Board of Directors:

My family has a membership to TCAN and has supported it from the very beginning-- more generously than our means allow, really. I bought a TCAN membership as a wedding gift for friends of mine. And the Friday night “The Love Dogs”; show, to which I brought an impressed Cambridge-dwelling friend, will in all likelihood be the last Center for the Arts event I ever attend.

I will not donate or contribute to The Center for the Arts in Natick again, not even through the purchase of a ticket, in protest of the unconscionable firing of founder, guiding spirit, and executive director Michael Moran. I didn't like everything about TCAN under Moran's leadership. (In my opinion he's done incredible things to bring the Arts to Natick, but not quite enough to bring Natick to the Arts. I've asked TCAN to reduce ticket prices to fill otherwise sparsely attended events, to give members better benefits, and specifically to combine these goals by giving members discounts to events that, at the start time, are clearly not going to be sold out. These discounts could be in the form of credit for later events, so TCAN keeps the money in the meantime.) I'm never sure if I even like Michael Moran's personal style. But he created TCAN, and continued to lead it brilliantly, and the reason for this stupid, cruel firing – "disagreement” -- is pathetically weak.

Any organization has to be more than one person-- and thanks to Michael Moran TCAN was. This firing brings up a lot of questions I've always wondered about in non-profit governance. TCAN is here to serve the community, but what makes the Board, the ultimate authority at I guess any non-profit corporation, accountable to the community? How are the board members chosen? However this worked out at TCAN, failing to create some new, innovative process that empowered the volunteers, the local community, and the artistic community to have final say on all decisions at TCAN was Moran's mistake, not anything you allegedly fired him for.

I ask the board members to please swallow their pride and take Moran back. Until he returns, neither will I.

Sincerely,

Benjamin Melançon