KEY POINTS:
Pasifika Festival's opening ceremony is back on the agenda.
The Pacific Island Board Auckland City has decided to fund the Friday event - the opening night for the annual two-day festival in March - after the Auckland City Council moved to scale this year's event down because of a shortfall in funding.
Board chairman Bruce McCarthy says maintaining the full event was a must to keep the festival alive for future generations.
"If we don't respond to this then there's a real risk of us losing the Pasifika Festival altogether," he said.
Pasifika - which has been running at Western Springs Reserve since 1992 - draws around 230,000 people a year.
With major sponsors pulling out of this year's festival, the council was forced to cancel the Friday ceremony because a shortfall of $355,000 meant the $130,000 needed for the opening night could not be provided.
But Mr McCarthy said that was "a hell of a lot of money" for an opening ceremony.
"With $130,000 I'd like to see caviar [and] champagne. We've had a lot of people put their hands up to help us achieve this. We're going to achieve this by the help from the community, not $130,000."
