Senator calls on Galway to raise €100,000 for festival

With less than a fortnight to the opening of the Volvo Ocean Race festival in Galway, Fine Gael Senator Fidelma Healy-Eames has urged Galwegians to raise €100,000 for the arts and culture events.

Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Jimmy Deenihan would then match this with €20,000 in State funding, Ms Healy-Eames said.

Under a “philanthropy leverage initiative” backed by Mr Deenihan, the sum of €20,000 has been awarded to Let’s Do It Galway, the organisation responsible for staging and promoting the Galway stopover of the race, on the condition that five times this amount is raised from private sources, she said.

“The deal is that for every €5 raised locally through philanthropy, the Government will pay €1 towards the event,” Senator Healy-Eames added.

“The total amount available under the scheme is €20,000, so in order to avail of all possible funds, the people of Galway need to get busy raising €100,000.”

The organisers say it will cost almost €7 million to run the event. Fáilte Ireland has already given €4 million to the Galway finish of the 2011-2012 Volvo race. There had been a shortfall in raising private sponsorship.