Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Let's Have The Facts":
I colleague of mine told me she went to one of those art classes at the cultural centre. She paid a couple of hundred $ for an 8 week course. She said that she was pleased with it until I actually told her what she actually paid for it through her taxes. Saying she was not happy is an understatement. She freaked. She had no idea how much of her taxes was going to the center, especially when she could have supported a small business in the area for less money. Unfortunately residents don’t know where their taxes are flowing to. Its election year hopefully the word will get out soon.
Posted by Anonymous to Our Town and Its Business at 27 February 2014 21:12
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Participation is growing . I do not ask for more. The rules need to evolve still.
Comments that make me the issue to detract from the topic will not be published.
When the discussion closes I will choose a comment. It may be a cogent point.
It may throw a new and different light on the issue.
Like the one above.
The culture centre is competition to professional artists attempting to make a living from their
chosen career.
It's not fair competition.
The Centre has free space. Pays no maintenance. Receives hundreds of thousands of dollars from
tax resources.
The independent professional receives no support and ,insult to injury, contributes to the taxes that fund the competition.
The same point has had to be made about the club facility at Highlanf Field.
They cannot be allowed to compete with town restaurants. Who pay taxes. provide employment . provide their own facilities . Contribute as sponsors of minor sports teams and other charities.
They cannot speak to unfairness. The hospitality business depends entirely on goodwill.
It's the function of the elected to speak to fairness and equity.
It's a simple concept.
One everyone can understand .
Some choose to ignore it and agressively pursue their own interest at the expense of others.
Others have no sense of it at all.
Social media allows the principle to keep being repeated.
If judgement, fairness and equity cannot be compelled in our small corner of the world, at least we can require accountability.
We have done it once already.
Friday 28 February 2014
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30 comments:
This deal can effect service clubs, churches, and more.The center can, and has offered cheap rent others can not compete with.I was shocked when I was offered the large room with the piano for$100.All I had to do was join up.Then I saw the second deal breaker about them filming our event for marketing purposes.No way I thought as enough people have had their programs ripped off, or been pushed to the curb here.
I also have been speaking to someone fairly new in town. It was pretty general until the topic of taxes arose. Ours seemed far too high to her especially given all the money that seemed available for certain groups. And I was unable to explain the contradiction to her.
Having lived in Aurora for a few decades, I am learning that Aurora politics grows on people. sort of like toe fungus.
The cultural centre infuriates me to no end. Other then Councilor Buck nobody on council sees this as a colossal was of money that it is.
If somebody wants my vote then they need to start taking a stand on this issue
Why would anyone want to complain after the fact if you were willing to pay the course cost before the knowledge of the support from the Town. When the Town (read "our taxes") are in fact subsidizing the cost of taking the art course). Indeed if the Town didn't subsidize the Centre it would even more expensive.
It looks like most of the instruction programs at the Centre are priced similarly at a rate of about $10/hr per person (any materials costs etc is extra). A 20 hr course is $200.
Let's say the Centre gets $500,000 a year from the Town. I believe it's about $370,000 in a grant but I also believe there are additional costs that the Town covers to run the building that don't show in the Centre's budget that they would have to otherwise pay themselves.
Let's say as they express that they have 25,000 visitors per year and this would be for paid and free programs (and people coming to the winter farmer's market). Now I could be wrong in my perspective but doesn't that mean that taking $500K divided by visitors gives you the average subsidy per visitor to run the place? Which would be $20 per visit. That being said then the 8 week art course (8 visits) would in fact be subsidized at $160 by the Town. So the real cost of delivering the art course is $360. This is what effects the private art instructor in competing with the Centre.
For those that can afford it, you best take courses, etc. at the Centre because you're already paying for it anyways. What is surprising though is how much the course still costs to take. How does this compare to other communities, etc. I know in my hometown my mother takes art classes at the local library and it's no where near Aurora's cost. (And yes, I know you have to compare the quality of instructor and other factors, etc). But I am sure there are plenty of people that can't afford it at the Centre's rates but would love to join in especially since their taxes are supporting it in general.
It was the beginner and intermediate guitar lessons that drove me nuts, particularly with a tax-paying music school right across the street! Offends me on two levels - nothing uniquely cultural about guitar lessons that we should be paying such huge tax money to support, and it is patently unfair to other music instructors trying to make a go of it on their own.
@ 9:25, you are right, our taxes are ridiculous. Blaming it on the crazy high portion that goes to the region is a complete cop-out. Our council should be looking to reduce taxes through cuts to things like the Cultural Center and the moribund Heritage Society, and efficiencies such as better use of assets the town already owns, like the former Hydro building AND putting pressure on the region (through our rep, the Mayor) to get its house in order and our taxes in line.
KA-NON
". . .nothing uniquely cultural about guitar lessons that we should be paying such huge tax money to support, and it is patently unfair to other music instructors trying to make a go of it on their own."
Who are you - or anyone for that matter - to determine whether guitar lessons are uniquely cultural? What does "uniquely cultural" mean anyways?
