Lexington Philharmonic Executive Committee Position on Negotiations Late Friday, September 13, the Lexington Philharmonic Board was

s given notice from the Orchestra Committee that they requested and received authorization from orchestra members to strike if their demands made in contract negotiations were not accepted by the Board of Directors. Following the Sept 13 notice, the Board President received a demand the evening of September 16, that a 3 year contract be signed by the Lexington Philharmonic Board that included all articles of the former CBA that have not yet been agreed on through negotiations. If their demands are not met, the Orchestra is threatening to strike this week, after having completed a number of days of rehearsal for an opening season concert, and go to the media with their positions. Late Monday evening, the Orchestra Committee issued an ultimatum requiring a response by Tuesday in order to agree to refrain from going to the media before we had a chance to discuss and respond to them. However, their release of information via social media on Monday had the same effect as releasing information to the media and has undermined our ability to constructively consider their ultimatum. The Lexington Philharmonic Board has had and currently has every intention to continue talks while continuing to play concerts. Instead of continuing to negotiate in good faith, they choose instead to threaten strike, or enact a strike. The Board of the Lexington Philharmonic is deeply disappointed and believes this to be an unfortunate position that will only weaken the role of orchestral music in our community and deny the community, loyal audience and dedicated donors the opportunity to benefit from the music in which they have invested. The Lexington Philharmonic Board, through its appointed Negotiating Committee, has been negotiating in good faith for 18 months and has always worked toward a realistic and responsible position in every article being negotiated. We continue to provide thoughtful and fair proposals and have responded to all of their information requests in a timely manner. We last met on September 6 & 7 and provided numerous dates to continue negotiations in the coming weeks. The Orchestra Committee has not responded to our requests to continue to meet. One of the primary issues remaining in negotiations is artistic control. Lexington Philharmonic Board and management values the input of the musicians in artistic decisions, but must retain ultimate authority and responsibility for artistic decisions. This necessarily includes the authority to hire and fire musicians. The Lexington Philharmonic Board has made several proposals to the Orchestra Committee in an effort to ensure that any artistic hiring, firing or discipline is fair to the musicians, but is unwilling to give final authority for these actions to the union. While the Union states that it is industry standard for peer review to allow musicians to have binding authority on the outcome of peer review, this is inaccurate. It is also common for there to be an outside, 3rd party or the employer render the binding decision. These types of processes are practiced by other orchestras in the region. Another issue remaining is guaranteed services (the number of concerts and rehearsals required per season). The musicians are demanding an escalating schedule of guaranteed concerts having a minimum of 60 contracted musicians per concert cycle. The LexPhil 2013-14 season includes 4 such concerts with a minimum of 60 musicians. The musicians want LexPhil to guarantee double this number of 60+ musician concerts. Like most arts organizations, the recent recession and current economic climate does not allow the Lexington

Philharmonic to foresee its financial position years into the future with enough certainty to make long-term guarantees as to the number or type of performances we will be able to fund, produce and the community will embrace. LexPhil must have the flexibility to respond to future economic environments and meet the communitys artistic desires and needs. LexPhil has offered its musicians a significant increase in wages and mileage in current negotiations. From the 2009-10 season through the 2012-13 season, LexPhil has provided its musicians a comparable number of total services as it did before the recession, coupled with a pay increase for each of the four years of the current contract of 2%(08-09) 3% (09-10) 3% (10-11) and 3.5% (11-12). Over the past four years when our country and community was in the midst of a significant recession, LexPhil Musicians received a total raise of 12%. Musicians have not been asked to take a cut in pay a remarkable feat when other orchestras are cutting pay by 20% or more, cutting concerts in whole or in part, or closing entirely.

Lexington Philharmonic Executive Committee Position on Artistic Leadership The current Music Director was chosen by the Search Committee comprised of musicians and Board members. He was hired and charged by the Board of Directors to further LexPhils mission to become an excellent regional orchestra with high artistic standards, known for playing a vibrant and diverse repertoire. This involves continually raising the bar for our expectations and the quality of programs we provide to our community. Terrell has made great progress toward these goals as evidenced by general improvement in ticket sales since his arrival, positive reviews from different critics, awards of nationally competitive grants, and artistic collaborations with some of the leading-edge artists and composers of our times. Scott Terrell has the Boards full confidence and thinks it is unfortunate that the Orchestra Committee and musicians have taken the position to target Terrell personally. Yet, these improvements are being resisted by the Orchestra Committee and Union, which have chosen to protect their interpretation of the status quo and turn the negotiations into a personal attack on the Music Director. The changes Terrell has enacted would have been required regardless of who holds the baton, and as a result the issues being negotiated are completely independent of any single individual, including Scott Terrell who does not participate in negotiations. The Board of Directors set a goal of artistic excellence for LexPhil and is unwilling to compromise its pursuit of artistic excellence.