Independent Financial Analyst Will Assess the Company's Fiscal Situation
The Metropolitan Opera and two of its unions have agreed to hire an independent financial analyst to assess the company's fiscal situation, postponing a threatened lockout by another week.
The agreement was brokered by a federal mediator who arrived Thursday to jump-start fractious talks between the Met and unions representing its singers and orchestra members.
The announcement on Saturday evening marked a second reprieve; after the mediator's arrival, the Met had initially pushed its lockout deadline from Thursday to Sunday night.
Contracts for 15 of the company's 16 bargaining units had been set to expire Thursday.
So far, the Met has reached tentative deals with three of its smaller unions, representing call-center workers, building engineers, ushers and security guards.
The Met said Saturday that discussions with other unions are on hold while the analyst, Eugene Keilin, prepares a confidential, nonbinding report on the Met's books. Mr. Keilin began his study Saturday.
The Met described the move as an effort to help it reach new contractual agreements with the singers and musicians.
General manager Peter Gelb is seeking deep concessions from singers, musicians and stagehands.
His initial proposal this spring—labor-cost cuts of 16% to 17%—prompted public debate over the company's financial position and Mr. Gelb's management approach.
Mr. Gelb has said he must reset the company's finances in the face of depressed ticket sales and rising costs.
Union leaders have countered that he should rein in what they describe as excessive spending on new productions.
The company's budget grew to $327 million last year from $222 million in 2006, when Mr. Gelb took the helm.
To cover its operating costs, the Met in recent years has drawn heavily from its endowment, which now stands at $267 million, compared with $305.8 million in 2006.
And in 2012, the company sold $100 million in taxable bonds to refinance debt and fund capital improvements.
It reported a deficit last year of $2.8 million, or less than 1%.
Mr. Keilin is co-founder of private-equity firm KPS Capital Partners. He previously served as chairman of the Municipal Assistance Corporation for the City of New York, an agency created in 1975 to address New York's financial crisis.
Union leaders Saturday said they were encouraged by the development.
"We all look forward to a fair and independent analysis of the complex issues we have been contending with for months," Tino Gagliardi, president of the Met orchestra's union, said in a news release.
James J. Claffey, Jr., president of the stagehands' union, called the one-week extension "a step in the right direction."
