Mon 3 Aug 2015 In: Our Communities View at Wayback View at NDHA
At the Darwin Outgames in 2014 a group of Auckland participants got together to decide whether to pitch for Auckland to host the event in February 2016. They envisaged a two-tier structure, a board and an executive committee to oversee the creation and running of a comprehensive programme of sporting, human rights and cultural elements The board included Phylesha Brown-Acton and Martin King as co-chairs, Kerry Underhill, Prue Kapua, and Paul Heard. Heard left the board for personal reasons late last year and was replaced by Vinnie Sykes. At a ceremony at the Auckland Town Hall in September the license to run the Fourth Asia Pacific Outgames on behalf of GLISA, the Gay and Lesbian International Sports Association, was co-signed by Barry Taylor of GLISA, Damian Strogen for the Auckland organising group and deputy mayor Penny Hulse for the city. Then at a waterfront launch event a rainbow windmill logo was unveiled and a million dollar budget spoken of. Subsequently, a list of 21 participating sports were confirmed and some venues identified. Things then went rather quiet; the assumption around the glbti communities was that those running the show had a lot of planning to do, that there were complex arrangements being put in place and in the fullness of time information and energy would start pouring forth. But in the background there was a nagging feeling that things were just a bit too quiet and time was ticking by. GayNZ.com Daily News attempted last week to set up a meeting and interview Executive Director Damien Strogen but his commitments, including travel overseas during which he would be promoting the Auckland Outgames, seemed to preclude this happening until mid-month. Today it emerged that on or around July 18 the entire Outgames board had resigned. A bombshell press release stated that unless sufficient sponsorship could be found within a week or two the organisers might have to abandon the Outgames. GayNZ.com Daily News has this afternoon been attempting to talk with the ex-board members to clarify the situation but there have been no responses to our messages and texts. No board member has so far picked up the phone. It is understood several members of the Executive team have also stood down. Ashley Barratt is determined to save the event Ashley Barratt, who is involved in a number of lgbti community organisations including GALS and Body Positive, became involved in the early stages of planning around the bid for the Outgames to be hosted in Auckland. He was involved in setting up the organisation's structure and then became a member of the executive. He agreed to be interviewed this evening about the situation. Because no board member has yet come forward to explain their group resignation, we asked Barratt what he understood had caused it. “My understanding, I don't know this for certain, but my understanding is that the board lost confidence in the ability of the executive to deliver. I think the sponsorship was one thing but there might have been other issues.” Should the board perhaps have remained and the executive left? “I can't answer that because I wasn't actually privy to any conversations at the board level because the structure was that the executive director, Damian Strogen, was the point of contact between the executive and the board.” If the board has gone does the organisation to run the Outgames still exist? “Yes,” says Barratt, “the organisation exists. What we need to do is re-form and put together a team that can deliver.” The initial announcements talked of a very big budget, in the million dollar range. How was that was going to be achieved, where was that million dollars going to come from according to the original plan? “That was a mix of three elements, from registrations, from corporate sponsors and from organisations such as [Auckland Council's events funding arm] ATEED." Has any corporate sponsorship been secured? “There was lots of interest but no commitment,” Barratt says. Isn't this rather late in the piece, with just 192 days to go according to the Outagmes website countdown, to be in a situation where there is interest but no commitment? “You could probably make that comment. Obviously it would be good to get the commitment earlier. I guess we've tried to do what we can to get commitment, but it's been harder to get than we anticipated initially. We have scaled down our expectations because of that.” There seemed to be some confidence initially that support from ATEED would be a given, perhaps based on its funding support for the annual Pride Parade as part of the Auckland Pride Festival. How did that pan out? “Late last week we received advice that they had declined our application which was a surprise to me and was quite a blow for us.” Saying that it was a surprise implies there had been some expectation or confidence building that ATEED was going to be on board. “That was my understanding, yes. We'd been talking to these agencies for at least six months, though I didn't participate in the discussions directly but that's my understanding.” So can the Outgames event happen without that million dollar budget, without any significant sponsorship in place so far and and no ATEED money? Barratt, in a more optimistic frame of mind than the earlier official press release suggested, is quite up-beat. “Absolutely, yes. It can be scaled down to a community-based response, and that's what we are now attempting to do. It's disappointing that we couldn't secure funding from ATEED and I guess we just need to reflect on the reasons why that was the case and make a decision on that basis. The people from GLISA who've given the rights will need to make that decision." The sports venues have been been announced, how were they going to be funded? Paid for by ATEED? Donated by the council? Hired at commercial rates? “A mix of all three I think, but I don't know the details.” It takes money to put on an event. Regardless of the input and enthusiasm of volunteers there are always going to be things that have to be paid for. Where is the income going to come from to pay for even a scaled-down event? “From the people who come to participate, from the community and a range of sponsors that we are continuing to approach.” Are all the planned sporting, human rights and cultural events likely to go ahead? “At