Waitaki Mayor Gary Kircher said though the Waitaki District Council was confident it would receive at least the majority of the funding, it was ''a good step''.
''And we've still got two big funders to come.''
The planned $6million redevelopment of the 1882 Heritage New Zealand category 1 registered site to amalgamate the Forrester Gallery, North Otago Museum and Waitaki District Archive survived a council ''stop-go day'' in June when the council voted to allow the project team to access another $330,000 of the council-approved $1.9million for the project to further its design work.
The project received $1,064,500 from the lottery significant project fund earlier in the month, but missed out on an additional $3million in this year's funding rounds because the project team did not have the resources to produce the detailed designs the regional cultural and heritage fund and the lottery environment and heritage committee required.
But Mr Kircher said the council was confident it would be successful in its applications next year once the work had been done.
And if the project remained under the radar for some in the community, there was very good awareness from those ''particularly interested'' in galleries and museums about what was planned.
''I think there's a lot of people that are still not overly aware of the project. It's not been an easy one ... we have had some images to show people, but we haven't got all of the plans done - we haven't got how it's going to look inside, so we haven't got any imagery that might help promote the concept.''
The total funding raised for the project is now $3,675,000.
In a statement this week, Otago Community Trust chief executive Barbara Bridger said trustees were impressed with ''the thought and consideration that has been advanced to preserve the important heritage of the Waitaki region''.
The redeveloped gallery would provide the Waitaki community with ''a contemporary facility to showcase collections'', she said.
The Otago Community Trust gave a total of $1,671,573 to 28 organisations in July, the statement read.
''Other donations across the Otago region included a $80,000 donation to the Lawrence Waitahuna Presbyterian Church to assist with the cost of renovating and extending the church facilities; $70,000 donation to Otakou Health Services Ltd to support the purchase of medical equipment and furniture for their new low-cost health centre; $25,000 to Oamaru Squash & Badminton Club Inc to assist with the cost of re-roofing the club.''
