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Friday, September 18, 2026
Los Angeles Opera Issues Statement Regarding Center Square Foundation Findings
OperaWire: In light of reports indicating that the Los Angeles Opera is under investigation for its tax returns, the company has a released a statement.
The company states that, “The LA Opera is committed to transparency and responsible stewardship of public and private resources.
I found this to be very disheartening. If the investigation reveals significant fraud, I worry about the effect on the arts and governmental funding as a whole. I think it’s shameful and disappointing if the LA Opera, such a valued cultural institution, was truly misusing its funds, or misleading the public about their spending; that’s something that deserves correction and penalties. However, I also worry that, if true, this could lead to a drop in government funding for other art institutions - if precedent is set for institutions misusing or overspending their grant money, it’s entirely possible that the government could start cutting back on the funding they provide, under the assumption that the recipients would be spending it poorly. This would, obviously, cause a multitude of problems throughout the entire artistic community, and possibly lead to closures and a loss of culture of people and institutions everywhere.
I found this to be very disappointing; if it is true, it could lead to significant doubt among the public in arts institutions as a whole at a time when they are already struggling. I think that the L.A. Opera in particular is an institution where they cannot afford to be frivolous with funding and/or be misleading with it, as they stand as a major theatrical arts institution. I also worry the domino effect philosophy could be applied by government agencies seeking to cut back, especially as federal funding is threatened for places such as the Kennedy Center, and as one major institution gets embroiled in financial trouble, it will spread, and we may lose many invaluable publicly funded institutions. I still believe that there should be an investigation and that these alleged frauds should be investigated; however, I sincerely hope all of this is false and that we can avoid a major crisis over publicly funded arts institutions.
2 comments:
I found this to be very disheartening. If the investigation reveals significant fraud, I worry about the effect on the arts and governmental funding as a whole. I think it’s shameful and disappointing if the LA Opera, such a valued cultural institution, was truly misusing its funds, or misleading the public about their spending; that’s something that deserves correction and penalties. However, I also worry that, if true, this could lead to a drop in government funding for other art institutions - if precedent is set for institutions misusing or overspending their grant money, it’s entirely possible that the government could start cutting back on the funding they provide, under the assumption that the recipients would be spending it poorly. This would, obviously, cause a multitude of problems throughout the entire artistic community, and possibly lead to closures and a loss of culture of people and institutions everywhere.
I found this to be very disappointing; if it is true, it could lead to significant doubt among the public in arts institutions as a whole at a time when they are already struggling. I think that the L.A. Opera in particular is an institution where they cannot afford to be frivolous with funding and/or be misleading with it, as they stand as a major theatrical arts institution. I also worry the domino effect philosophy could be applied by government agencies seeking to cut back, especially as federal funding is threatened for places such as the Kennedy Center, and as one major institution gets embroiled in financial trouble, it will spread, and we may lose many invaluable publicly funded institutions. I still believe that there should be an investigation and that these alleged frauds should be investigated; however, I sincerely hope all of this is false and that we can avoid a major crisis over publicly funded arts institutions.
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