Creekfest back on despite cash shortage

Creekfest – the full-sized version – is back on the calender and will be staged on March 9, after the Whanau Centre Trust board agreed to underwrite the event last week. A fortnight after organiser The Porirua Healthlinks Trust cancelled the event, it announced Creekfest was back on at a public meeting last Thursday, held to discuss the festival’s future.

A scaled- down version was mooted to coincide with the Cannons Creek market on March 23, but Healthlinks’ chairman Steve Kenny said the Whanau Centre Trust decided to take on the risk.

‘‘ We made the decision to cancel it [earlier this month, with the required funding not secured] but have been scrambling around since then. This is fantastic news for an iconic Porirua event.’’

Creekfest organiser Liz Kelly, who is also the Whanau Centre’s manager, said they were $25,000 short of the minimum $65,000 needed to run the event, even though past Creekfests had cost in excess of $100,000 to stage.

She was confident of raising $25,000 before March 9.