THE THREE main festivals in Hobsons Bay will have a third of their funding slashed if the council approves new festival funding arrangements.
Organisers of the Williamstown, Bayside and Laverton festivals each face running festivals on far smaller budgets than in previous years.
The proposal, to be considered at the next Hobsons Bay council meeting, sees Williamstown and Bayside – the two major festivals – each lose $13,500 in direct funding from the council and Laverton Festival losing $5000.
Money cut from the festival budgets will be allocated to special events funding under the proposal.
The president of the Bayside Festival’s organising committee, Therese McKenney-Campbell, said the cuts, if approved, would be “quite detrimental” to each of the festivals.
The Bayside and Williamstown festivals each received $33,500 in direct council funding last financial year.
“We will now get $20,000 and have to apply for any extra funding from the council on the basis of a specific project,” she said.
She said costs for running a festival included providing amenities such as portable toilets, health and safety requirements and traffic management. The audio-visual component of a festival cost up to $8000.
“And that’s before you even put a performer on the stage,” she said.
“The three main festivals are all different and I think they all have their place. The municipality is big enough to support three festivals like this because the community is diverse and that’s represented by the three festivals,” she said.
She said each of the three festivals had a unique focus, with none of them duplicating what the others were doing.
She said the new funding arrangement could lead to a rationalisation of resources with the prospect of one of the festivals eventually disappearing.
The chief organiser of the Laverton Festival, Michael Pernar, said he understood the rationale behind the proposal but would need to see more details
“The jury’s out till we find out more about the criteria and process for getting funding,” he said.
“It’s a control mechanism for the council. We could end up better off, it now just depends on whether council approves of the specific projects we seek funding for,” he said.
The Laverton Festival, the smallest in funding terms of the three festivals, had its coffers boosted last year by $5000 to take its funding to $15,000.
Last year’s boost was designed as an “incremental increase over the next three years of funding allocations to allow for parity with the Williamstown and Bayside festivals,” according to a council motion carried prior to last year’s funding round.
This year, Mr Pernar said, the festival would have to plan “thin” to stretch the money available.
“We’ll get by but it has got implications for the size of the festival,” he said.
“We’ve been fighting for a decade to build our festival funding levels.”
A council spokesman said the festival funding report would be tabled at the 10 July council meeting.
The council was considering the proposal for cuts before a formal decision was made.
The organisers of Williamstown Festival could not be reached before publication deadline.
