Is it taps for Woodpeckers?

NEW YORK CITY--Woodpeckers Tap Dance Center, official residence of the American Tap Dance Orchestra (ATDO), last fall announced its intention to close as early as January 1995. The demise of ATDO artistic director Brenda Bufalino's dream of a permanent company home is largely the result of financial difficulties stemming from ATDO's two-year dispute with the State Insurance Fund (SIF).

ATDO challenges SIF's contention that all workers hired as independent contractors can be assessed as employees for whom workman's compensation insurance must be provided. While ATDO claimed two full-time employees, the SIF assessed ATDO at forty-five in a January 1993 audit based on an insurance policy taken out in 1991 as a requirement for performing at the Joyce Theater. The SIF assessed every individual performer, technician, teacher, etc., contracted for the 1991-92 season, even though all signed affidavits attesting to their independent status.

ATDO's litigation is being handled pro bono by the legal firm of Vedder, Price, Kaufman, Kammhoiz, and Day as the case laboriously winds its way through the courts. Attorney Boris Thomas contends that the SIF has been "arbitrary and capricious in the way in which they have performed audits and applied the results in calculating premiums for workers' compensation insurance." He adds that "the workers' comp laws need to address the special concerns of nonprofit arts organizations."

For the past two years ATDO's executive director, Tony Waag, has been wrestling with a bureaucratic giant and this conflict has left the company dispirited as well as financially depleted. Adding to its problems is the rising rent on the 3,000-square-foot Woodpeckers studio in Soho, the only dance studio in New York City, and perhaps in the nation, designed specifically for tap. Waag claims, however, that without ATDO's legal woes, he could have been channeling the company's energies into more effective fund-raising.

Waag notes that a positive outcome of ATDO's troubles has been the response of the dance community as the direness of the situation became apparent. One show of support came from actress Sean Young (a former student of Bufalino), who donated $8,000 to ATDO in early 1994. Waag claims that for Woodpeckers to survive, "We need an angel with money or someone to share our space." Otherwise the entire studio must be sublet.

Opened in 1989, Woodpeckers is a vital international dance center. The studio sponsors a wide variety of educational and artistic events, often in collaboration with such notable tappers as Gregory Hines, Buster Brown, and Savion Glover.

If Woodpeckers must close, ATDO plans to keep on truckin' but will focus on performing only. The company will rent rehearsal space and find other outlets for teaching. A full winter touring schedule is planned.