SSO Board Management Committee and request that the public join them in asking the BMC to resign immediately.
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has announced a monetary settlement of $276,406 to resolve a complaint against the Springfield Symphony Orchestra Inc (SSO) for violating federal labor law. The SSO had breached the terms of its last contract with SSO musicians, requiring that individual contracts be issued to the musicians in June 2021 for the 2021-2022 concert season. The SSO must now pay this financial remedy to the 71 musicians of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra. Click here to access the NLRB case.
The Orchestra Musicians’ Committee had offered to drop all charges against the SSO, and allow the organization to keep the $276,406 settlement remedy in exchange for the resignations of all six members of the SSO Board’s self-appointed Management Committee (BMC). This offer demonstrated the musicians’ commitment to placing the financial health and future of the orchestra ahead of receiving compensation for services not rendered –– despite the NLRB finding that those services and compensation had been illegally denied them by the SSO. The musicians of the SSO have witnessed the members of the BMC –– operating outside the normal channels of full and open board governance –– mismanage the SSO for many years, creating a self-fulfilling prophecy of failure for the organization. As such, the 71 musicians of the SSO have voted unanimously that they have no confidence in the Board Management Committee.
In rejecting the musicians’ offer to drop the charges, the SSO will pay the NLRB-mandated remedy to all SSO musicians to NOT play eight of the ten concerts that have been presented in the SSO’s most recent full seasons. The musicians, to a person, have no desire to be paid to NOT play, and have resolved to fill this vacuum by using the settlement money towards producing their own concerts for the Springfield community in 2022, many of which will be announced soon.
What financial resources is the SSO drawing upon to cover the cost of this settlement, or for that matter, the legal expenses incurred by the organization for two years of fruitless contract negotiations, and more recently, the NLRB complaint? All of these monies, no matter where they come from, will have been spent by the BMC in order to evade its obligation to produce and present concerts in fulfillment of the SSO’s mission. The BMC members, many of whom have served for decades, insist on holding on to power, rather than agreeing to resign and make way for new board members who would dedicate themselves to a vibrant future for the orchestra, its musicians, music director, and mission. Without their departure, restoration of the Executive Board to its full, bylaw-mandated membership of fifteen will not be possible, and the other three board members currently serving will continue to remain powerless. (Click here to read MOSSO’s point-by-point rebuttal to the BMC’s late-November open letter to the community.)
Some context: When the pandemic shut down SSO performances in early 2020, the Board justifiably put the organization into hibernation in order to maintain financial health while weathering the storm. What CANNOT be justified now is the BMC’s continued invocation of the pandemic and stalled contract negotiations with SSO musicians as excuses for a deep freeze. Performing arts organizations all over the region and country have sprung back to life, offering full seasons to their audiences, while the SSO has remained on the sidelines.
The current state of non-play reveals that the revolving door through which many key SSO organizational staff have passed for several years has now become an exit door. The SSO is again without an Executive Director, given the recent departure of the organization’s fifth leader since the end of 2012. It also lacks a Music Director, a Development Director, a Marketing Director, an Operations Manager, a Personnel Manager, an Education Director, a Librarian and a Box Office Manager. None of these vacated positions has been posted, let alone filled. In addition, the SSO ceased all development activities for six months during the course of 2021, falsely claiming that the organization could not solicit funds or plan a 2021-2022 concert season until the settlement of a contract with SSO musicians. There is absolutely no historical or contractual precedent for this assertion. Hence the NLRB’s decision.
The NLRB settlement also includes a commitment to the production of two full symphony concerts in the spring of 2022, in order to bring the total number of played and unplayed concerts to the status quo of ten. Specific dates and locations have yet to be determined, so there is no guarantee that the performances will be in Symphony Hall. These two concerts will be the sum total of the SSO’s 2021-2022 season, down from the half-season of five “proposed” as a public ultimatum by the BMC in a 6/10/21 Boston Globe article –– ostensibly to determine the ”viability” of the SSO going forward. Successfully planning and producing even two concerts will instead prove a test of the viability of the BMC, absent a music director, staff, and specific dates that SSO players would normally have committed to in writing by July 1.
By presiding over the disappearance of the SSO’s organizational staff, the members of the BMC have now made plain what has been evident for years: They have a stranglehold on the functioning of the SSO, despite lacking any experience in running a performing arts organization. This iron grip explains why they have been unwilling over the last decade to pay market rate to attract and hire a strong executive director, a leader who –– if granted autonomy –– could have been empowered with assembling an able supporting team to raise money, market the SSO in creative ways, and expand its audience and patron base. The expenditure of hundreds of thousands of dollars drawn from the endowment principal to cover several years of operating expenses could well have been avoided had BMC members been willing to spend just tens of thousands of dollars earlier on capable, independent leadership for the SSO. Now, they will spend $276,406 in order that symphonic performances NOT be brought to Springfield and the Pioneer Valley.
The NLRB remedy accepted by the BMC shows that there are serious financial consequences for violating federal labor law. Unfortunately, this settlement can only treat a symptom, not the root cause of the SSO’s existential problems. Going forward, there are no guarantees that the BMC will commence bargaining in good faith with the SSO Musicians’ Committee in order to come to an agreement on a new contract. We must spare the organization and SSO supporters throughout the Pioneer Valley the possibility of a “Groundhog Day Scenario,” with the BMC continuing to bargain in bad faith, while making further crippling draws on SSO funds unrelated to producing concerts, and reaping further NLRB complaints and their subsequent remedies. The squandering of these precious financial resources must not become a pattern.
In sum: Our beloved Springfield Symphony Orchestra has been reduced to a hollow shell by the very people entrusted with its well-being. The musicians of the SSO believe the BMC’s destructive actions demonstrate that the time has come for its members to depart the organization.
Our musicians have given voice to this opinion in their unanimous vote of no confidence in the BMC. We, the musicians of the Springfield Symphony Orchestra, for the sake of the SSO’s future, ask that you join us in demanding the resignations of the members of this committee. Click below to sign and share the petition.