Update on Progress - Let's Keep Going to Save the Astor!

It’s been an interesting few days with the SAVE THE ASTOR THEATRE campaign in Deal, Kent.

This week, East Kent Mercury published an article whereby Deal Town Council defended their complete lack of urgency to save the Astor Theatre.

It has taken over 4 months for Deal Town Council to arrange an emergency meeting to resolve the Astor’s cash crisis. Unfortunately, claims in this week’s paper have insisted that the theatre has already been awarded nearly £40k in grants and thus they seem to believe they’ve been generous enough.

We are putting the record straight.

Deal Town Council’s press statement had failed to mention that £30,000 of that was awarded in 2009 as part of a £125,000 cash injection to renovate the dilapidated building and reopen as a thriving community theatre.

Similarly, £7,620.13 was awarded to set up the Deal Community Radio studio, an NVQ Apprenticeship programme and other community projects. An additional, £2,000 was awarded in 2018 to subsidise and support a wide range of community activities at the Astor.

Other than these community project investments, the Astor has been built up to the flourishing theatre it is today from immense hard work from its Artistic Director, James Tillitt and his fantastic staff and volunteers.

We have been told the maximum grant we could apply for from Deal Town Council during this period is just £2,000 which is entirely insufficient for the scale of crisis the Astor is facing.

We need Deal Town Council’s full support during this pandemic. This is an unprecedented emergency and the onus will be on DTC if they do not choose to support this vital arts venue.

Things you can do to HELP US:

Sign the petition http://chng.it/5jbpkvMq

Donate on our Go Fund Me page https://uk.gofundme.com/f/save-the-astor

Write to local councillors https://www.deal.gov.uk/Deal-TC/councillors-13588.aspx