Dear Friends,
As you know, Photographic Center Northwest (PCNW) is a unique community resource. It is one of the nation’s best photographic schools combined with an important gallery of contemporary photography. Last year, we served 1,183 students in 88 10-week classes and 57 Workshops. Accredited by NASAD, we also offer a rigorous certificate program in fine art photography. We present 10 major gallery shows each year, and provide Seattle University with classes in photography through its BFA program.

To a greater extent than any other school in the Pacific Northwest, PCNW pays its own way out of student tuition and other fees, a testament to the passion of our students and faculty, and the efficiency of our operation. Moreover, we have an unusually healthy balance sheet for an organization our size, reflecting the sizable net equity in our real property at 12th and Marion.

PCNW has successfully negotiated the impact of digital photography, and we now teach an integrated curriculum. This was an expensive transition, however, and has left us with permanently higher costs, as we now must own and maintain two different sets of specialized equipment, one for digital photography and one for chemical photography.

We currently face a financial challenge, as follows:
1. We are currently in the black month-to-month but have an unmanageable overhang of accounts payable. This problem developed as a result of the costs of transitioning to digital, marketing issues, and low historical fund-raising. Our operations are stabilized and we have built a stronger Board and brought in a dynamic new Executive Director.
2. The equity in our building is not available right now, due to the crisis among lenders. We are pursuing other ways to tap the equity, but have not yet achieved this goal.
3. Our building has an immediate need for a new roof.
4. Our cash constraints make it harder to spend enough on marketing to keep our classes full. We are doing OK right now, but could be doing better.
At this juncture we are asking for your help before we have to soon pursue extraordinary measures to tap the equity in our building. We are proud of being a Seattle-based art resource and the community epicenter for photography. Please consider how you could participate in helping us continue to serve as the region’s photographic resource.
Thank you for responding to our call,

PCNW Board of Trustees