Anglesea to keep land sale cash

Jane Emerick
Surf Coast councillors have given Anglesea first dibs on a $475,000 sale of shire-owned land despite warnings from the shire’s chief executive officer.
Cr Libby Mears convinced the majority of her colleagues at a meeting this week to vote for spending all the money from the sale of 3 McMillian Street on a master plan for Anglesea.
But chief executive officer Peter Bollen advised council to use the cash on building “new assets in the shire” or paying off debt.
He said previous councils that allocated funds to particular projects had regretted it later.
Torquay councillor Ron Humphrey said the motion was a case of “what’s yours is mine and what’s mine keep off”.
“For the Anglesea River bank plan at least more than half of the money was collected from Torquay,” he said.
“Shire-wide contributions from all ratepayers, not just from Anglesea, will pay for the master plan, so why all of a sudden this money has to stay in Anglesea?”