San Francisco’s California Academy of Sciences cuts jobs as financial strain deepens

The California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco plans to lay off 53 employees and scale back some programs as it grapples with a growing budget deficit driven by rising costs and lagging revenue.

The cuts, announced Tuesday, will affect about 9.3% of the academy’s workforce. The museum and research center reported a $7.3 million deficit for the 2025 fiscal year and projects losses of up to $8 million this year.

Officials told the Chronicle the reductions were intended to stabilize finances after years of structural problems worsened by the pandemic.

“These cuts are deeply painful, yet we believe they’re essential to enable us to deliver on our mission sustainably in the long term,” Executive Director Scott D. Sampson said in an exclusive interview.

The layoffs will include management positions, union-represented employees and non-union workers, according to academy leadership.

Another 32 employees – about 5.6% of the workforce – will be reassigned to new roles or have their hours reduced.

The cuts come amid ongoing contract negotiations with Cal Academy Workers United, the union representing employees across research, education and guest services divisions. Union leaders have previously criticized management’s handling of the academy’s finances and warned that layoffs could undermine its mission.

Academy officials said they have kept union representatives informed about the institution’s financial position.

“We have been in conversation with the union, letting them know that we have a structural deficit, sharing the details of our finances,” said Amber Mace, the academy’s managing director and chief strategy officer.

She added that the academy would follow notification requirements outlined in its collective bargaining agreement.

Costs rising faster than revenue

The academy’s financial challenges reflect a widening gap between expenses and income.

“It’s simply that our expenses are growing faster than our revenues,” said Chief Financial Officer Mathew Lau.

Operating the Golden Gate Park campus – including care for more than 60,000 live animals and stewardship of nearly 46 million scientific specimens – carries substantial costs. Salaries and benefits alone account for about 70% of the academy’s operating budget, Lau said.

At the same time, attendance and other revenue streams have yet to fully recover from the pandemic.

“Tourism in San Francisco has declined, which has impacted our visitation,” Lau said.

Full-price daytime admission is down about 6% compared with the same period last year, he said, while philanthropy and school group visits remain uneven.

The academy’s struggles are not unique.

Major San Francisco cultural institutions – including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Symphony and the Contemporary Jewish Museum  – have all faced financial strain in recent years, cutting costs as attendance lags and fundraising becomes more competitive. Many leaders cite a post-pandemic shift in audience behavior, with visitors slower to return and increasingly drawn to digital and at-home entertainment options.

About 55% of museums nationwide have not returned to pre-pandemic attendance levels, according to Lau.

Targeted cuts to programs

In addition to layoffs, the academy plans to reduce or restructure certain programs, though leaders said they aimed to preserve core functions.

“We have identified particular programs to reduce, to reduce the work so that we can go forward and support the teams that are remaining and still deliver on our mission,” said Mace.

One example is the academy’s planetarium programming, citing high production costs that are not offset by attendance.

“We have made the difficult decision to sunset the production of new shows,” Mace said.

Leaders said most visitor-facing experiences would remain intact, though some hours and services may be reduced.

“As we’ve made these decisions, we sought to prioritize the visitor experience, which of course is important to our revenue, as well as our education programs and our scientific research,” Sampson said.

Aiming to avoid further cuts

Leaders said the current reductions were intended to prevent additional layoffs in the near future, though they acknowledged uncertainty.

“We have thought this through very carefully. We do not want to be going through this again anytime soon,” Sampson said.

“Nobody knows what’s going to happen a year or two from now,” he continued, “but we are confident that with the budget adjustments that we’re making, we will be able to put the Academy on a course toward flourishing in the future.”

The academy was also exploring new revenue streams and partnerships, officials said, while working with city leaders and other cultural institutions to help revive tourism.

For now, leaders said their focus is on managing the immediate impact on staff and operations.

“We’re looking at navigating the next weeks and months effectively as we can and as fairly and with the appropriate empathy for our staff,” Sampson said.

The academy, founded in 1853, has undergone multiple rounds of cuts and restructuring since 2020 as it adjusts to post-pandemic realities.

“What we’re facing is hard,” Sampson said, “but if this organization is gonna persist another 170 years, it’s our responsibility to make necessary adjustments now.”

This article originally published at San Francisco’s California Academy of Sciences cuts jobs as financial strain deepens.