Steering Committee

Steering Committee Update

Our First Steering Committee Dinner

On May 26, 2023, the Cat Museum of New York City held its first steering committee dinner and meeting. The co-founders invited a group of community leaders in the worlds of art, cat rescue, and beyond who have the skills and expertise to guide the museum to its launch and through its early days. Those who participated included both prospective steering committee members and outside consulting experts.

This thoughtful and committed group of experts shared their unique personal insights and engaged in a conversation to help focus the museum’s mission to zero in on the various challenges facing feral and homeless cats— and the humans devoted to caring for them.

The museum’s early and long-term goals are guided by the values of cats’ well-being, respect for artists, environmental sustainability, social justice for racial equity and gender parity, and compassion for all beings in the urban environment including cat rescue, bird conservation, integrated pest management, and the physical and mental health and well-being of humans. We are also monitoring the roles of artists and authors in public forums such as the current art market and museum spaces and look forward to empowering them and supporting their creative work.

CMNYC co-founder Reynard Loki speaking at a table of steering committee members over a dinner meeting.

The inaugural CMNYC steering committee dinner on May 26, 2023. From left to right: Isabel Yerkes Birchard, Jocelyn Amon, CMNYC co-founder Reynard Loki, Mike Phillips, CMNYC co-founder Susan Steshko, and Millie Wollney. Photo by Andrew Garn.

Steering Committee Mission

Here’s what we came up with:

The Cat Museum of New York City is a proposed nonprofit institution whose mission is to support cats, particularly feral and homeless cats, and the humans who care for them through a dynamic community-responsive and supportive curated program of art, books, and educational events spanning all things cats, including the role they have played in human history and culture; the science of cat behavior, cat care, and how human and cat health intersect; and cat rescue, TNR, and adoption, within communities both local and global.

The Cat Museum of New York City seeks to educate, engage, inspire, and activate people around issues relating to cats here in New York and beyond.