Dear Councillor,
We, the undersigned, wish to register our stance as being opposed to the City Garden Project.
We are all under the age of 25 and live, work or are educated in Aberdeen. We are concerned about our generation’s future.
It’s very easy to say that the people of Aberdeen voted in favour of the City Garden Project. But they did not. They voted in favour of the Granite Web design. Over half of our age group did not even get a vote. And no one voted on the TIF scheme.
We are concerned that some councillors are in favour the £92m loan. In some areas of Aberdeen, one child in three is living in poverty. We have seen class sizes increase but the number of teachers decrease; cuts to the numbers of PSAs in Additional Support Needs departments; sixth years being forced to pay to travel in order to study certain subjects; social care budgets being cut; community centres struggling under changes to rules and many more vital services being pushed aside in the name of austerity.
Yet, we witness councillors pushing for a project that is largely unneeded and a financial plan that is unsound.
Even the £20m Art Gallery grant that is quoted does not exist. That means that the council could end up paying £20m for the project to go ahead. A school could be rebuilt for that sum of money.
And you have already been warned. The financial report shows multiple risks, like the 75% likelihood of grants not materialising.
It is too big a gamble for you to take and we fear that if you go ahead with the City Garden Project then you will put our generation’s future on the line.
Please do the right thing for the youth of the city and vote against the City Garden Project on the 22nd August.