Inquiry Into Pew's Role in $107 Million in PA Capital Budget

FBF has, today, sent a letter to Rebecca Rimel, Executive Director of the Pew Charitable Trusts, asking whether Pew played any role in $107 million in public funds being earmarked for a new Barnes "museum" in Philadelphia. These two earmarks, part of Senate Bill 1213, were established in 2002 just before or at the very same time that the Barnes Foundation, pleading insolvency, petitioned for permission to relocate its gallery art to Philadelphia. The Barnes Foundation has denied any knowledge of these earmarks. Ms. Rimel, when asked about them by the press, refused comment.

If the administration at the Barnes Foundation and Pew knew nothing of these earmarks, FBF wonders how the $100 million figure in one of the two earmarks came to be exactly the amount the Barnes Foundation told the court it needed to build a facility and move its gallery art?

Text of the press release and letter are on the FBF blog Barnes Letters.