Castles loses control of library review

Labor Councillor Margot Castles has lost control of a review into the plan to demolish the current Gosford Library when the new regional library opens next year.

Castles had called for a review at the November meeting and promised to come back to the December meeting to organise the make-up of the committee.

She put up a notice of motion that the committee consist of those councillors who showed their interest.

But the CEO had also put the matter into the December agenda as a follow-up item and Team Central Coast Councillor Kyla Daniels put up a motion suggesting only six councillors for the committee and naming herself and two Liberals, Trent McWaide as chair and Rachel Stanton as the first three of the six.

Councillor Jane Smith said professional courtesy should have allowed the original mover of the committee idea to lead the committee.

Councillor Kyle MacGregor asked how many people wanted to be on the committee and 11 councillors put their hands up.

Councillor Jarrod Wright said a smaller working group was more efficient.

MacGregor said the committee was shaping up as political and not in the community interest.

Smith asked a few questions and CEO David Farmer said that either way, it was going to be a multi, multi million dollar decision.

Castles said the company that originally built the library was still operating and had expertise on adaptive re-use.

Councillor Sharon Walsh said she was shocked and dismayed by how the item had been handled and she wanted her name removed from the list of possible additions to the committee as she now did not believe there would be any true working together on the issue.

The councillors voted 8-7 for the Daniels motion.

The eight consisted of the five Liberals and three Team Central Coast councillors and the seven were the five Labor and two independents.

The councillors then voted in Castles, Smith, and MacGregor to make up the six members of the committee.

It will meet in the library if space is available and report back to the council in March.

The committee will look at heritage value of the building, community opportunities for its ongoing use and environmental benefits of its preservation.

The CEO is to provide a summary on costs to bring the building up to current National Construction Code requirements including: disability access; ongoing maintenance costs; safety by design principles; heritage significance; and any other constraints.

Speaking after the meeting, Mayor Lawrie McKinna said he would not be drawn into commenting on some of the
financial issues surrounding keeping the library building for fear people might think he was in favour of demolition.

“I don’t want to paint the picture that it’s all doom and gloom but there would be certain costs involved with keeping the library building,” he said.

“Once Council has all the relevant pricing information a decision on the future of the library will be made.”

He said the panel of six councillors would sit on a review panel.

“Some councillors wanted to increase this number to 11 but you can have too many fingers in the pie,” he said.

“This panel comprises two Labor councillors, two Liberal councillors and two independents.”