Report offers NCC fundraising plan
Gatineau Park attractive to potential sponsors: consultants
Sunday bike days featuring music and games. Monthly street festivals in neighbourhoods along federal parkways. Selling naming rights for Gatineau Park assets. A national exhibit of public art for Canada’s sesquicentennial in 2017.
Those are just some of the ideas marketing agency TrojanOne Inc. proposes in a report that lays out a revenue generation plan for four National Capital Commission “properties” — Gatineau Park, the NCC’s network of parkways and recreational pathways, public art and the annual Christmas lights display on and around Parliament Hill.
The NCC commissioned the $69,000 report after concluding that each of the four properties had untapped potential to generate new revenue. A draft copy, dated March 2013, was released under Access to Information.
The cash-strapped agency is highly motivated to find new revenue sources. It has been hit by a succession of budget cuts that will reduce its annual parliamentary appropriation by an estimated $9.5 million.
As well, the 2013 federal budget announced that the Canadian Heritage Department will assume responsibility for a number of iconic NCC events, including Canada Day and Winterlude, that now generate sponsorship revenue.
As part of the shift, the NCC’s public art program and the Christmas Lights event — known as Christmas Lights Across Canada — will move to Canadian Heritage. The NCC will retain responsibility for Gatineau Park and the pathways and parkways.
The TrojanOne report says there is “significant room for the development of cash and value-in-kind sponsorship across all four properties.”
It identifies Gatineau Park as the most attractive to potential sponsors and recommends a strategy to turn the park into a revenue generating property with “diverse revenue streams, monetized event-hosting and new programming.”
The goal should be to generate annual sponsorship revenue of $400,000 in cash and value in kind, it says.
The NCC’s network of pathways and parkways has “considerable potential as sites for sponsorship activation,” the report says. The NCC should aim for annual sponsorship revenue of $300,000 by 2018 from that source.
For public art, the report recommends seeking partnerships — three with private companies and two with other public bodies — to raise $1.2 million by 2018, enough to acquire and maintain five new works of public art.
The report calls Christmas Lights Across Canada “a property in decline.” But if rebranded and revitalized, it could generate $150,000 in annual sponsorship revenue by 2018.
NCC spokesman Jean Wolff said the report’s recommendations “are being considered actively,” but with the NCC currently focused on the transfer of responsibilities to Canadian Heritage, there’s no timeline for action.
Here’s a closer look at the strategies the report recommends for each of the four properties:
PUBLIC ART
Summary: There are more than 30 non-commemorative pieces of public art on federal land in the National Capital Region.
Annual sponsorship revenue: None
Revenue potential 20142018: $1.2 million
The strategy: The National Capital Region is not the vibrant art city that a nation’s capital should be, says the report, which lays out a strategy for rectifying that.
The first step is to create public art programming, including a festival to showcase public art in the National Capital Region and a national public art exhibit for Canada’s sesquicentennial in 2017.
Next, the responsible federal agency — soon to be Canadian Heritage — should develop a model for public-private partnerships, targeting major private sector foundations in particular. It should also partner with other public agencies, embassies, consulates and high commissions, and engage “elite Canadians” in public art acquisition.