Philadelphia's city council is investigating the sudden closure of the Academy of Natural Sciences, the oldest natural history research institution in the Americas, after its public museum was shuttered at the end of September for financial reasons. The Academy, founded in 1812, holds a collection of more than 19 million specimens.

Drexel University, which has run the Academy since 2011, announced on 1 September that the museum would close on 30 September. The university says a two-year study funded by the Pew Center for Arts and Heritage concluded that the costs of operating the museum, alongside mounting capital needs, were financially prohibitive, and that it has provided more than 49 million dollars in support for the Academy's operating deficits over 15 years. The building needs about 150 million dollars in deferred maintenance, according to the university.

City council responded with an oversight investigation. On 17 September it unanimously authorised its Committee on Legislative Oversight to examine the closure, with subpoena power. At a hearing on 26 October, more than 120 people filled council chambers, many holding "Save the Academy" signs, as councillors questioned Drexel representatives. The hearing exposed conflicting accounts of the museum's finances: Drexel cited annual losses of five to six million dollars, while Academy board chair Suzanne Biemiller testified that in 2025 the museum's expenses were 3.6 million dollars against revenue of 2.7 million, a shortfall of less than one million.

The hearing was adjourned after Drexel's president, Antonio Merlo, and a deputy mayor failed to appear, prompting councillors to issue subpoenas compelling their testimony when the hearing resumes on 16 November. A separate council resolution would create a task force to study reopening the museum and how to pay for it. The Academy itself continues as a scientific institution; only its public museum, with its dioramas and galleries, has closed.