The City of North Vancouver has produced $25,000 to help bail out Presentation House Theatre after the provincial government doubled back on a commitment to give the arts group gaming money.

The theatre will be approaching the District of North Vancouver for the same amount.

In his written report to city council, Ian Forsyth, director of The Arts Office, said Presentation House was facing major cuts to the upcoming season, and might even have to close.

"In 2009, the theatre lost its annual gaming grant of $38,000," Forsyth wrote. "The province's cuts were sudden and the theatre had little chance to adjust its budget or eliminate production costs in an effort to accommodate this shortfall in grants revenue."

The province said its slimmed-down arts budget would be focused on youth programming, so Presentation House applied for funding to support the North Shore High School Drama Festival.

"In June, the theatre received telephone confirmation that they had been approved for a $17,000 grant," Forsyth wrote. "In September, three months into the fiscal year, the B.C. Gaming Commission informed the theatre that their grant request had been denied."

Presentation House Theatre has now exhausted its line of credit and is $50,000 in the red.

"My question isn't how do you run a theatre that way," said Coun. Craig Keating, "it's how do you run a provincial government that way -- in which you're making promises of grants and then suddenly they've gone back. It's a bit of joke."

Coun. Mary Trentadue asked Forsyth what would happen if the district didn't also come to the table.

"They would have to look at some very significant cost-cutting," he said. "I hope they would still be able to make it work, but you would be looking at a very different Presentation House. It's a situation many B.C. arts groups find themselves in right now -- they just have to hunker down and wait."

"Have no illusions about this," said Coun. Bob Fearnley. "This is just another example of downloading from the provincial government to municipal government. I must tell you I had to think about this one. There's two directions we could go with this: we could reject it and protest what's happening to the arts community right now or we bite the bullet and fund it. That's where I came down, but I'm really unhappy to have to do it."

Councillors considered offering the money as an advance on future funding and making it conditional on the district matching the sum, but ultimately voted 5-1 to produce an unconditional emergency grant.

The lone vote against was Coun. Guy Heywood.

"It is really inconvenient to try to deal with this on an emergency basis, particularly when it means an increase of 50 per cent of our current commitment," he said. "I can't see this as a loan I would approve."

"This situation at Presentation House Theatre is largely not of their own doing. This is a result of provincial funding cutbacks, and I want to be very clear about that," said Mayor Darrell Mussatto. "If you remember back 10 years ago we justified all that increase in gaming in the province -- casinos and slot machines -- because we were going to have more money for arts and culture.

"Now they've come back and said 'We're not going to give you as much.'"

balldritt@nsnews.com