At the Council meeting on Monday 26th November there was a vote 5-4 to defer the decison to go ahead with the $10.5 million redevelopment until further consultation with the ratepayers between now and mid-February. Many people will be disappointed with this decision as they believe that a redeveloped art gallery will be a great assset for the city.
I was one of the 5 Councillors who voted to defer the decision and I was very disappointed to have to vote this way but I felt that there were some important issues. I have been a collector of art in various forms for many years and I know that the gallery will be good for Albury.
So why did I vote this way? The original decision reached by the last Council was to approve the redevelopment on the basis of tripartite funding of $3.5 million from Albury Council, Federal Government and State Government. On August 17th it was clear that the State Governement was unlikely to commit its share of the funds yet, with an election pending, the Mayor stated that the project would go ahead anyway and that she couldn't rule out extra borrowings. Between then and now little seems to have been done to look at alternative ways of funding the project other than using cash and reserves or borrowing more money.
The election came and 5 new Councillors were elected; surely an expression of dissatisfaction with the actions and decisions of the past Council.
At the meeting Councillors were under pressure to make a decision immediately in case we lost the Federal funding but no one could say what the deadline was for jepoardising this money and a report in today's Border Mail appears to show that there was not the urgency being portrayed.
So let's have a look at this issue of the state of Albury City's finances and its ability to put another $3.5 million into the project. Much is made of the debt service ratio being less than 10% which is viewed as good. This is true but it is not much below the magic number of 10%. It should be noted that Albury has had operating deficits for the last 4 years and is projected to have deficits for the next 3 years. This is not a comfortable position and will need good management over the next few years.
We have already had a special rate rise and this will continue for another 2 years so there are some serious financial issues to be faced.
What can we do to get the Art Gallery redevelopment in these circumstances? We need to to keep lobbying the State Gallery to give proper funding to an electorate that has overwhelmingly voted Liberal for some time now and support a worthwhile project and we need to actively seek other sources of funds rather than fall back on hte easy solution of taking it from Albury ratepayers.
Have your say both for and against by contacting your Councillors and letting them know how you feel.
