Arizona Theatre Company gets $500K matching donation

Two years ago, Arizona Theatre Company faced a $1 million deficit and there was deep concern for its survival.

This week, the company announced that an anonymous donor has given a $500,000 matching donation. If it is met, ATC will surpass its fundraising goal for the fiscal year.

“Every dollar donated to ATC is matched dollar for dollar as it comes in the door,” said Matt Lehrman, interim managing director, of the donation.

“In the end, it’s worth $1 million to ATC. As you can imagine, this is very important.”

This year, the fundraising goal was $2.4 million, said Lehrman.

“This has been a challenging year from a contributed revenue perspective,” he said. “But I have no problem saying that we were confident we would achieve our objectives. The availability of our challenge grant helps considerably.”

About 40 percent of ATC’s roughly $6.8 million budget relies on fundraising; earned revenue, which includes ticket sales and rent income, provides 60 percent.

“Like any nonprofit arts organization, the mission is greater than the ticket sales,” Lehrman said. “Fundraising is essential … to support the continuing operations. We had a good year, sold a lot of tickets, did some wonderful art. But before the fiscal year is over we have to hit the contributed revenue objective. (The donation) puts a lot of fuel in the ask.”

The campaign to raise the matching funds runs through the end of ATC’s fiscal year, June 30.

The company did some low-key fundraising before the campaign was announced and has already raised about $300,000.

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“We have almost two months left to raise the money, and we are well past the 50-yard line,” says Cameron Artigue, the chairman of ATC’s board, calling the challenge grant “the best thing to happen to ATC in years.”

If the goal is met, it will put the company in the most financially stable spot it has been in since the 2013 crisis.

“It’s about having enough cash on hand,” says Lehrman. “This certainly does help restore vital working capital to the company.”

When ATC’s financial crisis hit, management was in turmoil — managing director Mark Cole left in the wake of the financial shortfall, and artistic director, David Ira Goldstein, who had stepped down, agreed to stay until a successor was named. He is still there.

Jessica Andrews, who was managing director for years and had retired, agreed to come back until the board could find a new executive director. In September, Lehrman, an arts consultant, replaced Andrews as interim director, though Andrews has an “emeritus” title and is working on the matching-funds campaign.

The board has not yet launched a search for either position, said Artique.

“We are totally comfortable and happy with Matt and David,” said Artigue. “At some point we’ll be doing national searches, but right now, we’re happy.”

The turmoil in the organization is a thing of the past, he added.

“ATC went through a rough patch in 2013. Since then, we’ve moved on and turned around. Things have been looking up in a major way.”