Pavilion public funding goes under microscope

Recommendations include axing an externally validated survey of residents’ satisfaction with the amenity, and using a £25,000 incentive grant linked to its findings to instead fund promotion of the opening and launch of Bexhill’s £5.6 million Next Wave seafront project.

Management and maintenance of the 75-year-old Grade I pavilion lies with the DLWP charitable trust, which receives core funding of some £500,000 a year from Arts Council England (ACE) plus a Sustain award totalling £370,000 for the years 2009 to 2012.

Rother gives a further £500,000, an annual capital grant - £43,945 in 2011/12 and rising 2.5 per cent annually until March 2014 - plus a £12,000 fixed grant to allow local groups to use DLWP facilities. The DLWP gets other income through its shop, bars, catering and ticket sales.

Councillors are being advised that abandoning satisfaction surveys and incentive grants will help it meet Comprehensive Spending Review cuts while still showing real commitment to ACE on attracting its funding.

The biggest risk is that if Rother gets the funding package wrong the charitable trust could fail, and the DLWP would then pass back to the council with major financial, regeneration and public relations implications.

Meanwhile the Bexhill Alliance has raised a petition of 1,700 names, sufficient to force DLWP issues to be put before full council prior to final approval.

In contrast to scrutiny committee recommendations, the Alliance wants more of the Pavilion’s public funding to be incentivised, so that £120,000 of its annual income becomes dependent on ensuring local satisfaction.

It has also raised a question mark over re-allocating unawarded incentive cash to the promotion of Next Wave - still a highly controversial issue among Bexhillians. Rother’s services overview and scrutiny committee meets at Bexhill Town Hall on Monday, February 7 at 5.30pm.

PICTURED: John Lee of Bexhill Alliance hands the petition over to Suzanne Collins, head of corporate services