Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - Shea's Buffalo Theatre announced on Monday the appointment of Congressman Brian Higgins as their next President and CEO effective Feb. 5, 2024.
The Congressman will replace former Shea's president Michael Murphy, who departed from his duties officially in October of 2022 following complaints from current and former employees of a toxic workplace environment under Murphy's leadership.
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Congressman Higgins spoke with reporters following his official appointment announcement on the importance of fostering quality employee and staff relations. Higgins says this matter is a top priority for the Shea's Performing Arts Center Board of Trustees Chair, Jonathan Dandes.
"I know what I read, and we met with the staff earlier. Jon has been insistent throughout the process that the first thing we have to do before there's an announcement is meet staff," said Higgins.
"I've met with senior staff several times, we met with staff and volunteers earlier today. My governing philosophy will be consistent with my administrative philosophy here, and that is everybody needs to be respectful, everybody needs to be their authentic self, without fear or apprehension and we will build --- and Jon is going to insist on this because he has throughout this process --- an inclusive, heard and seen group of people."
"I will tell you that we did not ignore what had happened," said Dandes. "We embrace that, as I said to Brian and to all the candidates, you need to understand what you're dealing with when you come here. You need to be prepared to deal with our staff and create this environment of inclusion and positive, constructive operation that I think Brian is going to bring to it. Rather than try and avoid it, we embraced it and said, 'This is something that's a priority that you need to to deal with immediately.'"
The congressman has a number of ideas to advance Shea's and further cement the theatre into the "crown jewel" of Buffalo's theatre district.
"We have a vision for the theater district to make it more active, not just when the theatres is operational, but when they're not. A theater district should be an extraordinary place in the city. Jon and I have talked about the fact that this lobby, and this theater, it's magical. The process of getting to that magic is not magic, so doing things to look at new opportunities to expand the patron base," said Higgins.
"Right over the border is 15 million people that live in the most populated province of all of Canada. Jon knows because of his leadership, with the Buffalo Bisons, the viability of these organizations is about regionalizing. The franchise, a lot of Canadians go to the Bisons game for various reasons, including the AAA club or the Toronto Blue Jays. When you look at cultural institutions, expanding that offering to larger segments of the population regionally, I think it's going to be critically important."
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