A resident advisory committee will be established to liaise with Council about the usability of Pyrmont Community Centre.
Following a City News report last month about resident concerns over “user pays” fees they said were unfair, 22 residents met with Council representatives at a special meeting last Friday with the outcome being the decision to establish the committee.
Independent councillor Marcelle Hoff, who chaired the meeting, said the meeting had been very positive.
“I think the community had some valuable input [and] I also think they heard information that was valuable to them,” she said.
“I personally am very pleased that I’m in a community that is as outspoken and proactive as the Pyrmont Community is … it would be wonderful if we could nurture these attitudes in people in all communities across our local government area.”
Resident Donald Denoon, 69, who raised the original concerns over the centre, said the meeting had been useful.
“Each side now understands the other’s position much better than it did before … and Councillor Hoff chaired it [the meeting] very effectively,” he said.
“What we are proposing to do … is create an interim committee of residents with a view to creating a broadly based representative group of residents.”
Mr Denoon outlined the purpose of the proposed committee.
“The purpose will be two-fold, one is to advise the community of what services are actually available through and in the centre … and the other thing will be to advise the centre on the evolving needs of the community around here,” he said.
“The advisory committee would also be able to help the centre management to formulate priorities for what are the most important things to be done in the centre, [as] at the moment it’s pretty much ad-hoc and first come, first served.”
In regard to the “exhaustive” application form for reduced user rates that City News reported on last month, Mr Denoon said that “we don’t have to answer all the questions.”
by Gareth Narunsky
