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City's arts and culture thinking is totally backwards

Council is raving about a huge new cultural plan but has no idea how much it will cost to implement.

To the Editor,

Re: Study charts arts economic impact, Nov. 12.

The majority of Nanaimo city councillors have their fingers in your wallet but their heads in the sand.

Council is doing cartwheels and tripping all over each other raving about a huge new cultural plan but has no idea how much it will cost to implement.

Arts-supporting councillors at-any-cost Diane Brennan and Diana Johnstone should be ashamed for covering their eyes and ears and applauding what will be mega-spending and adding a new city arts and culture manager, a staff, an office and so-forth but carelessly overlooking that there is no budget for any of it. Is this how ineptly they run our city? Like Coun. Bill McKay said, would you pick the most expensive car in the lot without knowing how you are going to pay for it?

Meantime at the same council meeting, staff came up with ways to fund mitigating the Colliery Dams but gave no plan.

What totally backwards thinking: A cultural plan with no costs attached and ways to snatch great amounts of money for the dams but no plan decided. This is slimy manoeuvring from cty hallers who want to push their own agendas through – at any costs.

George OliverNanaimo