Chinese community role in garden suggested

Lyndon Weggery
Lyndon Weggery
The Chinese community needs to take some responsibility for the financial "predicament" the city finds itself in with the Chinese garden, the Dunedin Ratepayers and Householders Association says.

Merging the garden with the Toitu Otago Settlers Museum was possibly the best way to deal with reducing operating costs, but if that was not viable, the garden should be offered to the Chinese community to run as a private commercial operation, like Olveston or Larnach Castle, association president Lyndon Weggery told a public forum at the Dunedin City Council this week.

He said recent news that the garden's operating costs were increasingly higher than its income did not paint a rosy picture of the future financial situation of the garden, nor what it was costing ratepayers.

The completed garden was given to the city by the Chinese community when it was opened in 2008.

The Dunedin Chinese Gardens Trust was set up in 1998 to oversee the fundraising and establishment of the $7.7 million garden.

The council contributed $1 million for its construction, gave the land for it, and agreed to take on the ongoing maintenance costs of the garden when it was given to the city.

Reports to the council before it took on the garden estimated it could, through ticket sales, shop sales and room hire, break even in the 2011-12 financial year.

But visitor numbers have been less than hoped for, and last year the garden cost $180,000 more to run than it earned.

It is expected to cost the city $585,000 to run in the coming year.

The question was whether the city could "continue to afford to throw good money after bad", Mr Weggery said.

The council is reviewing the situation. A report was expected to go to the council's community development committee on Monday, but was not completed in time and is now expected to be presented to the committee's October meeting.

If the council was going to keep its promise of keeping rates rises as low as possible over the next few years, urgent action was needed, Mr Weggery said.

Staffing at the gardens needed to be reviewed, as did operational costs.

Linking the garden with the Toitu Otago Settlers Museum would save duplication of food, merchandise facilities and management costs, and dropping the admission fee to locals, he suggested.

But if the council did not favour that, the garden should be offered to the local Chinese community.

The council should ask the Chinese community if it was interested in operating the garden as a private commercial enterprise.

"We realise there are cultural objections here, but with the greatest of respect, don't the local Chinese community need to take some responsibility, including financial, for the predicament that we all find ourselves in as a city?"

Council community development committee chairman Cr Bill Acklin, who has previously said the garden should be compared with the Dunedin Botanic Garden, which cost the council a lot more each year to run, told Mr Weggery all the association's questions and concerns would be addressed in the October report.

Dunedin Chinese Gardens Trust chairman Malcolm Wong declined to comment, saying he did not wish to pre-empt the staff report.

- debbie.porteous@odt.co.nz

Add a Comment

 

Advertisement