$16.25 MIL COMMUNITY CENTRE GREEN LIGHT

By Tim Howard

A contentious development that has divided the Yamba community will go ahead after Clarence Valley Council accepted a tender price of more than $16 million.

At the September 26 meeting the council voted to accept a tender from Bennett Construction of $16,256,053.00 for the demolition and construction of the Treelands Drive Community Centre and library.

Cr Bill Day had questions about the process of the council arriving at a decision to approve the development application. He asked the council general manager Laura Black to explain for the benefit of the community a document revealed through a community group’s GIPA request. The document, revealed to the Yamba Community Action Network, showed correspondence between the council and Department of Regional NSW in which the department revealed it had been willing to consider two different paths for the Treelands Drive centre.

They were: Option A the demolition and rebuild and Option B to refurbish the existing building.

Cr Karen Toms called a point of order on Cr Day’s question, saying the situation had been explained in a council workshop and it was not relevant to the meeting.

But the mayor, Cr Peter Johnstone, overruled her objection and asked Ms Black if she could answer the question.

She said she thought it would not be possible without all the documents showing the full trail of communications between the council and the government department.

Cr Day also asked why the council had presented the two options as viable alternatives to the community.

Ms Black said this had occurred during a period when the council believed the $11.1 million Bushfire Local Economic Recovery Grant which the centre had attracted could be transferred to the Regional Aquatic Centre project.

“The Option B that went to the community was a bare minimum project that did not need to meet the BLER funds because by that point in time council had resolved to transfer the funds,” she said.

“So the Option B was a totally council funded plan.”

Cr Toms said the journey to this point began in 2006 and it was disappointing some people did not understand how it got there.

She said the price increases for the project were largely down to the GST component being added to final figure, which meant the council needed to borrow more than $3 million to fund “a wonderful new building”.

Cr Toms said the email which showed the BLER funding could have been used to fund an alternative option was not a “smoking gun”. She said it was an option like any other option, but it might not have kept the BLER grant. She said the community centre needed to be rebuilt to provide the facilities a growing community like Yamba needed.

Cr Day was not as enthusiastic.

“I made it very clear that my question that I wanted to clarify the situation for the community and the community were not in attendance at that workshop,” he said.

“I believe the Yamba community deserve a new library, I believe the Yamba community deserve government grants and this is a substantial grant.

“I can count to five and I honestly believe this motion will go through, but I don’t feel we’ve been fully informed along the way and I’m going to vote against it.”

Cr Jeff Smith said this decision had been torturous and it went against his grain to approve the demolition of a building. But he said the community had saved the Wooli St Hall, which had been under threat during this process and the council could lose the grant funding if it failed to meet the deadline for completing the project. “There was a window there for a while, but that window’s long closed for any Option B,” he said.

Cr Greg Clancy was against the decision. He said the numbers were against him and the time scales.

But he said when Option B first surfaced there was time to prosecute it. He said if the council pursued an alternative option staff estimated the project would miss the funding deadline by 3.5 months.

Councillors voted 7-2 to approve the building.