Colgate’s Center for Art and Culture receives $750,000 in state regional development funding

JANUARY 30, 2015

Colgate University is poised to prove that regional development can have an international reach.

Governor Andrew Cuomo, through his Regional Economic Development Council (REDC) initiative, has awarded $750,000 to Colgate, supporting the university’s efforts to relocate the Picker Gallery of Art and the Longyear Museum of Anthropology from campus to the new Center for Art and Culture in the Village of Hamilton.

“On behalf of the Colgate community,” said President Jeffrey Herbst, “I want to thank Governor Cuomo and his administration, Senator David Valesky, Assemblyman Bill Magee, the entire Central New York REDC, Madison County Board of Supervisors Chair John M. Becker, Hamilton Mayor Margaret Miller, Hamilton Town Supervisor Eve Ann Shwartz, and everyone who endorsed our application for this grant.”

Cuomo made the announcement last month, during a ceremony to award a total of $709.2 million to 852 projects, statewide. More than $80 million of that amount has been granted to 85 projects in the central New York region.

Colgate’s REDC award recognizes the ways in which the university’s ambition to create a world-class, state-of-the-art facility for the preservation and presentation of art and cultural objects complements the state’s objective to expand creative opportunities for residents and visitors.

By moving the collections out of campus buildings and into a welcoming, dynamic environment in the Village of Hamilton, the Center for Art and Culture will be able to launch exhibitions, lectures, and educational programs that speak to all ages.

The center will also be able to display works on loan from other institutions, potentially drawing more than 17,500 visitors from around the region and the globe to Hamilton. An increase in tourism could spur an estimated $4 million in economic development and generate nearly 50 jobs.

Design development on the $21 million project has been completed. The REDC allotment came in response to the university’s first application for funding, and will be crucial to the project’s success.

“We are thrilled to have received the $750,000 REDC grant,” said Director of University Museums Anja Chavez. “It signals the central role the future CAC will play, at so many levels, in our community.”

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