Alma Doepel needs urgent funding

The Alma Doepel restoration project is under increasing financial pressure, with local corporations failing to put their support behind the initiative.

A fundraising event held onboard the Lady Cutler in June, and attended by local corporate stakeholders, has failed to attract any sponsorship.

A further $1.7 million is needed to finish the project and, with looming deadlines, the pressure is on to secure the required funding.

Owned by not-for-profit company Sale and Adventure Limited, the 110-year-old historical three-masted topsail schooner has been under restoration at Shed 2 in Docklands since 2009.

The ship is the last of its kind in Australia and is expected to become a key part of the Harbour Esplanade redevelopment.

While work hasn’t come to a standstill due to the current lack of funding, it has slowed down, according to restoration director Peter Harris.

He said volunteers were continuing to make progress but $800,000 was needed to get the ship back in the water and around $900,000 was needed to get the ship fitted out and rigged.

“The question is what happens if we don’t get the money for the skilled labour we need to put it together,” Mr Harris said.

“It just won’t be finished by those target dates and it will be exposed to more unfavourable weather.”

Professional shipwrights are required to help finish the project but currently the organisation does not have enough funds to hire any.

Mr Harris said plans to have the boat back in the water by Christmas seemed unlikely at this stage

“My preferred timetable would be that the ship doesn’t have to suffer another summer because, being a wooden ship, it dries out over summer,” Mr Harris said.

Exposure to the wind and sun causes the wood to shrink, which requires them to be replaced, resulting in the loss of pieces of original timber.

Compounding the issue is the fact that the team need to finish the job before Lend Lease, who has development rights over the Shed 2 site, requires the land.

“The longer it takes the more likely we are to run into the deadlines that are set externally by the Docklands developers, Lend Lease in particular, who are very kind to us and support us being in the shed here until they need it,” Mr Harris said.

Mr Harris said if required to move the project would relocate somewhere else with a suitable workshop, ideally within Victoria Harbour.

“If we have everything finished in two years I think we would be fairly safe, if it takes longer than we don’t know what will happen.”

Mr Harris said the City of Melbourne had been a great supporter of the project, while the restoration team itself had put in about $1.3 million worth of work, including 33,000 volunteer hours.

The council committed $300,000 to the project in 2012 and in June Lord Mayor Robert Doyle spoke at the fundraising event, calling on stakeholders to support the initiative.

“I have to say the support we’ve had from the City of Melbourne is fantastic, I couldn’t fault them in any way,” Mr Harris said.

“It’s that sort of support we anticipated when we brought the ship to Docklands.”

“We felt that the people in Docklands, both individuals and commercial organisations, would see that this a valuable project and would see that they will benefit from us activating the waterways and connecting various people to that community project and they would come forward and support it,” Mr Harris said.

Mr Harris said he wasn’t seeking one organisation to fund the remainder of the project but ten or 20 individual groups to contribute.

“What we’re asking is that other people join us in order to establish a valuable community asset, which will be in Victoria Harbour in Docklands.”