As a way of ensuring quality children's programming for future generations, the Pittsburgh International Children's Theater is merging with the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust.

Under the merger being announced today, the Trust will handle financial operations, marketing, fund-raising and administration for the Pittsburgh International Children's Theater. Children's Theater executive director Pamela Lieberman will remain in charge of programming.

Officials say the arrangement is driven more by efficiency than economics, although the move is expected to save roughly $150,000 a year.

"This is not a merger of desperation. [The Children's Theater is] in relatively good financial shape. It's two strong organizations deciding that together they can do even more," said J. Kevin McMahon, president and CEO of The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust.

"We looked at that as a great opportunity for the Trust and a great opportunity for them. We want to be sure the brand of the festival and the programming is maintained and strengthened."

McMahon said audiences will continue to see the high level of national and international children's performances Pittsburgh International Children's Theater is known for.

The Children's Theater hopes to expand, with more programming and more venues in the future. "We're in a good place now, but we want to grow," Lieberman said. "It's more of a long-term look. We can't continue at the pace we are now."

The merger will take effect in June, although the Trust will handle ticket sales for the upcoming Children's Festival, which will be May 14-18.

The agreement is similar to the merger between the Trust and the Pittsburgh Dance Council in 2001.

The long-running Pittsburgh International Children's Theater was founded in 1969 as Performing Arts for Children. In 1985, Performing Arts for Children and Citiparks launched the first Pittsburgh International Children's Festival.

Today, its Family Series runs an October-through-March season of stage performances at several venues throughout the region, including Downtown's Byham Theater and suburban high schools.

The festival is a five-day annual event held in May. This year, it moves from the North Side to Oakland, where it will remain for the next three years.

Pittsburgh International Children's Theater is one of only four international children's presenting organizations in the nation. It's a lean organization, even by nonprofit standards. With an annual operating budget of $667,600, it has a small staff -- Lieberman, and two other full-time employees. Maranne Welch, organization founder and original artistic director, continues to work as a consultant on a year-to-year basis.

There have been bumps in the road. In 2004, the Children's Festival was canceled in the wake of the city's financial problems that affected other events such as the Great Race and the Sunday morning music performances in Mellon Park. Without in-kind city services such as police and equipment, festival organizers couldn't put on the event, although it returned the following year.

"It took a long time to bounce back from that," Lieberman says. "One bad season and the organization could be finished."

These are challenging times for independent, midsize nonprofit organizations such as the Children's Theater and the Dance Council, said Paul Organisak, executive director of the Pittsburgh Dance Council and vice president of programming for the Cultural Trust.

In the Dance Council's case, Organisak said, the cost savings realized from the merger have been channeled into programming instead.

When the merger was announced in 2001, "There were the skeptics saying, 'There goes the Dance Council,'" Organisak said. "The Dance Council programming has not only not decreased as a result of the merger, it has flourished because the organization can focus on the artistic product. I'm not spending my time worrying about meeting payroll."

Since then, the Dance Council has continued to present a full slate of top national dance ensembles, such as the Joffrey Ballet and Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo. "Those undertakings would have been very difficult as an independent organization." Organisak says.

The Pittsburgh region has a reputation as a good place for families with kids, McMahon said, and the alliance could help both organizations in their shared mission of inspiring the next generation of arts audiences.

"This kind of programming is vitally important to the arts community in terms of future audiences."