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Dateline: 31st October, 2010
Darlington to Slash Arts Funding Darlington Borough Council is planning to axe funding for both the Darlington Civic Theatre and the Arts Centre as a result of cuts to local authority funding in the Comprehensive Spending Review. The council believes it will have to save £22m by 2014 and so has been forced to look at all areas of its spending. Also affected will be the library service, non-residential care for the elderly and there will be up to 400 job losses among council workers. The council hopes that a buyer will be found for the theatre but " the message is clear – we cannot afford to subsidise it any more." A final decision will be made in March. The theatre will not close immediately as there are contracts which will have to be honoured but chief executive Ada Burns said that, unless a buyer is found, it will close in the summer. The closure of the two venues will save £1.7m a year. The 439-seater theatre opened in 1907 and became a civic theatre in 1966 and had a £1.5m refurbishment in 1990. The Arts Centre was taken over by the council in 2001 and underwent extensive refurbishment in 2007, including the creation of a studio theatre dedicated to theatre work for and by young people. It is the home of of the National Association of Youth Theatres (NAYT) and Hullabaloo Theatre Company (formerly CTC Theatre Company). Unlike the Civic Theatre, the Arts Centre is an Arts Council England Regularly Funded Organisation and, it was announced this week, will receive £121,558 in grant for 2011/12.
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