Lindy Cowan, the company's director of finance and administration, said that donors were aware of the transfer.

"Ever since the big cuts to our government funding in the mid-90s, we've always has a $1-million gap between expenses and revenue, no matter what we've done," she told the Globe and Mail. Cowan added that the company expected to use up to C$3 million of opera house funds for operations over the next two years.

The company's C$181 million Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts is scheduled to open in 2006.