Tamworth council to spend half-a-million on rent for Leader building for 70 staff after Ray Walsh House closed

And the council has an option to occupy the building for as long as five years, if repairs to asbestos-contaminated Ray Walsh House run into delays.

According to the lease agreement signed by Tamworth Regional Council, the first year of rent for the building has been set at $236,776 for next year, the Leader understands.

The cost of renting the Leader building had previously been confidential. The refit costs remain confidential, but are expected to be revealed publicly in advance of next Tuesday's council meeting.

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The building will cost $177,582 to rent this year.

The Leader understands the council's lease period for the building will kick in on October 1 this year and the lease agreement covers until 2025. Council also has options to rent the building for two more years, if needed.

The council has been forced to relocate hundreds of staff that work in Ray Walsh House until asbestos in the half-a-century old brutalist-style structure can be remediated. About one quarter of council's staff will be housed at the Leader building.

Mayor Russell Webb told the Leader that the two-year option was a safety measure in case refurbishment of the old Ray Walsh House building is delayed.

He said it's not likely that the refurbishment will take longer than three years, but it's a sensible "security measure" just in case.

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"As a protection we've taken a two-year option in our favour - so we can take it or not take it - with the understanding that what's happening in the construction industry at the moment, and there's no sign of it letting up, there could be supply chain issues and there could be extensions to the time to get that building fully complete," he said.

"What we don't want to do is leave ourselves in the situation where the three years is up and we're still sitting there with nowhere to go. With that two-year option it gives us quite a bit of breathing space if things don't go according to plan. The unexpected often happens."

He speculated that council staff might occupy the Leader building by the end of September or October, but said the actual moving date is still up in the air.

The Leader building is only big enough to accommodate between 65 and 70 of the Tamworth council's 278-strong workforce, according to a council spokesperson.

Other council staff will be relocated to offices elsewhere in Tamworth, and the organisation has done its best to fit as many as it could in facilities it owns to cut down on rents, she said.

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The four-storey ex-newspaper building will house the council's most senior staff including directors, the general manager and mayor, plus regional services and communications staff.

Staff will be spread across levels 2, 3 and 4 of the building at 179 Marius Street.

Council last month approved its own development application to spend hundreds of thousands refitting the council-owned Parry Building, on Peel Street. It allocated $242,000 for building refurbishment in July.

It's not yet known what will happen to Ray Walsh House. Any decision on the building's future will need to go before a council meeting.

The asbestos problem arose when Tamworth council made a decision to replace the heating and cooling systems in the structure, requiring the removal of a false ceiling which had separated the dangerous material from employees and visitors to the building.

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