By Afraa Kori
Councillors wrapped up the year with their final meeting on December 16, where debates arose over the consideration of a roof replacement as part of the proposed facility redevelopment.
There were significant rain events in July 2024 which led to roof leaks at Cardinia Life and the Officer Community Hub, causing disruptions to community activities, including cancelled basketball games.
The leaks sparked widespread concern, leading to an online petition with over 1,000 signatures.
Following community complaints regarding roof leaks at Cardinia Life, Councillor Stephanie Davies requested at the 19 August 2024 Council meeting, through a question to the CEO, for a report to be tabled providing detail on the investigation into the roof leaks at Cardinia Life and Officer Community Hub, including the proposal of medium to long term solutions.
At Cardinia Life, urgent maintenance works were carried out on the basketball stadium roof, including resealing gutters, silicone joins, and penetrations, as well as replacing 6,000 rusted screws to prevent further leaks.
Re-sealing and whirlybird replacement was also undertaken at Officer Community Hub.
Regular inspections and preventative measures will be carried out at Cardinia Life and Officer Community Hub.
While Council acknowledges the need for ongoing maintenance, it has determined that a full roof replacement estimated at $600,000 for the Cardinia Life basketball stadium is unnecessary at this stage.
Ranges Ward Cr David Nickell voted against the motion due to concerns about the financial implications and prioritization of resources.
“Council has been briefed on the full three stage vision for Cardinia Life. The numbers around $10 million as our first tip-in amount might give everyone pause for thought… the amounts we need to tip in for Stage Two and Stage Three make this truly an eye-watering proposition for a council in our financial position.”
“The amount that we have to tip in just for this Stage One gets us what? Four basketball courts, part of a car park, some stadium seating, and a gymnasium for $10 million.
“What does the rest of the shire go without for that $10 million? We’ve got hundreds of kilometres of unmade roads, communities with limited access to footpaths, unmade gutters and open table drain gutters. Every major rainfall event, we see households flooding. We’ve got huge levels of risk distributed throughout the shire in terms of trees and a huge backlog of arborist work that needs urgent attention before the next storm. We ourselves are a very geographically dispersed community so we have high levels of risk to all sorts of unpredictable but almost certain events from storm through to flood we need contingency capability.”
Mayor Jack Kowarzik voted to approve the funding for the Cardinia Life project, recognizing the need for a full roof replacement.
“We’ll be waiting with bated breath to hear in the coming months if we’ve been successful with this application.”
“I think we’re making genuine community needs and advocacy from right across the shire with this project. I hear it from people in the hills and from people down south as well. It’s certainly not just a central Pakenham or officer facility.”
Beacon Hills Ward Cr Brett Owen hopes the state government will provide additional funding so the council can make essential improvements, including a full roof replacement, benefiting the entire community.
“This report does detail how complex this issue is and I’m pleased that council officers are responding and addressing these concerns. A full re-roof of the existing structure is not recommended at this time. We did talk about this issue at the previous item and if council is successful in receiving that 45 million from the federal government, part of the proposed works is the full re-roofing of the Cardinia Life basketball stadium. This facility is for all of Cardinia, I know that well. People in my ward up north use this facility as well so it’s really important.”
