Minister of State for Culture Claudia Roth only wants to tackle the reform of the financing of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation in a second step.

Roth said this on Monday in Berlin in a press conference on the sidelines of a meeting of the Prussian Foundation's board of trustees, in which she chairs as the representative of the federal government.

Before financing issues can be clarified, the individual institutions, i.e. museums, libraries and institutes, which belong to the SPK, should describe their needs, "and then we'll start the negotiations".

The Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, which was founded in 1957 to manage cultural assets belonging to the former Free State of Prussia, is jointly funded by the federal government and the sixteen federal states.

However, the contributions of the federal states have been frozen since 1996,

Andrew Kilb

Feature correspondent in Berlin.

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In contrast to Claudia Roth, Dagmar Korbacher, the director of the print room of the State Museums in Berlin, emphasized the direct financial shortage of the museums under the umbrella of the Prussian Foundation.

The houses are no longer able to meet the increased demands of a modern museum operation without an increase in staff and funds.

After all, according to Korbacher, the room for maneuver of the museums has been "enormously expanded" by the key issues paper of the reform commission.

The Board of Trustees had previously passed the reform paper unanimously.

An increase in state contributions is not in sight

The representative of the federal states in the reform commission, the Saxony-Anhalt Minister of Culture Rainer Robra (CDU), also expressed reservations on the question of financing the reform process.

Robra explained that the restructuring of the Prussian Foundation's structures could essentially be financed from efficiency gains.

When it comes to increasing the state contributions to the foundation's budget, "two hearts beat in my chest," says Robra.

The core of the reform resolution provides for two measures to reorganize the foundation structure.

On the one hand, the foundation is to be managed by a six to seven-strong board of directors, including two representatives of the museums, rather than by a presidency as has been the case up to now.

On the other hand, the individual houses of the National Museums in Berlin should be able to independently manage their program budgets approved by the board and also make personnel decisions.

Additional administrative tasks, such as the legal department and building management, are to be performed by a central service unit.

According to the President of the Foundation, Hermann Parzinger, the new structure will ensure that the individual institutions share responsibility for the overall strategy of the Prussian Foundation.

When it comes to financing, Parzinger also senses “the desire to set a political signal” in the federal states.

On Monday in Berlin, however, it remained unclear whether this sign would already be set at the next meeting of the Foundation Council in June next year.

Instead, the Minister of State for Culture and her counterpart from Saxony-Anhalt are calling on the representatives of the foundation to start reforming the foundation's structures before the summer of 2023.

In the long term, Claudia Roth also wants to think about a new name for the Prussian Foundation, which will guarantee a “stronger public image”.