One of the problems with the arguments about the "Cultural Centre" is that everyone has an opinion what they think "Culture" is and no one is right (or wrong). However, no one can assume that their vision of culture is the only one or the only correct one.
I wonder how many class instructors who are getting paid for their services are even from Aurora? You would think that they would be using Town residents as instructors.
@ 13:06
In order for me to accept that there is even a modicum of legitimacy to the level of public funding that the Cultural Centre receives, I have had to develop some rationalizations. One of these is the idea that the Cultural Centre might provide access to a kind of Cultural programming that might not otherwise make its way into small town Aurora, which might benefit the town as a whole, ummm, culturally, I guess? Indeed, I suppose that they have done this to a degree with some of what they have brought to the school (piano series, etc.). I can sort of convince myself that the centre is "uniquely" positioned to do this, given the level of public funding they receive and the level of organization that funding facilitates.
Guitar lessons, and art classes, don't fit that idea, in my opinion.
I am KA-NON, and that is what I think "uniquely" cultural means.
It is a great, publicly-funded facility with outstanding events and programming. Frankly, those that don't avail themselves of it out of pettiness or spite are the only ones losing out.
No, 14:58.
It is not pettiness or spite. Not at all.
I don't want to take guitar lessons, or art classes.
And if I want to hear John Sheard play, I'll pay what it costs. I've done that, and he is fabulous. I just don't expect the rest of Aurora to subsidize my ticket.
Or my guitar lessons, should I ever change my mind on that.
You really need to open your eyes and understand that the issues people raise here are not about spite and pettiness. These are real concerns.
Thank you so much, KA-NON.
KA NON may be a thanked for his take but I still find that his rigid definition of "culture" is limited to WASP visions of culture.
To provide someone with guitar lesssons whose first language is not English or who came from a Asian country is as a valid demonstration of culture as me (a WASP) taking Thai cooking lessons.
Rigid thinking like his doom this subject to an us vs. them argument.
@14:58
This is likely a waste of time but I will try.
If your life that revolves around the Centre is so fulfilling, why are you always so angry ?
17:03
You sound like a be-sotted teen-ager living with his/her folks. Aurora has always been a melting pot & no individual is treated as less than another. Music lessons & cooking lessons have always been available for those who chose to pursue them. Take a close look at the faces around the schools & please note the intermingling of groups.The families, schools, churches and service groups were doing the job long before the Centre demanded the entire stage.
Oh my! 17:03- You are missing the whole point of this discussion.
14:58 - $$$,$$$,$$$.00 is pettiness? Competing with private Auroran businesses is pettiness? I wonder if the Town started competing with your livelihood what you might say?
See, 17:05, it just shows how one's interpretation of the written word can be so far off-base. Reading from your perspective isn't aligned with mine while writing.
I don't really do angry...
Also, you have no way of knowing what my life revolves around, but, rest assured, you're far off the mark...again.
"Aurora has always been a melting pot..."? 18:24, you sound like someone who hasn't lived in Aurora for any great length of time.
"I don't really do angry..."
" I do not really do anger "
20:25, you can add misquotes (or, at least, inaccurate quotes) to your laundry list - a list that has nothing to do with anger and everything to do with difference of opinion, correction, and illumination.
Also, I hope you don't mind me saying, but as I perceive your tone, you come across as a very angry person. Hey, relax!
What dribble ! There are a lot of WASPS in Canada tonight who care about what happened to Loretta Saunders.
Everyone can do angry.
I have yet to visit the Cultural Centre. Not from not trying. I can't get near the place when events are on, which is sooo frustrating, and find some events so poorly advertised that I miss attending them. I regularly participate in other cultural activities in town, Music nights, concerts and movies in the park,Farmers market, street sale, Rib Fest, Canada Day Festivities, outdoor skating, the list goes on. There isn't much offered at the centre that I can't access elsewhere in town so There is no incentive for me to go there. Dedicated parking for this facility would help tremendously, why it wasn't insisted on in it's original design is beyond me. And when I have a meeting at the library, and there is a function at the cultural centre, it is bedlam. Don't press my nerve! I'm too old now for that.
It looks like the towns contribution to the Cultural Centre barely covers the staff salaries.
There are 8 people currently employed there, plus several instructors paid on contract basis. I'm sure they are all very good at their positions, but none of this work is essential to the town. It's a lovely building, and a lovely idea, but I reseet my tax dollars paying for it's extravagence. I'd rather give more money to the old gentlemen that plant trees for the arboretum that give back something concrete that can be seen years to come for townspeople, and even then, it's a duplicate and unneccessary expense.
Oops, 20:25's angry comment has disappeared.
8:19
“To improve our quality of life” apparently is considered “essential”. It’s some sort of “strategic plan”, “corporate value” which is now the go ahead to spend more money and label everything “essential”.
8:07
I wrote that comment and am just fine with its removal.
19:03
That would be incorrect. I knew Kennedy Street West when the kids tried to hide where they lived because as soon as you mentioned that street others figured you had to be poor.
21:24 Thank you for providing the Blog with your " illumination ". I had not realized we were so blessed.
De nada, 19:39.
@08:19
I think you'll find that half of those jobs are part-time positions.
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