which requires that the museum's collections "shall be kept open and accessible to the public free of all charge throughout the year," and any unlegislated changes would be subject to challenge by the New York State attorney general, Eric Schneiderman, or one of the tristate counselors, Christopher Porrino or George Jepsen. In January 2018, Pogrebin writing for The New York Times reported that amid-continuing reverberations from "a period of financial turbulence and leadership turmoil" that the museum president Daniel Weiss had announced that the museum would rescind its century-old policy of free admission to the museum and begin charging $25 for out-of-state visitors starting in March 2018. Pogrebin stated that although the museum had made progress in decreasing its deficit from $40 million to $10 million, that an adverse decision from the City of New York to curtail funding for the Met's operating costs by as much as $8 million "for security and building staff" caused Weiss to announce the change in admissions policy. Weiss indicated that the new policy would be estimated to increase revenue from the current $43 million it receives from admissions to an enhanced revenue stream as high as US$49 million. Attendance For the fiscal year 2017 which ended on June 30, the museum was reported as having 7 million visitors during the past year, where "37 percent of these were international visitors, while 30 percent came from New York's five boroughs." Previously in 2016, the museum set a record for attendance, attracting 6.7 million visitors—the highest number since the museum began tracking admissions. Forty percent of the Met's visitors in fiscal year 2016 came from New York City and the tristate area; 41 percent from 190 countries besides the United States. In 2017, the attendance figures indicated seven million annual visitors with 63% of the visitors arriving from outside of New York State. Roberta Smith writing for The New York Times in September 2017 voiced growing public concern that proposed increases in admissions costs would have an adverse effect upon attendance statistics at the museum. Smith referred to the public perception that such costs would appear "greedy and inappropriate" because "The museum already gets around $39 million a year from its gate—equal to the entire annual budget of the Brooklyn Museum." Smith's article continued to report the negative response of local communities in the tristate area surrounding the museum which was previously introduced in a