These are difficult financial times for everyone, and Fife Council meet this week on 13th February to make hard decisions on proposed budget cuts for the next few years.
StAnza has always been very grateful to Fife Council for their support, which has helped the festival to deliver successful festivals each year. However this week our councillors will be voting on proposals which contain very bad news for StAnza and other Fife cultural festivals for 2015 beyond. It is proposed that the Strategic Events fund from which we receive money should be significantly cut. This doesn’t affect this year’s festivals, but it would affect festivals in further years.
If the proposed cuts are approved by the council this week, StAnza has been told that it may receive no funding from Fife Council in 2015.
We all understand that cuts are never welcome, and that these are not easy decisions for the councillors. However the cuts proposed to the Strategic Events Investment Fund will only provide a tiny saving for the council’s whole budget cuts, about a half of one percent, but if approved this tiny cut will have huge impact for StAnza and other festivals in Fife, not just because of the reduction in money from Fife Council, but because of the impact of this on grants we receive from other funders.
As well as the many cultural and educational benefits which StAnza provides, like other cultural festivals StAnza has a substantial economic impact in Fife, which positive economic impact is also under threat from the proposed cuts. It is estimated that every £1 contributed by Fife Council to cultural festivals generates spending of £36 across Fife.
If you live in Fife and think the proposed cuts to the Strategic Events Investment Fund would be a bad thing, please let your own councillor know. If you do not know who your councillor is, you can find out via your postcode here: http://ow.ly/trtOB
More detailed information about the proposed cuts can be found at http://publications.1fife.org.uk/uploadfiles/publications/leisure_savings_11.pdf
the StAnza Blog 
I’m from over the Tay Bridge, but I have plastered this all round Twitter and Facebook.
Thanks, that’s much appreciated.
Please do not cut the funding for this hugely important festival in the St Andrews events calendar. All manner of businesses benefit from this international event at an otherwise very quiet time of year. Cutting the funding will have a terrible effect on the local ecconomy. Events are what keep a town thriving to cut the help now after all the hard work and effort put in by local people and business’s would be a big mistake. We need more festivals and events not fewer. Please please do not make these cuts.
Thanks, just to be clear we’re not under threat for this year, this year is fine, we have had great support from Fife Council this year, the worry is about 2015 and after.
I’ve emailed my councillor. : )
As a non-Scot who attended StAnza in 2010 I feel compelled to ask that the funding for this organization be protected next year and on into future years. While at StAnza, I was fortunate to share my own Gaelic Nova Scotia poetry compositions. However, what I was truly impressed by were the numerous Scots poets who shared their compositions, many of which were in various Scots dialects, via the medium of performance poetry. It truly was a great experience and I am confident that this is the case for those who attend StAnza each year. Cutting the funding for this festival will seriously impede the longer term viability of the platform for the spoken and written word art form that StAnza has nutured and encouraged. There is a societal good that is inherent in the funding of organizations such as StAnza. It is my earnest request that this good continue to be supported in the future.
Thanks Lewis, Jude and paisleybuddy for the comments, much appreciated!