Uncertainty for MTG amid ongoing lease dispute with district council

Musical Theatre Gisborne president Peter Grealish and vice president Ben Chisholm say the last four years have been stressful for the group while it waits on the district council for answers. Picture by Liam Clayton

A Gisborne theatre group is looking for answers in an ongoing lease saga with the district council that has no clear end in sight.

Musical Theatre Gisborne owns a building on council land in Awapuni — an industrial area also home to a number of other clubs.

The group’s long-standing lease of around $400 per year quietly expired in 2019, but the group is still waiting on word from the council as to what the future holds.

“We need to know what’s happening. It’s so upsetting — it really has been a hard three years,” club president Peter Grealish said.

According to Mr Grealish, the group was never contacted when the lease expired and had to contact the council a year later itself.

Since then, it has been almost four years of trying to get answers out of the council through  myriad emails, texts, calls and meetings, he says.

“The council haven’t been playing nice in this whole three-and-a-half to four years since the lease has been up.

“They just keep changing their minds.”

Mr Grealish claims the council came close to offering an 11-year lease with two rights of renewal in late 2022, but the arrangement never got the approval it needed from councillors.

At a closed meeting in April, they ultimately decided on a shorter term of five years, at the end of which the group is expecting they’ll need to find a new place to call home.

The area is almost solely home to industry, and the group understands there is interest in the site for business purposes.

“Why weren’t they (the council) ready in 2019?”

Theatre group vice president Ben Chisholm said Musical Theatre Gisborne has had to contact the council every step of the way, and now faces a new dilemma — building maintenance.

Mr Chisholm said $60,000 needed to be spent on roof repairs for the existing building, but the group was reluctant to spend the money while its future was uncertain.

“We don’t want to do any maintenance if we’re not going to be here for a long time,” he said.

“There’s buckets out because when it pours, it even rains inside.”

Musical Theatre Gisborne was created through the merging of Gisborne Musical Theatre (formerly Gisborne Operatic Society) and Gisborne Theatre Arts in 2008.

The latter began its lease at the Awapuni site in 1984.

Mr Grealish said Musical Theatre Gisborne was a big user of local theatres in Gisborne for its productions, having used the War Memorial Theatre six times since its refurbishment and Lawson Field Theatre 65 times over 40 years.

In response to questions from Local Democracy Reporting, Gisborne District Council acting director liveable communities De-Arne Sutherland said expired leases continued on a holding-over basis until terminated by either party.

The council had tried to keep the leaseholder as updated as possible in recent months, but the situation was a complex one, Ms Sutherland said.

Investigation was required and issues would be reported to council before a decision was reached, she said.

“The clubs have been offered a five year lease while we work through the various complexities of this situation.”

Other clubs in the area also operating on expired leases include Menzshed, Gisborne Harrier Club and Surf City Rod and Custom Club.

The council said the clubs had been met with and offered five year leases.