In an era in which funding for the arts is being curtailed and any mention of the words “diversity” or “underserved” is cause for cancellation, Leon and Toby Cooperman announced Saturday night they are making a transformative $50 million donation to the New Jersey Performing Arts Center to serve as the start of an endowment for the center’s social impact programs.
The programs, many of which already are in action today, will find a permanent home at the $80 million Cooperman Family Arts Education and Community Center, which is scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2027 (and was jumpstarted by a $20 million donation from the Coopermans in 2019).
The gift, the largest ever to NJPAC, was announced during the organization’s annual Spotlight Gala, which raised more than $2 million.
Leon Cooperman, in an emotional and heartfelt speech to the crowd Saturday night (after a minute-long standing ovation) said the donation was an important thing to do during a time he said the government is “malfunctioning.”
A billionaire hedge fund manager who has donated many millions in the state (including an incredible $100 million gift to RWJBarnabas Health), Cooperman told the crowd the best way to spend a lot of money is to do something that will lead to the betterment of society.
NJPAC CEO John Schreiber said the gift will do just that. He detailed to the crowd all that the Cooperman Family center will do, starting with the fact that NJPAC programs reach more than 100,000 children each year — free of charge.
“The Cooperman Family Arts Education and Community Center, now being constructed on our parking lot across the street, will provide the beating heart for most of what we do in arts education, community engagement and arts and well-being,” he said.
The center speaks to the core mission of NJPAC.
“If there’s a singular story to what we do, it is ‘arts are for everybody,’” Schreiber said. “Arts improve and enhance the lives of everybody. This is generational work we’re doing here, and I believe this work changes lives.”
The arts, simply put, are good for health.
For everyone.
NJPAC officials detailed how children who engage in the arts have lower levels of social isolation, lower depression and lower loneliness. Older adults who engage in the arts have lower cognitive decline — it is helping seniors live longer, happier and healthier lives.
Of course, doing this costs money.
Schreiber unabashedly told the crowd that NJPAC is hoping to create an endowment of $100 million to ensure the impact of the Cooperman Family center will last generations.
After the event, he told BINJE he was overwhelmed by the Coopermans’ generosity — and thrilled to describe its meaning.
“People use the word ‘transformative’ all the time — this truly is transformative,” he said. “What I love about it is that it will help now and forever.
“Building this endowment will enable us to predictably deliver services in all aspects of social impact work for years and decades to come, no matter what is going on elsewhere.
“That’s why it’s so important.”
Those who know Schreiber, the CEO at NJPAC since 2011, know he’s delighted to bring world-class entertainers to a facility that is built to produce sound as good as any venue in the world.
Schreiber is most proud of the social impact programs NJPAC offers — both in its facility and in the community.
“We provide arts programming — and all the benefits that come with it — to communities who may otherwise not have such exposure,” he said.
The Cooperman Center will be purpose-built to not only house these programs, but to grow these programs for the next 50 years.
“It will allow us to serve our community even better than we’re doing right now,” he said.
And it will do so at a time when diversity, equity and inclusion have become dirty words.
Not at NJPAC. Not with Schreiber.
“We say those words here,” he said.
And now, thanks to the $50 million gift from the Coopermans, NJPAC will be able to do so for generations to come.
