June 11, 2013
The South Burnett Regional Council will reconsider the idea of public swimming pool closures after receiving negative feedback from some South Burnett residents over the past few days.
Today SBRC Mayor Wayne Kratzmann told southburnett.com.au a proposal to close some of the region’s public pools to save money was now “off the table” for the Council’s upcoming Budget, which is due to be handed down early next month.
However, it could be revisited in future if Council’s finances don’t improve over the longer term.
“The range and type of services our Council should provide is a debate our communities need to have at some point,” the Mayor said.
“If we were forming a new council today – from scratch – how likely is it that we’d have seven public swimming pools or four visitor information centres or six libraries? I think most people could answer that for themselves.”
The Mayor said the current structure of SBRC services was a result of the way the Council was created by forcing four smaller councils together, not from common sense or sound business practices.
But he didn’t believe the current situation necessarily reflected the best use of the community’s resources, and said he was keen to see a public debate on this question in future.
“For example, our swimming pools cost $680,000 a year to operate,” he said.
“But for not much more than that, we could provide a public transport system that would let any resident travel from any part of the region to any other part of it for, say, $2.
“Do our residents want swimming pools or would they prefer a public transport system?
“Or look at Yallakool. At the moment it generates approximately $1 million a year for our region, and we use that money to cross-subsidise other council services like swimming pools.
“But what if we ploughed that money back into Yallakool for a few years so that the park wound up generating $10 million a year? Council could provide a lot of services with that sort of revenue stream. Would that be a better use of the South Burnett’s resouces?
“Again, I don’t know the answer to that. But it’s a debate our communities need to have amongst themselves.”
- Related article: SBRC Considers Pools Closures
