By NOEL MURPHY
A $100 MILLION waterfront student housing project and 1000 jobs for Geelong are on hold as Federal Government wrangles with a controversial assistance scheme.
Commercial & General wants to build 500 students units at the corner of Brougham and Cavendish St but has shelved the project until it can determine the level of assistance that might be available.
Student accommodation developers have increasingly utilised the $4.5 billion National Rental Assistance Scheme, initially meant for low-cost public housing when launched in 2007. The scheme has come under attack for diverging from its original purpose.
Commercial & General, working with Geelong’s Teleta Property group, is waiting anxiously as the Government reviews the program.
Teleta’s Ryan McGarigle said providing low-cost student housing in a student precinct beside Deakin University’s Waterfront campus would help free up rental accommodation across Geelong.
“The decision to build has basically been made and is sitting on the minister’s desk but it all comes down to finance,” Mr McGarigle told the Independent.
“We applied for 550 (units) and we could be sitting on that, or maybe just 100 or 200, but until it gets the financial tick, if there’s the money to spend, we can’t go ahead.
“A lot of jobs will fall over if doesn’t go ahead. You can only tie up a project like this for a reasonable time, not forever.”
The apartments would be available to the rental market at a 30 per cent discount if the project secured funding, Mr McGarigle said.
Commercial office and ground-floor retailing and car parking were also part of the plan.
Student housing is an important potential money-maker for Geelong’s embattled economy. In addition to the C&G/Teleta project, a $45 million, 10-building, also ostensibly for student accommodation also, is slated for nearby Brougham Place. Geelong estate agent Bob Gartland, who brokered the project’s sale to a Chinese consortium, said the group had no comment at this stage.
Deakin recently completed more than 300 new students units at Waurn Ponds, taking the campus’s stock to a total 794, with NRAS and state funding.
