The head of the Victoria International Buskers Festival is denying a statement made by Tourism Victoria that they cut ties with the buskers festival in part because financial demands kept rising.
Tourism Victoria CEO Paul Nursey said yesterday the operator of the buskers festival, among other things, made increasing financial demands to the point the requests became unreasonable.
The operator of that buskers festival, John Vickers, responded on CFAX with Pamela McCall this afternoon.
"It's just disappointing. He said, for example, we've asked for more and more money," says Vickers. "The buskers festival society now for three years running has not asked for any additional increase in funding."
Nursey also says the operator didn't consult with downtown sponsors before moving a portion of the festival to Uptown.
"We only wanted to reach out further into the community and we did three afternoon shows," says Vickers. "So three shows a day at Uptown (and) over 500 hours of programming all across downtown Victoria."
After breaking ties with Vickers' festival, it was announced Tourism Victoria was partnering up with three other groups to host their own Victoria buskers festival. It will run over six days this summer and will overlap with Vickers' event.
UPDATE: Now responding to Vickers' response, Nursey says Vickers is being untruthful and he's got the numbers to prove it.
Vickers has denied requesting a funding increase in the last three years, but Nursey says his request jumped in each of the last three years. Nursey says Vickers requested 45-thousand dollars for 2014; 63-thousand dollars for 2015; nearly 66-thousand dollars for 2016; and then 73-thousand dollars for 2017.
Nursey adds the requested increases were for more more money to pay performers and for a winter stipened for Vickers himself.