As stated previously here, I just don't get this fundraising drive for the new pool.
For those who came in late...
Council decides to the demolish a perfectly good 50 metre pool because it has leaks and the filter system is inadequate.
Instead of just fixing the leaks and the filter system, it decides to spend $4m on a new one, which will be half the size (25 metres).
We have no pool over summer because, we are told, work on the new pool has to be done during those dry months because it is impossible to build a new pool during winter. Work on the new pool does not commence until April and is now being carried out during winter.
We then learn that more money - $160,000 - is needed to "fit out" the pool. A public fundraising campaign is launched.
Greenbushes miner Talison, which is managed by councillor Pat Scallan, announces it will put in $100,000 and match any other donations $1 for $1.
Now, in today's paper we see that Holden dealer Kordics has donated a small car as a raffle prize. There are 300 raffle tickets selling for $100 each. Sell those tickets and you have raised $30,000. Matched dollar for dollar by Talison, you then have $60,000 and the $160,000 target has been reached.
So why all the fuss about a community fundraising drive? Its all been taken care of with a couple of large business donations.
And in the paper today, Cr Scallan offers the comforting angle that this community fundraising will keep the rates down.
Yet every year he and the other councillors agree to spend tens of thousands of dollars of ratepayers money on community grants to organisations such as St Johns Ambulance and the Agricultural Society, which are quite capable of doing their own community fundraising.
As I said, I don't get it.
