- Robert Pritchard, 70th Dist. -- R-Sycamore
- Carol Ammons, 103rd -- D-Champaign
- Scott Drury, 58th -- D-Highwood
- Norine Hammond, 93rd -- R-Macomb
- Donald Moffitt, 74th -- R-Galesburg
Paragraph in brackets was sent only to Rep. Moffitt.
I am writing to urge your support of SB 317, which would mandate reopening the Illinois State Museum in Springfield and its satellite facilities in Lewistown, Rend Lake, Lockport and Chicago. My interest in the issue is personal, since on Sept. 22, 2010, I discussed my research on the topic "Vachel Lindsay, Edgar Lee Masters and the Roots of Oldtime Music" at an Illinois State Museum Brown Bag Lecture in the ISM’s Research and Collections Center in Springfield. The opportunity to present my findings to a group of my academic peers at the Museum was important to my personal and professional development; in fact it helped me clarify research questions that led me to develop a proposal for the Illinois Humanities Council’s Road Scholars Program in 2014. I am retired now from my position as an associate professor at Benedictine University-Springfield, but I believe it is of utmost importance that younger scholars in Illinois have the same opportunities that I did.
[I have also presented talks on musical history in Andover and Bishop Hill in your legislative district, so I speak from experience when I say the impact of closing the ISM goes beyond the communities where its facilities are located.]
My interest in reopening the ISM facilities goes beyond that, however. As you are no doubt aware, the Accreditation Commission of the American Alliance of Museums has voted to put Illinois’ state museum system on probation. According to Commission Chair Burt Logan, “The actions by the Illinois state government that forced the Illinois State Museum system to close to the public left us no choice but to place this museum on probation pending further information from the museum system. We have grave concerns about the impact of this closure on the long-term viability of the museum, including affecting its ability to retain a professional staff and operate at the highest professional level; impairing the museum’s ability to care for the 13.5 million specimens in its collection; impacting donor support; risking its role as a major educational resource in the state of Illinois; and harming its reputation as a premier international museum and research institution.”
Senior administrators and scientific researchers have already found employment elsewhere, and some of the damage done by closure already is irreparable. If AAM is forced to pull accreditation, it will be terribly difficult to get it back. For all of these reasons, and because of the adverse economic impact that closure is having in the affected communities – and among artists and craftspeople statewide – I urge a yes vote on SB 317.
-- Dr. Peter Ellertsen (Ph.D., English; M.A., history and journalism)
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