Despite some first-year hiccups and underwhelming revenues, Palo Alto officials are in no rush to raise ticket prices to the newly rebuilt Junior Museum and Zoo, a popular Rinconada Park attraction that has historically welcomed visitors for free.

Instead, the Palo Alto City Council Finance Committee indicated by a unanimous vote on Tuesday that it would like to see better forecasts, revised policies on cancellations and a more stable operating environment before it would consider hiking up ticket prices from their current level of $10.

The discussion about admission costs was prompted by a new report from the Department of Community Services showing that the museum would require about $1.2 million in support from the city to cover its costs. While city officials had projected that the museum would cover about 65% of its operating costs through ticket prices and membership purchases, as of late June the facility was recovering just 54% of its costs, according to staff.

On Tuesday, Sept. 6, staff from the Community Services Department cited some of the challenges that they'd been facing since the revamped facility reopened to the public last November. Chief among them is the continued impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which prompted the city to keep the museum closed on the weekdays in the first two months of operations and which may have discouraged some visitors from coming in.

"The pandemic is the wild card here, and how people are feeling about it," John Aikin, director of the Junior Museum and Zoo, told the committee Tuesday. "There are still people that believe this is done and gone and want everything to be opened up and there's those who are still cautious about coming even when we have a mask policy, as we do now."

Not all of the museum's woes, however, can be blamed on the pandemic. Its clunky ticketing system is also a problem, staff acknowledged. Though the museum has recently switched to a new online system that have smoothened operations, its prior system required visitors to make reservations well in advance and did not give them the option of canceling their reservations. Staff reported that museum members, who get unlimited visits, "overbook reservations to hold up space" but don't actually show up.

"As a result, JMZ sells the unused membership reservations each morning to walk up guests, but this has resulted in long lines for tickets and distracts staff from assisting guests with other needs such as booking birthday and facility rentals," the report from staff states, noting that rental revenue came in at about $33,000, well below the city's projections of $120,000.

Another problem is staffing shortages. Kristen O'Kane, director of the Community Services Department, said the museum has a staff vacancy rate of about 14%. Some of its hourly employees have recently left their positions to take salary jobs elsewhere

"So part of the challenge is that we haven't really experienced the new JMZ at a fully staffed scenario," O'Kane said. "We're always chasing the departures and the vacancies and haven't had that experience where every position was staffed and what that would look like. How would we function in that scenario?"

The staff report offered four scenarios for raising revenues, all of which would raise admission tickets, with new costs ranging from $15 to $18 per ticket. The council had considered similar pricing schemes last year before settling on a $10 price amid public backlash and fierce resistance to higher charges from Friends of the Junior Museum and Zoo, the nonprofit that led the fundraising drive to rebuild the facility.

All three members of the Finance Committee agreed Tuesday that now is not the time to raise the ticket prices. They noted that the revenue figures were heavily skewed by the pandemic, which resulted in some months having much greater demand than others, and argued that the council will need more accurate and reliable projections before it raises prices for admission.

Committee Chair Tom DuBois said the issue with the museum "isn't so much about pricing but simplifying the processes and not trying to run it like an airline." He suggested that the city consider modifying some of its policies to discourage members from booking reservations that they don't use, including a possible fee levied against those that do so.

Council member Eric Filseth also raised concern about raising prices. Increasing membership costs probably won't have too big of an effect on the bottom line, he said. At the same time, raising prices on general admission tickets could reduce the number of visitors.

"We're in a space of, 'There's no easy choices here,'" Filseth said.

It doesn't help that the museum had recently removed its birds and canceled its bird feeding to protect them from bird flu.

"It's a lousy time to raise ticket prices when you just took all your birds out of exhibits and there's no visibility in any zoo in California on when they're going to go back," Filseth said.

The committee made it clear that some pricing adjustments may ultimately have to be made, though members agreed they would need more information before making these changes. Vice Mayor Lydia Kou suggested hiring an expert in pricing optimization to evaluate whether and when ticket prices should be raised.

She also suggested a program to subsidize entry fees for those who cannot afford ticket prices.

"I think it’s really important that no one misses out on opportunities because they do learn from it and the first impression could be long lasting," Kou said.

The museum's woes are, in at least one sense, a product of its success. It has sold 2,917 memberships by end of June, well above its projection of 2,000. Aikin noted that at any give time, members make up about 50% of the museum's visitors. But while the high number of members are normally a thing to be celebrated, in this case city officials are concerned that members are "poaching" tickets from general visitors.

Resident Jonathan Erman, who strongly opposes the raising of ticket prices, argued Tuesday that the museum has been incredibly successful in its first six months of operations, particularly given the pandemic's impacts. Raising ticket prices to the zoo, he said, would make it harder for people to experience it, Erman said. This would be akin to "killing the golden goose," he said.

"Don't kill the goose," Erman said. "You've created a subscription model for the zoo and you're upset that it's been more successful than you anticipated. It's completely bizarre."