Tourism funding cut could be disastrous for Napier's Art Deco

Art Deco Trust general manager Shane Gorst at the Art Deco Trust HQ in Tennyson St, Napier.

If the proposed reduction in funding for Hawke's Bay Tourism was to go ahead, Art Deco Trust would face significant challenges in sustaining our current service level.

The inevitable drop in tourism revenue would directly reduce our capacity to deliver the annual Art Deco Festival, our year-round guided tours of the city and our preservation and restoration of the heritage that makes up such a critical part of our regional identity.

Art Deco Trust is a community organisation that relies heavily on the revenue from its own social enterprises across tourism, events and retail, to deliver its mission and the significant economic benefits for the region that go along with it.

Alongside our volunteers, sponsors, grant funders and other supporters, all that we do is made possible by the collective efforts of our commercial channels and the people and organisations that support them.

Over recent years, we have grown and developed our services significantly. This is great for the community but also presents us with a challenge of how we continue to pay for it.

A major talking point for the discussion in regard to Hawke's Bay Tourism funding is that the "industry should stand on its own two feet. Operators should invest more".

Art Deco Trust is a major operator that invests heavily in promotional activity for our own operation but also for the region as a whole. Any proceeds from our activities are directed back into the community.

Economically, we deliver more than $12 million in impact through the annual Art Deco Festival alone and far more through our year-round tours operation thanks to our network of volunteer guides.

Believe me when I say, we have no more to give.

Whether you are a massive fan or avoid it like the plague, Art Deco is a huge part of our identity. It brings tens of thousands of visitors not only to the well-known and well-loved Art Deco Festival, but throughout the year and particularly during the summer season.

Over the years, we have built something special around our heritage that delivers huge economic outcomes as well as social and cultural outcomes for the region.

If we don't continue to receive the support that we do from Hawke's Bay Tourism in terms of driving growth across the tourism sector, we simply will not be able to sustain the rate of growth that we have seen in recent years and will have to scale back our activity in line with even the most marginal decrease in tourism business.

Are we really willing to risk the future of an industry that delivers 8 per cent of our GDP, the future of our biggest regional event along with other major events, and the future of our heritage over a 1.6 per cent reduction in rates? Or what is in actual fact just 1.6 per cent less of an increase in real terms?

Art Deco Trust is extremely grateful to have Hawke's Bay Tourism as one of our primary supporters, and we fully appreciate that they would not have been able to achieve what they have so far without the generous support of the HBRC.

We also appreciate that environmental issues are non-negotiable in terms of the need to invest and protect our natural environment.

This is why we can accept that Hawke's Bay Tourism funding cannot increase any further under current conditions, but we strongly insist that it is not reduced from its current level.

We are a non-profit organisation that dedicates itself to delivering significant outcomes for the Hawke's Bay Community and we cannot afford to lose momentum in the tourism business that supports and enables us to deliver these outcomes now and into the future.