Money: To Get It You Need It

Some of the gloom over the Fogg lifted this week when the National Endowment for the Arts came through with a $170,000 grant to erase the museum's $10,000 operating deficit, support new programs and cover the costs of future fundraising.

But museum officials said yesterday plans for $12.7 million worth of renovation and expansion of the museum are also in a fog. No one is saying exactly what will remain when the mist clears, but changes have been made in the design for the new facilities.

The money from the NEA is a challenge grant based on the old help-someone-to-help-himself principle. For the next two years, each time the Fogg raises three bucks, Washington will kick in an extra dollar.

Meanwhile, everyone is waiting for an imminent announcement of new plans for renovating the Fogg. Last November Fogg officials said they would take over Burr Hall for the Fine Arts Library and build a new wing onto the museum.

No one will say for sure why the plans are changing. Maybe the Fogg decided Burr Hall, the only vertical lecture hall on campus, is not such a great place for a library.