By NOEL MURPHY
GEELONG Trades Hall has lashed out at mayoral aspirant Ken Jarvis’ call to resurrect a controversially proposed water sports complex on Belmont Common.
The proposal was hotly-contested more than a decade ago, with the community, politicians and councillors divided over the push for an international-standard rowing course.
The former Kennett government wanted to build the 2000-metre course on flood plains beside the Barwon River at a cost of $9.4 million.
Geelong Trades Hall Council secretary Tim Gooden said Belmont Common and the river were off limits to developers.
He suggested an old cement works quarry at Fyansford as an alternative site.
“The industrialist didn’t clean it up or re-establish the site after mining, so it makes sense for an elite sport to pay to fix up the mess.
“Remember, most ratepayers and taxpayers don’t row.
“The Barwon River frontage is very utilised by the public and the Barwon Common is off limits to profiteering developers.”
Mr Gooden was also concerned about Mr Jarvis’s calls for additional development along the Barwon River and in Geelong’s waterfront precinct.
Mr Jarvis’s call for lower rates should not be at the expence of services to ratepayers, Mr Gooden said.
However, he generally supported some of Mr Jarvis’s other ideas, including taller buildings in the city centre, a world-class boulevard along Moorabool St, cut-price land sales to bolster Heales Rd’s industrial precinct, a major project for Geelong’s north and increased support for existing business.
Mr Jarvis said his aim was to improve “community opportunities”, generate jobs and enhance opinions of Geelong as “a vibrant, interesting region going somewhere”.
“However ideas are just ideas if you do not have the money to make them happen and so if we want these bigger plans to happen we need council to stop thinking along ward lines and to start thinking strategically about the needs of the whole of the City of Greater Geelong region.
“One major change that I would want to see is the removal of the $600,000 per ward councillor allowance and that this $7,200,000 thus saved be leveraged by combination with state and federal funding to achieve significant community developments and improvements.”
