Cork 2005 under fire over failure to hit cash target

THE organisers of Cork 2005, European Capital of Culture, have been criticised for their failure to raise adequate commercial sponsorship to fund the year’s programme of events.

The high-level criticism from the Department of Arts is revealed as the Irish Examiner established that a number of large local companies were either never formally approached for major sponsorship or were only approached in recent months.

Since January, several events have been dropped, including concerts, a play about Frank O’Connor and a food project with celebrity chef Seamus O’Connell.

But Cork 2005 spokesman Shane Malone last night insisted this was not because of a shortage of funds.

“We have a budget of €15.5 million and are still on course,” said Mr Malone. “No projects have been or will be cancelled due to lack of funding,” he added.

Mr Malone and director of finance Sean Angland told the department the corporate sponsorship target was €10m. Last October, Mr Angland revised it to €7m. Yesterday, sponsorship to date, both cash and benefit-in-kind, stood at €5.9m, said director of sponsorship Nigel O’Mahony, who insisted the target was always €7m.

The €5.9m figure is over €450,000 more than six months ago, when, two weeks after the programme launch, the secretary general of the Department of Arts, Philip Furlong, said in an internal memo that the organisers had “manifestly failed” in terms of “failing to secure an adequate level of commercial sponsorship”.

Increasingly, businesses supportive of the Capital of Culture year have been sponsoring events not associated with the Cork 2005 organisation, including concerts by Andrea Bocelli, Kiri Te Kanawa and Diana Ross.

However, investigations by the Irish Examiner have established that while Government was being lobbied for extra funding, a number of large local companies were never formally approached or were approached late in the day.

Property developer Owen O’Callaghan said he was informally approached regarding sponsorship in 2003, but heard no more after that.

“There was a commitment given that we would be contacted again by Cork 2005 for fuller discussions, but this never happened,” he told the Irish Examiner.

“Given that, we decided to support a number of cultural projects during 2005, in any event,” he said.

Similarly, another major property developer, O’Flynn Construction, was approached last February.

Even at that late stage the company was willing to become involved, and sponsored the Frank O’Connor short story competition.

Funding has been a major issue surrounding Cork 2005 from the outset. It is widely believed that the original director, Brian Beattie, left because he felt the level of State support was inadequate, a view shared by his replacement, John Kennedy.

Additionally, the original director of corporate relations, Philip MacKeown, left the organisation last year, and was replaced by Mr Nigel midway through the year, with the clock ticking rapidly towards 2005.