Tauranga City Council is launching a new fund to celebrate Māori culture in the city.

The Kaupapa Māori Legacy Event Fund will reopen this Friday, July 1.

It provides support to recurring events that celebrate tangata whenua, promote tikanga Māori, and raise awareness of historical and culturally significant events in Tauranga Moana.

The focus of the fund is to support hapū and iwi to elevate and share their culture, and provide opportunities for the community to connect with the Māori culture and grow their knowledge basket.

"As knowledge holders, cultural owners and kaitiaki of mātauranga Māori, these events provide the community with the opportunity to be part of the culture and to learn," says a statement from Tauranga City Council.

In this year's Matariki celebrations, the fund supported the Matariki ki Mauao Festival which provided a series of events and workshops to schools and the community.

This included Te Matahi o Te Tau ki Tauranga Moana where master navigator Jack Thatcher continued his near 30-year tradition of walking to the top of Mauao for the first observations of the Matariki star cluster.

To be eligible for funding one of the key criteria is the event must be driven or partnered with iwi and/or hapū of Tauranga Moana.

Tauranga City Council Strategic Māori engagement manager Carlo Ellis says 'promoting partnerships with our iwi and hapū is crucial”.

'We want to bring their aspirations to the fore and help their stories be told; the Kaupapa Māori Legacy Event Fund is just one of the ways we can do this.”

The Kaupapa Māori Legacy Event Fund was first initiated by Tauranga City Council and TECT back in 2019 and this year BayTrust joins in as a partner.

"BayTrust is excited to be offered an opportunity to be a part of the Kaupapa Māori Legacy Event Fund,” says BayTrust chief executive Alastair Rhodes.

'We're pleased to be collaborating with other local funders to better serve groups running Te Ao Māori events within Tauranga and we're looking forward to seeing the collective benefit for our communities we serve."

The fund amount is $90,000 and will be allocated in rounds with a maximum grant amount of $15,000.

'While the fund supported a number of events since its inception, the impacts of Covid-19 and its restrictions saw many events not being able to go ahead,” says TECT Community impact manager Paula Hudson.

'This is an important fund to provide grants to events that celebrate our local Māori culture, and we are looking forward to supporting more events now that we've increased the funding pool.”

Tauranga City Council encourages those who wish to apply for the Kaupapa Māori Legacy Event Fund to contact Te Pou Takawaenga at kaupapafund@tauranga.govt.nz to discuss their application.

More information about the fund can be found online here.