Only 450 people replied to RCoW Survey

Action group attacks survey’s legitimacy
BY DI THOMAS

WANGARATTA residents fighting against the demolition of the city’s town hall to make way for a new performing arts centre have questioned the legitimacy of a survey that found 47 per cent of respondents in support of the project.

A spokesman for the Save the Memorial Town Hall group, Bill O’Callaghan, compared the results of the response by 450 ratepayers with a petition opposed to the hall’s demolition and signed by 5700 people over a fortnight.

“The response to the petition represents 21.3 per cent of the entire population,” Mr O’Callaghan said.

“Of those people approached, three-quarters of them signed the petition.

“It was indicative of the fact that people of Wangaratta and district do not want the demolition of the town hall.”

Mr O’Callaghan said by comparison the survey result was questionable since the question referred only to the building of a new performing arts centre and not to the demolition of the existing hall.

“Forty-seven per cent of those were in favour of the new performing arts centre and that equates to 211 and a half people or 0.78 of 1 per cent of the population,” he said.

“On that basis the council intends to demolish the town hall.”

Cr Justin Scholz was the only one of seven councillors who stood against the town hall’s demolition at the council meeting on Tuesday.

Cr Scholz said he was very much in support of the new facility and thought it should be constructed, but the town hall need not be demolished to do so.

He told Tuesday’s meeting that members of the community were not aware the town hall was being considered for demolition until a few days before the council adopted a demolition proposal.

“As councillors we were only told of the demolition option seven days in advance of the meeting where the demolition proposal was adopted,” Cr Scholz said.

“For me, this lack of time for the community to consider the options and engage in debate undermines what community representation is about.”

Yesterday, Cr Scholz said the decision had now been made by council.

“The community has articulated its concerns in relation to the existing hall, but for whatever reason the council has decided not to heed that view,” he said.