S.F. Arts Commission staff says leader who makes more than $230,000 a year has been absent during tumult

Employees and artists are speaking out about turmoil in the San Francisco Arts Commission, alleging that its leader has been chronically absent and arguing that it’s harming the arts by cutting staff and changing how it funds artists.

Two employees of the commission made the claims about their director, Ralph Remington, during public comment at a meeting on May 4. One has also filed a whistleblower complaint. The commision oversees the city’s public art program, manages two municipal galleries and distributed $12.7 million in city grants to individual artists and small arts nonprofits last year.

Remington, who plans to retire in July, did not respond to a request for comment.

Their complaints come during a time of broader change in city funding and operations for the arts. A planned merger of the San Francisco Arts Commission with fellow granting agency Grants for the Arts and the Film Commission, which handles permits for movies filmed in San Francisco, has created uncertainty. A newly created position, the executive director of arts and culture, will oversee the merger. Matthew Goudeau assumes that new role June 1; he declined to comment for this story.

In her public comments, Program Officer Jennifer Atwood, whose position is being eliminated in July, criticized the commission and the mayor’s office for the cuts. Many city departments are getting hit with layoffs as officials work to close a $644 million two-year deficit.

Atwood decried “harmful” city changes such as stricter new grant policies, in which recipients get less of their grants up front and do more reporting to receive them. Now individual artists get 50% of their grants up front, whereas previously it was up to 90%, and both individuals and arts organizations must submit quarterly, instead of annual, reports.

Atwood also alleged that Remington did not attend staff or constituent meetings, did not come to the office despite a four-day in-office mandate for city employees and did not attend programming by grant recipients.

“Where has the director been, and what has he been doing all this time, other than writing and publishing his new book while collecting a city salary?” she said.

Remington, who was appointed by former Mayor London Breed, published “Penetrating Whiteness: How White Supremacy Built America” in February. His current salary is $237,943, and his total compensation, including benefits, is $313,802.

Senior Program Manager Jackie von Treskow told the Chronicle that among the “handful” of times she’s seen him in the office since his retirement was announced in February, “he’s showing up to give layoff notices.”

At the meeting, von Treskow also criticized a “move-fast-and-break-things” ethos at City Hall that she said is a poor fit for government and public support of the arts.

“In this moment, we are operating in a profound leadership vacuum,” she said. “Our director has been largely absent during one of the most tumultuous periods in this institution.”

Arts commission spokesperson Coma Te told the Chronicle that while the commission welcomes public comment at its meetings it “does not provide further comment on them.”

“The Arts Commission remains committed to supporting artists, cultural organizations, and creative workers across San Francisco,” he continued. “We also value the dedication and service of the employees who help carry out that mission every day.”

Changes to grantmaking, he added, “align with citywide requirements related to community-based organization contracting, payment processing, contract monitoring, and advance grant payments.”

Patrick Carney, one of 13 commissioners on the SFAC, said he applauded the women’s “courage and honesty.”

He emphasized that he spoke only for himself, not the full commission, a volunteer decision-making body composed of both artists and citizens, that oversees the agency. Still, he added, “Each commissioner present that day heard the concerns expressed, along with the passion and sincerity with which they were made.”

Atwood told the Chronicle she’d also made a complaint about Remington to the city’s Whistleblower Program, claiming that in working on his book he’d broken the Ethics Commission rule prohibiting outside activity that “imposes excessive time demands,” and the in-office mandate. Waivers are available, but it’s unclear if Remington requested or received one.

Atwood’s union, Service Employees International Union, filed a complaint about the layoffs with the state’s Public Employment Relations Board. The complaint, reviewed by the Chronicle, alleged contract violations regarding the layoffs, including that the city failed to provide the union with sufficient notice and that it failed to prove it had adhered to seniority rules.

Department of Human Resources spokesperson Adam Young declined to comment on the number of layoffs at the commission, citing confidentiality, but acknowledged receipt of the complaint.

Maysoun Wazwaz, currently the SFAC’s manager of education and public programs in its galleries, will take over Atwood’s job. Wazwaz’s current position is being eliminated.

“I am devastated,” Wazwaz said. “Having a fully funded and functioning municipal gallery sends a message that the arts are important and valued in San Francisco.”

Te, the SFAC spokesperson, referred questions about layoffs to Mayor Daniel Lurie’s office, which directed the Chronicle to public remarks Lurie made about the budget on April 14.

“The city has to stop spending more money than we have,” Lurie said.

At the same time that the city is laying off staff, it’s also asking the remaining SFAC workers to process more grantee reports and explain to frustrated artists the new policy that requires artists to pay for more of the expenses up front then get reimbursed later. For Atwood, these challenges represented an opportunity for leadership that Remington missed.

“He could’ve used any political power or leverage that he had to speak out against some of this stuff, and he’s done nothing,” she said. “That’s been really disheartening and frustrating for the staff.”

Stella Lochman, a board member at SOMArts, a fiscal sponsor of one of this year’s SFAC grantees and one of the cultural centers the city regularly supports, also described a “leadership void.”

She said that whenever SOMArts staff ask the arts commission questions about the reimbursement plan, “The folks on the ground don’t have any answers for them, and they don’t agree with it either.” She blames leadership for that information gap.

Painter Shrey Purohit, an arts commission grant recipient, spoke at two recent commission meetings about the difficulties of the new reimbursement policy.

Purohit said he was grateful for his $50,000 grant, which he called “life-changing.” But rather than receive 90% of the funds up front, as in the past, he’ll receive half now and then will submit for quarterly reimbursements.

As an artist who works five jobs and lived on less than $40,000 a year before his grant, Purohit worries that spending money he doesn’t have, in hopes of getting reimbursed later, might require him to take out a loan or rack up credit card debt. “It seemed like a little bit of misalignment,” Purohit said.

Geoffrey Grier, executive director of past city grantee SF Recovery Theatre, worries the new policy will dissuade many artists from even applying. “Who has $50,000 in their bank?” he told the Chronicle.

In arts grantmaking, Atwood explained, current best practices are to “get out of the way, let people do the work, remove all these stringent reporting requirements.” The city’s new policies, she went on, make it “impossible” to adhere to those best practices.

At the same time, the city has a duty to account for taxpayer dollars. A 2024 memo from the controller’s office noted, “While the majority of nonprofits provide high quality services, some high-profile exceptions have shone a spotlight on the City’s oversight of these contracts.”  That same memo, however, says monthly, quarterly and annual reporting are all viable options. The SFAC is the only city agency that makes grants to individuals.

Von Treskow, who has not received a layoff notice, sees a connection among the merger of the city’s three arts agencies and the lack of communication with staff.

Lurie’s Chief of Housing and Economic Development Ned Segal, who was once the CFO of Twitter, has frequently said the goal of the agency is to make a “one-stop shop.” But if the goal were truly efficiency, von Treskow said, executive leadership would have asked workers for their input. Instead, she believes, the goal is consolidation of power.

“In tech, you can break something, and you can … put out a new version or whatever,” she said. “But in public service, when you break institutional knowledge, when you break community trust … there’s really no fix for that. There is no 2.0. You just lose it.”

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This article originally published at S.F. Arts Commission staff says leader who makes more than $230,000 a year has been absent during tumult.