## Facts

- The Metropolitan Museum of Art, a private not-for-profit operating on City-owned property under a lease, maintained an admissions policy requiring every visitor to pay some amount, with a “recommended” fee (about $25) but allowing payment as low as one cent.
- Plaintiffs, museum visitors and New York City residents, alleged that an 1893 statute conditioning public support on free public access at specified days/times and the City–Museum lease required free admission during certain periods.
- Plaintiffs alleged they paid admission when admission should have been free and that the Museum’s practices and signage misled visitors into thinking the full “recommended” amount was mandatory.
- Plaintiffs sought injunctive relief to enforce a free-admission requirement and to stop charging or misrepresenting entrance fees inconsistent with the statute and lease.
- The trial court dismissed the complaints for lack of standing; plaintiffs appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the 1893 statute gives individual members of the public standing to sue the Museum, including by implying a private right of action to enforce free-admission obligations.
2. Whether members of the public have standing to enforce free-admission terms in the City–Museum lease as intended third-party beneficiaries.

## Decision

- The Appellate Division affirmed dismissal for lack of standing.
- The court held the 1893 statute did not confer, expressly or by implication, a private right of action for individual museum visitors to enforce free-admission conditions.
- The court held plaintiffs were not intended third-party beneficiaries of the City–Museum lease and therefore could not sue to enforce its free-admission provisions.

## Legal Principles

- A private right of action will not be implied from a statute unless it is consistent with the legislative scheme; where the statute links obligations to governmental oversight and funding mechanisms, enforcement is generally for public authorities, not private litigants.
- Members of the public are typically incidental beneficiaries of government contracts; absent clear contractual intent to permit individual enforcement by a definite class, individuals lack standing to sue on the contract.
- Public-benefit obligations in statutes or government contracts are not privately enforceable without clear legislative or contractual authorization.

## Conclusion

The court rejected visitors’ attempts to compel free admission, ruling that neither the statute nor the City–Museum lease authorized private enforcement: the statute lacked an implied private remedy, and the lease did not manifest intent to grant enforceable rights to individual members of the public.


Grunewald v. Metro. Museum of Art, 125 A.D.3d 438, 3 N.Y.S.3d 23 (1st Dep’t 2015)