One of Ballarat's most important arts events has taken yet another blow, with two of Royal South Streets biggest competitions reduced to regional competitors only due to the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak.
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With four events already cancelled and one contested online, Royal South Street's popular dance and calisthenics competitions will be restricted to entrants from regional Victoria, cutting their numbers by more than half.
Meanwhile, other competitions, such as the Herald Sun Aria, the Victorian brass band championships and Chopin piano competition, have been pushed back right through to the end of November in the hope they will be able take place in a less restricted environment.
Losing Melbourne entrants to the dance and calisthenics competitions is another hit to Ballarat businesses that welcome the annual boost from hundreds of competitors and parents visiting the city for a weekend.
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Royal South Street chair Peter Zala said the main impetus for carrying on was coming from the competitors themselves, many of whom have not been able to take to the stage for 18 months or more, but everything depended on the restrictions in place at the time and further postponements beyond November were not possible.
"This is where a lot of our impetus is coming from, to hang in there for them, and if we can, that will have a bit of a rub off on the Ballarat economy which has been doing it hard and tough," he said.
"We keep putting it back and we're back to operating right through November at multiple venues so that we can operate concurrently, but it depends on the prevailing COVID restrictions at the time.
"That sees the end of it. It's just too much time, effort, trouble and cost. We are, at the end of the day, a not for profit organisation, community-based, so there's a limit to our resources."
City of Ballarat Mayor Daniel Moloney said Royal South Street was one of Ballarat's best 'bang for buck' events.
"Royal South Street and the Queen's birthday long weekend basketball are the two big spikes we get every year and we've missed them both, unfortunately," he said.
"It just continues to be a compounding challenge for so many of our businesses that depend on the visitation because most of it is from Melbourne and some from interstate.
"The concern we've got now is that with it being an event people go-to every year that we're now going to experience two years of Melburnians not being able to make it to the South Street eisteddfod, then we'll all need to work hard to encourage them back again."
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