The Beagle Editor,
The Fight for Batemans Bay 50m Pool team were out in force at the Village Centre this afternoon where they were busy handing out brochures and engaging with the community.
Pictured are locals Heather and Hans Sohlueter from Lilli Pilli with Team Save our 50m Pool members Maureen Searson, Coral Anderson and Peter Coggan.
Team member Peter Coggin said: "We have just wrapped up our Kiosk in Batemans Bay’s Village Centre . Distributed some 250 info leaflets re. Public Meeting on Thursday & the need to have people support it if they want to have a 50m pool in the new Aquatic Complex . "Council spokespersons confirmed that they would be inviting expressions of interest from architects as early as next week on the Design Stage Drawings for the proposed $46.3 million Mackay Park Complex . A 50 m pool is not an option in the brief to be issued . "Councillor Rob Pollock again stated that ,”Batemans Bay will never get a 50 m pool.Too expensive to construct and maintain & not financially viable. The old pool is just that worn out & too much has been spent on its maintenance in the last few years . It has to be replaced with a 25 m pool. Narooma has the 50 m pool for our Shire. Like hospitals we have to have towns offering different services eg. Batemans Bay Hospital does not have the space to expand so facilities are being upgraded at Moruya. I am happy to talk to anyone & I send my apologies & you can tell them at the meeting that this is my position .” "Mark Upson Council Director for Recreation Facilities was present & took part in the conversation . I asked if we could have costings for construction & running costs for the other 5 water bodies" "When they said the 50 m pool would displace some of the other water bodies I said, “ No the 50 pool will fit so why not issue that in your brief to architects next week ie. get comparative costings? “ "Mark Upson diplomatically responded ,“There are pros & cons for both a 25 m pool & a 50 m pool.” "Today we handed out about 250 brochures to the public regarding council’s push to demolish our 50m pool which, we are informed, is structurally sound despite council’s advice to the contrary. "We have been advised by a representative from the consultant company who provided the audit report to council that they cannot release the report without council permission.’ (Councillors - the Audio voicemail is available confirming this is available).
Council’s general manager yesterday told Peter Coggan that ‘it’s commercial in confidence and the consultants will not release it.’ Which appears to contradict what the consultant has advised saying "I can't see that there would be anything in the report that would be commercial in confidence. It would be our standard structural report".
Our Save the 50m Pool team hardly had time to sit down for the three hours while we were at the Village Centre. People came up to us saying, yes, we support what you are doing, we are coming to your meeting on Thursday @ the Soldiers Club.’
A visitor from the Blue Mountains remarked that the council up there wanted to do the same thing ie get rid of the 50m pool but people power forced the to back down under threat of administration. Save the 50m Pool Team
