’We still have to pay $10,000 a month and we’re closed’

It’s not easy keeping a nonprofit children’s museum open for nearly a year when kids can’t visit it.

But that’s the struggle the KidsWork Children’s Museum is experiencing right now. Furthermore, the museum’s very premise makes it challenging for the 6,500 square foot museum to reopen open during the pandemic.

“It’s because we’re interactive,” said Executive Director Nicole Underwood. “Everything in our museum you interact with, you touch it. So, for right now, that’s where we stand.”

Underwood said cost-cutting measures included furloughing her employees, cutting her own salary by 95 percent (Underwood said the museum is her only source of income), and getting abatements for the utilities.

“Even with reducing our expenses, we still have to pay $10,000 a month,” Underwood said. “And we’re closed.”

Remaining expenses include rent, professional services and insurance. Underwood has spent the last few months fundraising and making sure KidsWork stays relevant in the community, she said, for losing the museum would be a shame to the more than 35,000 people who visit the museum each year so they can “have a space for children and families to play together.”

Less than 35% actually come from Frankfort. The rest come from Cook County and other places in Will County.

“A children’s museum is a community resource,” Underwood said. “It’s as much of an asset as libraries, schools, park districts. We’re an extension of them and we partner with them, too. We provide high quality, interactive exhibits for children 0 to 13 years old.”

All exhibits are permanent (“Traveling exhibits are very expensive,” Underwood said) and specific for KidsWork’s themes of art, technology and world community, she said.

Underwood, who came to KidsWork in 2017, said the idea to open a children’s museum in Frankfort started in 2007. A group of local parents, teachers and business owners developed the idea because Will County didn’t have a children’s museum, Underwood said.

So the group held a capital campaign and opened KidsWork two years later, she said. One of the first exhibits was a large pinscreen, which local firefighters installed.

“It was kind of a grassroots effort,” Underwood said.

Before the pandemic, fundraising was focused on adding custom-built exhibits for the museum, such as the wind tubes that teaches kid the basics of aerodynamics, Underwood said.

Children can create a flying object out of paper and other supplies and then put the object into the tubes to see if it flies. The kids then make adjustments to their object based on their observations, Underwood said.

“That’s the whole fun of it,” Underwood said. “It’s a very popular exhibit.”

Some of the other exhibits, all interactive, include a grocery store, a veterinarian’s office with stuffed animals, a stage with costumes, a dinosaur dig, a fishing area with a boat, a music section and an exhibit called “light and shadows.”

“We also have a fantastic art center with all kids of art supplies where kids can be as creative as they want to be,” Underwood said. “It’s also very popular.”

Underwood said KidsWork did reopen in October with 25% capacity under the Illinois’ indoor/outdoor recreation guidelines. Temperatures were checked at the door and face masks and reservations were required, she said.

“You could not just show up and walk in,” Underwood said. “You had to be on the list, and you had to sign up for time slots. But then, sure enough, on Nov. 20, we had to close again because of the new restrictions the governor had reenacted. That’s where we stand now. Hopefully, we can reopen soon.”

But in order to reopen the museum, Underwood will have to bring staff back to work. That’s why she’s working hard at raising money. The museum’s revenue stream has been severely impacted by the pandemic, she said.

“Seventy-five percent of our revenue comes from people walking in the door,” Underwood said.

The rest comes from paid memberships, birthday parties and other private events and field trips, she added.

To donate and for more information, visit kidsworkchildrensmuseum.org or visit GoFundMe at charity.gofundme.com/o/en/campaign/local-museum-needs-your-help.