Raise the Hammer

I'm not at all shocked or suprised that the proposal was voted down yesterday- despite the many merits of the Inc's plans, the idea to move the Inc to Jerry's Man Shop has only been considered now for a few weeks, and from what I know of what the Inc was shooting for in their original proposal, Jerry's is smaller in scope than the original plan.

I think a feasibility study is probably the best idea for now- I see many organizations at this stage who make a push for their own building, and in the meantime everything else falls to the wayside and people get laid off, regardless of how much "fiscal prudence" they might exhibit. ;)

I think the Inc. needs to spend even more time to consider the full consequences of that kind of upheaval on the organization itself. Unexpected things will happen, and hopefully the organization and everyone involved is prepared for that.

I think this week was a bad time to be asking for that kind of money as well- after the provincial budget, every councillor is thinking of ways to cut back- there's a $5 Million shortfall in this year's budget, so considering that amount, $750,000 is a lot to ask for right now.

Yes, it sucks that the Future Fund was drained before you got a piece of it- but that shouldn't have come as much of a shock to anyone- council kept "borrowing" from it more or less since the fund was established, and the time to speak up about that was YEARS ago.

Obviously Councillors aren't very familiar with the Inc. and the good work it does- maybe if they had a better idea of the benefits of an organization like the Inc. they'd be more inclined to help out. But that's not their responsibility- it's the Inc's.

I know the Inc. is a great organization for artists, but that's because I'm an artist. Just about everyone's one-sentence understanding of this has been "Some arts group wants 3/4 of a Million taxdollars". It's up to the Inc. to educate people- sounds like a lot of work, but $750,000 is also a lot of money.

I do wish to see the Inc. make their plans happen, but I would hate to see it happen too quickly, in a way that risks dissolving the entire organization as we know it.