While Cr Tiley regretted the lack of information in the report on which councillors were expected to make their decision, he held the view that Evocities was a very well recognised brand and served Armidale well through its jobs advertising.

"In my view, for far too long [Armidale] council, rightly or wrongly, has carried the tag of being a 'do very little', conservative local government," he said.

"How can we hope to prosper as a region if we go into our shell yet further and disengage from a highly successful arrangement?"

Mayor Simon Murray said the fact that councillors did question the value of the services being provided reflected the true situation.

"If we want to go back we may look at that. It will be up to a future council if it wants to do that, and that will depend largely on what we do in place of Evocities," he said.

"It may turn out that we advertise and promote this region more successfully than what we've done with Evocities.

"We've got no measure of how well Evocities has done for us. We have got no good record of how many people have come to Armidale because of Evocities. That's the problem."

ALSO READ:

Cr Murray said he was unaware of a single person who had made the move to Armidale because of Evocities advertising.

Armidale council CEO Susan Law said this year's $80,000 set aside for Evocities would not necessarily be a saving for council.

"What we're saying is that what we spend on our membership could perhaps be better spent on other things that will help the economy of the Armidale Region grow," she said.

"We would be looking to spending it in those areas where we can draw a direct correlation between expenditure and regional growth.

"We're taking a slightly broader view of it, and we're working through some options and recommendations to take to the Regional Growth Advisory Committee's next meeting."