Caetani Cultural Centre Receives Major Funding from Cultural Spaces

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Caetani Centre

The Caetani Cultural Centre announced they have received notification from the Minister of Canadian Heritage of a successful funding application in the amount of $75,000. The funding comes through the Department of Canadian Heritage Cultural Spaces Fund.

Board president Angelika Jaeger stated “We have always believed that the significance of the Caetani family, their unique and heartbreaking story, and especially the legacy of the artworks and writings of Sveva Caetani are of great importance to this area.

This commitment from the Federal government validates what we have been working so hard towards. This project is of huge significance to this community and opens up wider arts programming and cultural heritage tourism opportunities. It’s also bringing our tax dollars back into this region.”

Susan Brandoli, executive director for the Caetani Centre, said “This grant from the Federal government will go a long way towards our goal of opening up the house to public access. The project in total is about $225,000, and includes improvements to the structure of the house, upgrading the HVAC and electrical systems, and most importantly, the installation of a fire suppression system.

The sprinkler system installation is the missing key we have been seeking in order to open up the house to public access. Without this, our hands were tied for future development into a significant cultural and heritage site. It will allow us to also to accommodate and expand our public arts programming and events through the development of an additional presentation space for this community.”

The City of Vernon and the Regional District of the North Okanagan have contributed over the years to upgrading and maintaining the 120+ year old heritage house, located on 1.5 park-like acres on Pleasant Valley Road. The investment by local governments has gone a long way towards attaining matching funding from higher levels of government. Thanks to good timing in 2016 with the major infrastructure upgrade project on Pleasant Valley Road, and the construction of the new traffic calming circle on 35^th Avenue directly in front of the Caetani Centre, they were able to capitalize on this opportunity to replace aging water and sewer lines, and additional infrastructure upgrades on the adjacent Caetani site.

“We are so very grateful to all levels of government for believing in our project, and listening to our future plans for the Caetani Centre. This proves that great things can happen in this community when we all work together to achieve our goals,” said Brandoli.

It has been over 20 years since Sveva Caetani, beloved teacher, mentor, artist and writer, passed away in 1994, leaving the house and grounds to the City of Vernon for use a cultural centre. The Caetani Cultural Centre Society was formed as a separate society in 2008 to directly focus on seeing the bequest fully realized, and many individuals and volunteers have worked tirelessly over the years towards this goal.

Thanks to this recent funding commitment from Canadian Heritage Cultural Spaces Fund, the Caetani Centre now has confirmed funding of $177,000 in total of the $225,000 goal.

“We still have about $50,000 to raise in order to complete our remaining project funding goal. However, we are confident that we can raise the remaining amount in 2017,” said Brandoli. “Additional funding applications are in the works, and the Society will once again be going ahead with its popular Splash of Red fundraiser on August 24.

“The success of our organization is a direct result of support from local artists, business and corporate sponsors, volunteers, partnerships with other organizations, and also the local community who have stuck with us over the years. Partial funding of this enormous project has also come from the annual Splash of Red event. We can’t thank all these people enough.”

2017 marks the 100^th anniversary of the birthday of Sveva Caetani as well as Canada’s 150^th birthday. It will be a year of celebrations!

“I think Sveva is smiling down on us today” said Jaeger.

Source: Caetani Cultural Centre