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Council’s finance and assurance group manager Michael Day said the increase in required council input was due to lower estimated external funding and increased project costs because of the delay to the project. The project is now expected to cost $17.6m in total. The council has reduced its expectation for external funding contributions for ACI from $9.7m to just $3.5m. Day said the external funding predictions, as part of the 2018-2028 long-term plan, were based on outside advice. He said the emergence of Covid-19 had since changed the funding dynamic and the council also had a better understanding of what was realistic around funding.
Building a 6000sqm multi-storey space in the area beside and behind the Tuatara Backpackers Lodge on Dee St for a new museum would cost just $36m, he said. His proposal was ideal because the council already owned most of lower-Esk St and it would tie in to the Invercargill Central development bordering Esk and Tay streets, Harpur said.
Kavinda Herath/Stuff
The Southland Museum and Art Gallery pyramid building in Queens Park, Invercargill, has been closed since April, 2018. “[The old buildings on Tay St] are going to have to be . probably demolished anyway, so it’s an opportunity to latch onto the existing development as well as get rid of some potential hazards that are sitting there now.
Great South chief executive Graham Budd said it was no longer tenable for the i-SITE to remain open, with the drop in international travellers since Covid-19 resulting in a major decline in revenue. “We have fought hard to keep the i-SITE open for as long as we have since lockdown, but sadly the time has come, for now at least.” Affected staff, including one full-time and one part-time, had been informed about the change following a consultation process. Following the closure, bookings for external services will need to be completed directly through service provider or through i-SITE’s website. Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, i-SITE NZ had initiated a review of the role of i-SITEs in the tourism sector.