The Port Augusta City Council are planning to reduce the Cultural Centre - Yarta Purtli's opening hours from 6 days to only 2.5 days a week! The Council is also considering moving this Gallery by mid 2018 to some other location. This will mean that no large touring visual arts and international exhibitions will be showed any more as having the gallery open only 10 days a month will not attract the high quality exhibitions the communities in this part of South Australia have come to appreciate. This high quality space is under threat, and with it the arts communities of the Eyre Peninsula, Far West and Mid North. High standard exhibitions that need a high quality gallery space, such as the Malka Aboriginal Art Prize and the Arid Land Sculptural Festival is also under threat. The high investment in upgrading the gallery to its current standard, plus the beautiful Barracks space, will be closed and handed back to the state government to deteriorate like other old, abandoned buildings in Port Augusta. This will also mean that the Institute Theatre will be negatively impacted and shows cancelled as the theatre uses crucial facilities of the Cultural Centre such as dressing rooms. This decision is fuelled by a proposed saving of $76,000 (less relocation costs as those costs have not yet been determined). These decisions will effectively harm the arts in South Australia, and ultimately, the social and cultural wellbeing of the communities that appreciate and use this gallery space. Also consider the impact on tourism in Port Augusta and the businesses that thrive through tourism. Let us save Yarta Purtli!