New Yorkers receiving food assistance benefits known as SNAP are now eligible for a free membership to the Metropolitan Museum of Art that grants them admission and access to the institution’s cultural programming and special exhibits.
“For us, it’s really important that we continuously make every effort to make the Met as accessible and as welcoming as possible,” Max Hollein, CEO of the Met, told Gothamist in an interview.
The Met announced the partnership with the city’s Department of Social Services and the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs on Tuesday, opening the doors for SNAP recipients to sign up at the museum’s locations on 82nd Street and Fifth Avenue or the Met Cloisters.
The new initiative comes on the heels of major changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program imposed by the Trump administration that could destabilize the safety net program and kick thousands off their benefits.
“It's important that at a time when it must feel like you're under attack from various parts of the government, that a cultural institution and others are coming together to support you,” said Erin Dalton, commissioner of the Department of Social Services, which oversees eligibility for SNAP.
“ People do spend their scarce resources to go to cultural icons like the Met and with this partnership, that money can stay in their pockets for food, for medicine, for healthcare, for other programming for their family,” she said.
About 42,000 New Yorkers risk getting kicked off SNAP this month because they haven’t yet complied with new work rules, the Department of Social Services estimates.
SNAP recipients have to demonstrate they are working, volunteering or in school to keep their benefits for more than three months.
City officials are urging SNAP recipients who haven’t yet complied to reach out to them for help, even if their benefits have already been turned off.
While admission to the Met, which welcomed more than 6.3 million visitors last year, is pay-what-you-wish for New York residents, the new partnership allows SNAP beneficiaries special perks as well.
SNAP recipients will get an Explorer membership that offers them and an additional guest, plus their dependent children, access to preview days for new exhibitions and invitations to events and programs. A Met membership at that level can cost $120 for one person.
“It’s not just a museum, this is basically access to such a vast array of programming, special exhibitions, activities for kids and families, all of that,” Hollein said.
He said SNAP recipients can look forward to the “Raphael: Sublime Poetry” exhibit that features the work of Renaissance artist Raffaello di Giovanni Santi, known as Raphael. It features more than 230 works from dozens of collections and includes the High Renaissance masterpiece, “The Virgin and Child with Infant Saint John the Baptist in a Landscape (The Alba Madonna).”
The museum is also opening its Musical Bodies exhibit on June 7, which explores the relationship between human bodies and musical instruments.
NYC Cultural Affairs Commissioner Diya Vij said the partnership with the Met was a good reminder that cultural institutions belong to all New Yorkers. She said her agency is also working with cultural institutions to develop volunteer opportunities that can help SNAP recipients meet their work requirements.
SNAP recipients can meet the new work rules by demonstrating they are working, volunteering or in school every month.
“This administration believes the very best of our city should belong to the people, and today’s announcement is another step toward making that vision real,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said in a statement.
