Creative submissions to the Tauranga long term plan Photo: supplied
Artists in Tauranga recently took a creative response to comment on the City Council's Long Term Plan, which proposes steep rental increases for community groups, and a 'user pays' approach to charging for access to community spaces.
Led in part by arts hub The Incubator, not only did artists provide 15% of the total submissions to the LTP, 54 people asked to speak to their submissions at the hearings. For more than an hour they filled council chambers with submissions through poetry, ukulele and gifts made by school students from the creative space The Incubator’s sewing club.
The mission, says The Incubator board member James Wilson, was to show the diversity of Tauranga's creative community, and send a powerful message about arts and wellbeing, and the importance of community access.
The Incubator Photo: supplied
Simone Anderson Photo: laval
The Incubator Creative Hub is based at the Historic Village in Tauranga. They run a range of community galleries, artist studios, a creative campus, a community cinema and live music venue, the Jam Factory. They receive council funding, and Wilson says they have had a great partnership, but the LTP proposes rental increases that in some cases are up to 300% more than what they are currently paying.
Simone Anderson, the Director of the Incubator joins Mark Amery's Culture 101 to introduce arts and culture in the Tauranga region on our Regional Wrap.
Anderson is also gearing up for the one-day Tauranga Fringe Festival, on 9 March, which The Incubator runs at the Historic Village.
Tauranga's Jam Factory Photo: supplied