the moment we're reviewing the programme to suit our budget and I'm not in a position yet to be able to say,” Barratt says. “But we are intending to deliver a programme of sports, human rights and culture." For people looking to come from overseas in particular, or from out of Auckland, those for whom organisation and money and bookings and commitment are important, to take time off work, to train and prepare, what reassurance can Barratt give those people that the Games and the associated Human Rights, Cultural and Youth festival will all go ahead? “There is no doubt that they will all go ahead. No doubt.” Is it possible that some anticipated events will have to be jettisoned? Barratt hedges: “I think that we need the community to come alongside and support it.” For the glbti communities to come forward they have to feel engaged, to have a sense of ownership. People need to have a desire to see the event happen and want to be involved. Does Barratt think we have that sense of engagement from the glbti communities in Auckland and further afield for the Outgames? “There's always more to do and I'm personally disappointed that we haven't been able to do more. The question is: 'What can we do going forward?'” I suggest that so far there has been little sense of engagement between the organisers and the Auckland glbti communities. Perhaps some individual sports groups and their organisers are visibly on to it but there is as yet very little buzz in the community about this. GayNZ.com, for instance, has been trying for months now and have got no real information about what's been happening to help build glbti people's sense of engagement. Isn't Outgames going to have to somehow create that link rather quickly if people are now to step forward to a greater level than they might have anticipated? “I agree completely.” Which begs the rather blunt question as to why the glbti communities of Auckland and further afield should care about whether the Fourth Asia Pacific Outgames 2016 goes ahead or not? “As a city we have an opportunity to showcase Auckland as a progressive and community-focused place to be," Barratt says. "I think it's been shown that the cities that have held the Outgames in the past, particularly Wellington in 2011, did an amazing job of promoting the well-being of the glbti community in their city, and in New Zealand and across the Asia/Pacific region. And that's our intention.” Over the past month or so there have been postings on the Outgames Facebook page from people practically begging for information. It's symptomatic of an information vacuum which seems to surround the organisers and it's not a good look. How are the organisers going to improve the way they communicate the details and the spirit of the event, how do you change that around, and find the resources to do it? “I can't answer that question specifically,” says Barratt, “but I agree that we need to change where we are... we need to do it.” So Outgames is not just looking for people who can assist on the ground to provide services on the days of the event, but those with the ability and expertise to create budgets and sponsorships and have more organisational success than Outgames has had so far. And they're also looking for a whole new board to take on the responsibility of overseeing the whole thing. The needs seem to be at every level. “Yes, we need the skills and connections that people in the community have and the resources, capability and time that they have available. The decision for issuing the press release today was to mobilise around some action. The viability of the games probably isn't in question, it's who delivers it and how it gets delivered. What we're saying is that we need the community to help us, accepting that we need to reach out more. I would suggest that in the next two to four weeks we will have a clearer view. Outgames will take place concurrently with Auckland Pride, which itself absorbs a lot of resources of time and effort and money from the Auckland glbti communities' performers and volunteers, is that a good or a bad thing? It seems likely that the sort of people who are involved in Pride are the same people they're hoping will come forward to help stage the Outgames. Is there enough time and energy to go around? “I'm not sure I know the answer to that,” Barratt says. “I know that people from overseas are excited to be in Auckland at the same time as the Pride Festival and we've had some very positive feedback around that.” Have the Outgames organisers been in touch with Pride and if so what is the situation there? “We're working on that in the same way that we're working with the community, I can't really say much more than that at the moment.” Barratt says the remaining Outgames team is in daily contact with GLISA “and we're working collaboratively with them to get to the outcome that we all want. Their resources are limited too, but they're doing everything they can to provide support to the organising committee." At the end of the Wellington Outgames the organisers handed on a surplus to help seed the Darwin games and it was anticipated that it might in turn be handed on from Outgames to Outgames. Have the Auckland organisers received anything in the way of seeding money? “Yes. There was a loan made from GLISA to the organising committee.” Barratt won't be drawn on the amount of the loan. But he says the Auckland team has been in touch with the Wellington organisers to see if they have any expertise or advice which might assist. “I was talking with them today and they are very supportive to try to help us in any way they can to make sure the Games is delivered in a way that makes New Zealand and Auckland proud.” As originally conceived and budgeted, was the concept an over-reach? “I think that's something that might be considered now. We've tried hard to deliver what we believed we could deliver and you could probably conclude that were were overly ambitious in terms of what we thought we could do." Barratt is urging anyone who has time, skills or resources to help get the Outgames back on track to contact the organisers as soon as possible, though the link below. "Together I'm sure we can, and will, deliver something marvellous.” We can be reached at news@gaynz.com if you have information to add, or are a former Board member who can clarify what happened. Jay Bennie - 3rd August 2015