Around 1,000 Iowans have signed on to a petition to prevent state administrators from closing the State Historical Society of Iowa’s (SHSI) facility in Iowa City.
Retired special collections coordinator Mary Bennett said the decision to close the Centennial Building was made without public input. Administrators finalized the decision before notifying the Board of Trustees, she said.
Visits to the research center will move to appointment-only this month. The state will close the Centennial Building in June next year.
Other cuts to the SHSU include ending the state’s 163-year-old partnership with the publication Annals of Iowa and shutting down the mobile museum.
Bennett created the Save Iowa History Coalition and started the petition to protest the cuts.
In an SHSI Board of Trustees meeting in June, a trustee asked Iowa Department of Administrative Services (DAS) Director Adam Steen why the board was not invited to weigh in.
“This may sound cold, but nothing technically requires that,” Steen said.
When Bennett was working for SHSI, she said she upheld the institution’s mission to serve and educate the public. Now, she feels that administrators have strayed from SHSI’s fundamental legacy.
“I entered into deeds of gifts with people and made promises on behalf of the state that we would take care of their treasures and that we valued them. And so, they gave them up,” Bennett said. “Now, I feel like that trust has been violated.”
In the June board meeting, SHSI administrator Valerie Van Kooten said her team had four weeks to decide how to come up with $800,000.
Once the building is handed over to the University of Iowa, Van Kooten said SHSI would see savings of $450,000-$500,000 a year. The building also needs $750,000 in maintenance.
What will happen to the Iowa City collections?
State Archivist Tony Jahn said the department is working on a plan to move the Iowa City archive to the Des Moines facility. Jahn told the SHSI board the Des Moines location would only be able to absorb 40% of Iowa City’s collection, with 2,000 feet of space to spare.
Jahn said there is no institution in Iowa that would be able to take the entire collection.
Bennett said the remaining 60% of the collection might be divvied out, privatized or possibly destroyed.
“If you think about taxpayers paying 168 years to make sure this treasure was kept safe and sound and intact, it is a joke that for less than a million dollars, you're going to take the thing down,” Bennett said.
Gov. Kim Reynolds approved $5 million dollars in funding to replace Des Moines’ archival storage unit. But Bennett said the new shelves were intended for existing archival holdings, not for adding new materials.
Why is the State Historical Society of Iowa downsizing?
SHSI is facing a budget shortfall of $800,000, forcing them to reduce their staff and cut back on various programs.
State funding left a gap in the organization’s budget. SHSI originally requested $1 million for the fiscal year that started July 1, but the legislature awarded them half that. Another $200,000 would have come from grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, which the federal government has cut.
SHSI also took on more of the costs for its facilities after a restructuring of the state government passed in 2023.
“We have to take care of this building by ourselves. We're not getting all that. But having DAS's financial team come in is the best thing that ever happened to this organization,” Van Kooten said.
In the June report to SHSI, Van Kooten wrote that donors have been “skittish” about supplying sponsorships and donations “in light of an unsettled economy.” SHSI cancelled their Decades Dinner event because they could not secure sponsors.
SHSI has been using money from unrestricted funds and donations to fill the gap. But that can’t go on forever, Van Kooten wrote.
DAS Director Adam Steen told the board in June the historical society needs to be looked at like a business.
“Money comes in, money goes out, and if more money is going out than coming in, we have a problem with sustainability,” Steen said.
