I would like the opportunity to expand upon some matters raised in Reg Brody's letter of 26th. Reg has hit the nail cleanly on the head; TRC has never actively planned adequate maintenance for any established assets.
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Successive council's fall over themselves to produce new so-called "infrastructure" (read:white elephants), at the cost of setting aside adequate funds to maintain existing buildings, parks, etc. By way of illustration; successive councils put absolutely no maintenance dollars into the Guy Kable Building (the old Library on Marius Street) to the point that staff prepared a report that said the building was beyond repair......check out that same building nearly 20 years later under the care and occupation of a well-known local legal firm.
Illustration number two; the Bicentennial toilet block needs replacement according to staff. The toilets flush, the taps work, the sinks empty.....with a lick of paint and reattachment of the guttering which is falling off at the rear, and you have a solid, functioning public toilet block with years of life to go.
Walk further into the park (ignoring the collapsing vine covered walkway) to the old caretaker's cottage with its leaf-covered roof, just waiting for an airborne hoon's cigarette butt or match to catch fire, then turn and walk back to the park stage.
Not one single dollar has been spent on this facility since it was constructed. The wooden posts are rotten and crumbling, the alsynite at the rear of the stage is "holed", the roof is covered in moss and the odd brick is beginning to go missing. For the sake of a few hundred dollars being spent on maintenance, this stage could be usefully retained for years to come; but already the calls are mounting for council to build a newer, bigger, better stage on the western side of the park. At the very least TRC, cover-up or remove the multiple pieces of steel tubing that are jutting out of the paths before they penetrate some aging or youthful skull in the event of a fall on the uneven ground surrounding the stage.
My comment on the currently-exhibited Operational Plan is this: where is your comprehensive maintenance plan for existing assets, you must fund this before you create any new, extra liabilities for future councils to caretake.
Allan Joyce
West Tamworth
