Challenges to create the Santa Fe Railway Historical Museum became too much for the board behind the effort, and they recently voted to disband according to the Amarillo Globe-News.
The board was working to secure a location to showcase more than 20,000 artifacts that have been donated.
Here are the issues the board faced:
- The second floor of the Santa Fe Building could not be renovated to provide a secure museum location.
- The City of Amarillo purchased the Santa Fe Depot before the board could raise enough money to buy and restore it.
- The board’s finances are being questioned by the Potter County Commissioner’s Court.
Commissioner Mercy Murguia’s questions the museum board's financial accounting.
“In September, in open court, I began asking the organization for a financial report of the account. The account has received close to $400,000 of county funds in $50,000 increments since 2006,” she said. “In the last meeting of the Commissioner’s Court, the president of the Santa Fe Depot Historical Museum came to court with an incomplete accounting which reflected half the funds had been spent, and the president of the organization was unable or unwilling to answer questions about the county’s funds.”
Murguia went on to say the museum board has not shared a financial report in six years.
It will take a month or more for the museum supporters to shut down their nonprofit.