Council jeopardises Melbourne’s cultural capital status

Just three days before the close of ballots in this year’s local government elections, the Melbourne City Council CEO notified all staff of a proposed restructure that appears to eliminate Creative City, the arts and culture branch. 

Amid an election campaign period marred by anti-arts rhetoric and commitments, such a restructure risks destroying Melbourne’s global cultural capital status, setting back creative progress by a generation. 

With more and more artists and creative organisations leaving the municipality by the week, and the last remaining arts community in the iconic Nicholas Building struggling to survive, it’s a concerning time for the City of Melbourne to consider undermining one of its world-renowned strengths.

Events, recreation and waterways

Rather than redressing the availability and affordability of space for artists and organisations, the restructure proposes the redundancy of the Creative City director, Creative City initiatives lead and the creative infrastructure lead roles, among other unknown redundancies. The highly respected arts leader in Creative City director role had already vanished from the role a few months ago without explanation, causing significant internal and industry concern. It then redistributes the remaining staff, shoehorning them into ill-fitting departments without expert senior leadership to support and champion their work. 

Libraries, for example, would fall under “Recreation and Waterways”, diminishing and grossly misunderstanding their specialist role in fostering literacy, lifelong learning, social and technical entrepreneurship, and culturally respectful community development.

YIRRAMBOI – the City of Melbourne’s nationally and internationally renowned First Nations creative development, mentoring and capacity-building team – would be moved to “Events”, mistaking their sensitive cultural work for the fanfare of one-off productions such as New Year’s Eve celebrations. 

In the local languages of the Boon Wurrung and Woi Wurrung peoples, YIRRAMBOI means “tomorrow”; founded in 2017, it’s taken years for YIRRAMBOI to establish its programs as national best practice. Right now, however, its tomorrow is in doubt.

Such a restructure would also eliminate the visibility of arts and culture to council. If the branch were to be axed, there would be no dedicated councillor serving as Creative City portfolio lead to be the strong voice the council chamber needs.

The mere announcement of the restructure itself appears to be in breach of caretaker conventions which bar public servants from announcing major strategic change during periods of political transition. The City of Melbourne’s specific policy in this area was adopted as recently as July 30, 2024.

So, what’s motivated this radical approach? And what does the new council mean for the future of Melbourne’s arts and culture?

A follower, not a leader

It’s not great news. Newly elected Lord Mayor Nicholas Reece had served as deputy to previous Lord Mayor Sally Capp. At a business breakfast during the campaign, lord mayoral candidate Arron Wood described Reece as “a follower”, “not a leader”. This is Reece’s first major opportunity to prove Wood wrong.

But Reece did attempt to lead the debate during the campaign period – often with disastrous results where the arts were concerned. Threatening to sell an iconic cultural asset met with universal condemnation and was quickly shut down by the state government, as well as by the council itself in a motion led by Cr Jamal Hakim, with whom I ran as Deputy Lord Mayor candidate. 

Reece also fell afoul of the creative, architecture and planning sectors when he released gruesome AI-generated images of dystopian “proposed parks in the city containing AI-like features like lifeless bodies, extra limbs and floating objects”.

As is well known, the City of Melbourne used to be a leader and not a follower on arts and culture. In the 1990s, its groundbreaking Postcode 3000 initiative pulled the city out of its deepest recession since the Great Depression by focusing on places for artists to live and work. The iconic Laneways Commissions were an artist-led urban planning initiative that transformed everyone’s experience of living and working in Melbourne, and to this day remain a top tourist drawcard. The renowned Biennial Lab project offered the streets of Melbourne as sites for experimentation and creative growth. Co-location of organisations was once fostered in council assets such as the City Village building. Together, these initiatives brought significant economic benefit to the City of Melbourne, as well as cultural cred and international renown as a place artists choose to work. Today, none of these initiatives exist, and there are no plans to innovate with renewed ambition.

While the new mayor did not make any arts-specific campaign commitments outside of the Regent Theatre sale announcement, Reece did commit to making Melbourne the “events capital” of Australia, which might help explain some of the restructure’s focus – but certainly not its full scope, nor its timing.

Restoring trust

The proposed restructure immediately attracted the ire of the Australian Services Union who represents a significant proportion of council staff. 

“The ASU has previously been given no notice, written or verbal, of any intent to enact these changes,” they advised members, adding: “You may be shocked by these proposed changes, or scared”.

Staff in the Creative City branch are indeed feeling shocked and scared. Speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals, they said: “This is so backward and frankly amateurish”, “I just don’t know how we’re going to be able to work credibly enough to win back industry respect”, and “We’re going to become the laughing stock of the world”.

People outside the municipality would rightly be mystified at all this: they rely on the City of Melbourne’s leadership to safeguard the arts for all Australians. Isn’t council proud that Melbourne is Australia’s arts and cultural capital? Hadn’t a sustained creative city focus already rescued Melbourne from a major recession? Isn’t Melbourne a confident, smart community who’s elected progressive state and federal MPs for decades?

One difference is in the City of Melbourne’s integrity-defying electoral laws: residents get one vote, businesses get two. It’s a democracy dodge that all but ensures an outcome in conflict with community expectations. 

Not content with two votes, however, the Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry recently told The Age that, given the city’s growing residential population had “diluted” the business vote, “it’s probably time to revisit whether two votes is enough, whether it goes to three or more”.

The City of Melbourne is the only municipality in Australia where businesses get two votes to residents’ one. Last year the NSW government scrapped that same law, citing the imperative to return “democracy and fairness to the City of Sydney.” It’s high time we return that expectation to the people of Melbourne. Announcing a council-wide restructure during a caretaker period is not a marker of robust democracy and fairness; there’s considerable work to be done to restore integrity.

Creativity as “a defining feature of Melbourne’s unique character [that] contributes to its ongoing economic resilience and viability” remains a core component of the City of Melbourne strategic plan.

Substantial arts and culture commitments are urgently needed, addressing creative spaces and cultural infrastructure meaningfully, and restoring Melbourne’s arts leadership.

It’s now up to the new council to provide ethical oversight and direction for council staff, protecting and championing our exceptionally creative culture to safeguard the Melbourne of tomorrow.

*This opinion piece has been edited from its original published version

Arts leader Esther Anatolitis is Editor of Meanjin, Hon A/Prof at RMIT School of Art, and a member of the National Gallery of Australia Governing Council. She is a City of Melbourne resident, rate-payer and small business owner. In 2024 Esther ran alongside Cr Jamal Hakim as a candidate for Deputy Lord Mayor.