‘Everything had been on hold’: Powerhouse Museum announces program after rocky few years Kelly Burke The Powerhouse Museum’s chief executive Lisa Havilah has endured a rocky ride since her appointment, with an insecure future facing the Ultimo site, a Covid-19 enforced lockdown, and a deluge of controversy surrounding the museum’s expansion to Parramatta. By the time Havilah stepped up, in 2019, the Powerhouse Museum was more than $3m in the red, despite receiving $28m in recurrent annual funding. In 2020 the New South Wales premier’s department delivered an emergency injection of a further $5.3m to “address the museum’s cash position” the year before.