California Academy of Sciences cuts 53 jobs amid deep deficit

At the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, a place that draws families, students and tourists by the millions, the cost of a deepening deficit is now 53 jobs.

The museum said it is eliminating those positions and reshaping another 32 as it tries to close a recurring budget gap that has become too large to ignore. In its April 28 message to the community, the Academy said it ran a $7.3 million cash deficit in fiscal year 2025 and is projecting more than $8 million in losses in the current fiscal year.

Leaders blamed a mix of high building and maintenance costs, the expense of caring for 60,000 live animals, stewardship of nearly 46 million specimens and a post-pandemic shift in tourism and visitor behavior. The Academy said the reductions will affect public programs, staffing and the visitor experience at one of San Francisco’s most recognizable cultural institutions.

That makes the cuts more than an internal budget exercise. The Academy says it welcomes about 1.4 million to 1.5 million guests a year and provides more than 150,000 free field trips for students. Any pullback in programming or staffing could ripple through San Francisco schools, family visits to Golden Gate Park and the city’s broader science and arts ecosystem.

Workers and union leaders pushed back sharply, saying staff members received little advance notice and that management did not meet with them to discuss alternatives before announcing the layoffs. They argued the institution should have looked harder at executive compensation and other top-level costs before moving against front-line employees whose work shapes the public face of the Academy.

The financial strain lands at a fraught moment for San Francisco’s visitor economy. San Francisco Travel said the city drew a record 26.2 million visitors in 2019, but 2024 visitation remained below pre-pandemic highs, and its 2025 outlook ties recovery to conventions, events and continued lodging growth. For a nonprofit attraction that depends on tourists, schools and local members alike, the slowdown is showing up not just in attendance figures but in the jobs that support them.

Founded on April 4, 1853, the Academy has long been both a museum and a research institution. It said less than 10% of its 46 million specimens are discoverable online, even as it received a $10 million state digitization award under Proposition 4 that Gov. Gavin Newsom signed ceremonially at the Academy on Sept. 19, 2025. Scott D. Sampson, who joined the institution in September 2019, now faces the challenge of protecting that scientific mission while shrinking the staff around it.