Narrogin Town Council has raised about $1 million through private means for a regional recreation complex. With a town based population of 4,700, and using a series of pledges and tax deductible donations, Narrogin has built a major recreational centre.
The fund raising only went part of the way. During the extensive feasibility phase, Council agreed that the facility could be funded and operated with three rate increases of five per cent. CEO, Gary O’Neil, said that regional inland towns must address the population drift to the metropolitan area and coastal strip.
“Council’s strategic plan aimed to do this by providing even better facilities than those available to our city counterparts,” he said. While the solution is clear, finding the funds was difficult.
“We did not use the traditional cake stall, but asked citizens and business to make pledges over the next four years,” he said. The Town of Narrogin could not achieve this on its own so Council formed partnerships with surrounding Local Government bodies.
“This helped ensure facilities can be jointly funded, are not duplicated and meet the needs of all stakeholders well into the future,” Gary O’Neil said.
Although the Narrogin Leisure Centre is not in itself new technology, the heated pool and wet synthetic hockey turf both use new technologies and are a first for Local Government in Western Australia.
The end result has been a new centre for the Narrogin community provided largely with private funding.
For more information contact Gary O’Neil on (08) 9881 1944.
