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Projects at some of the city's most important cultural organizations are likely to suffer cuts that will endanger their completion, when the Department of Cultural Affairs capital budget is released this week.
While most of the specifics have not yet been announced, the Queens Museum of Art has learned that the first installments of $22.5 million in promised city money for its long-planned expansion have been deferred until at least 2006.
The move puts into question whether the expansion will happen at all.
"It's going to be even harder to raise the additional private money now," says Tom Finkelpearl, the museum's director. "I've heard the money will be deferred, not cut, but it's the same thing, really."
Funds for the Joseph Papp Public Theater's $50 million expansion have been delayed, as well.
City Center's $15 million capital budget for urgent building repairs was cut by almost 35%, leaving the center without the money to fix its air conditioning system. Air conditioning is crucial, since without it the center can't rent out its stages...