The Metropolitan Museum of Art will charge non-New Yorkers a $25 admission fee

{{{Yep, that's me in front of the Met Museum}}}

One of the best features of coming to New York City, for visitors, was being able to get into the Metropolitan Museum of Art for whatever the person chose to pay. The Met had a recommended admission fee, but you could get in for a dollar if you wanted to. 

Now the Met is changing its policy and requiring anyone who is not from New York State to pay a $25 admission fee. So people from New York can still pay a dollar to get in, but visitors will have to pay through the nose (pay a lot). Indeed, $25 to get into a museum seems to be close to a standard fee, but I feel it is outrageous. The most time anyone can realistically spend in a museum is about 3 hours. If you really want to see everything at the Met, this will require multiple visits. $25 is way too much for a visit (even though the Met will give a person a 3 day pass under the current policy).

The Met is an amazing museum - clearly the best art museum in the United States. But I tend to disagree with this policy. What do you think? It seems to me that the Met wants to take advantage of visitors. The average visitor to New York City spends around $1,200 here. So the Met thinks people from out of town have money, and the Met wants more of it.

The following article implies that the Met has not been wise about handling its money and that is one reason why this crisis and this new policy have developed. Please feel free to read the following article and judge for yourself.

The article:

http://www.vulture.com/2018/01/metropolitan-museum-of-art-25-admission-fee.html

Vocabulary to help you understand the article:

to pay through the nose - this is an expression meaning to pay a lot of money

the resignation of - when a person voluntarily leaves a position/job

financial stability - financial health, how well someone or some organization is doing in regard to money

mandatory - no choice, you have to do this

satellite museums - there are 3 museums that are operated by the same organization, the Met is the primary one, with two 'satellites'

the wheels began turning - the plans to change things began developing

a deficit - a debt, when someone or an organization owes money

fueled by - made worse by

a head for numbers - someone good at accounting and money

righting the financial ship - fixing the financial mess

to vouch for something - to say that it is true, to indicate that something is a fact

stat-heavy - lots of statistics

support contingent on - the support from the city was based on a pay-what-you-wanna policy

gamely renegotiated - aggressively renegotiated

a budget crunch - a lack of money in the budget, not enough money

a silver bullet - an easy solution, a quick effective solution that fixes everything (a Werewolf or other monsters can be killed with a silver bullet)

stingy - cheap, not willing to spend money, not generous