Oval precinct funding wins approval
Multi-million-dollar redevelopment of a Horsham City Oval-sawyer Park precinct has gained momentum, with councillors endorsing a funding plan for the proposal.
Horsham Rural City Council agreed, at a meeting on Monday night, albeit in a drawn-out split vote, to push ahead in exploring state and federal government funding opportunities for a $12.8-million first stage of the project.
The decision meant the council, if it had success in its funding applications, would reduce its $6.4-million co-contribution for the project to $3.6-million.
Horsham mayor Robyn Gulline had to use her casting vote to pass a 10-point motion involving a funding-application process and how the council would match funding it received.
The first stage of the City OvalSawyer Park precinct redevelopment includes community facilities which incorporate Afl-standard change rooms, netball facilities, including two netball courts, flood lighting, change rooms and spectator areas and works to develop event-promoting infrastructure.
The council, at a November 22 meeting last year, endorsed a concept plan for the redevelopment and agreed to seek state and federal government funding. It also asked that any funding applications and financial implications based on co-funding return to the chamber for discussion.
A recommendation from Communities and Place director Kevin O’brien on Monday night involved the council approving an allocation of $2,856,792 in Federal Government Roads and Community Infrastructure funding and finding a matching $1,856,792 for netball facilities and $1-million for ‘event activation’ works.
It also noted the council had already applied for $2-million for the event activation project from Regional Development Victoria’s Regional Tourism Investment Fund and asked for a go-ahead to apply to Sport and Recreation Victoria for $800,000 for netball-facility work.
Pending
The recommendation also included applying to the Federal Government’s Building Better Regions Fund for $6.4-million to complete all of stageone of the project.
Mr O’brien’s recommendation noted that projects could only proceed if funding applications were successful. If they were successful, the council would fund its co-contribution through borrowings and inclusion in a capital-spending budget across 20222023 and 2023-2024.
Crs Les Power, David Bowe and Gulline voted to proceed with the recommendation and Crs Di Bell, who asked that points in the recommendation be dealt with independently, Ian Ross and Claudia Haenel were opposed. Cr Penny Flynn was absent from the meeting.
Councillors opposed to immediately pushing ahead involved anxiety surrounding whether alternative arrangements for city oval tenants were in place and uncertainty in schematic designs and how that would impact on funding.
Cr Ross: “I’m not against the project. But I am concerned about the planning and the way it’s going. I have not seen any cost-benefit analysis and with schematic designs not complete how can we have effective costings?”
But Cr Power was adamant the council should strongly push ahead with the funding plan.
“We need these applications to go in to enable us to get facilities with the least amount of money provided by the residents of Horsham and surrounding communities,” he said.
Cr Bell: “I understand value of leveraging and that it’s the only way to achieve big projects. But I’m here to represent community locally and equally. Yet all the funding seems to be directed to City to River project.”
The council went through each of the 10 recommendation points individually, with each motion tied and requiring a casting vote to pass.