PUBLIC pools must be retained in small communities, writes Miranda reader ROSE DARLING
Mount Alexander Shire, like many small rural shires, struggles with steering a path between financial sustainability and delivering services and facilities to its residents.
It is tempting, when the largest centre is in the geographic centre of the shire, to rationalise facilities there.
This thinking has been applied to plans for an aquatic centre in Castlemaine.
Advice to council is to close three of the five outdoor swimming pools - Harcourt, Chewton and Castlemaine - so that patronage and spending can be "pooled" in a $14 million centre with one 25-metre heated indoor pool.
Recently the Victorian Government released its plan to attract people to regional Victoria.
Young families already populate the villages and townships in Mount Alexander Shire, encouraged by affordable housing, jobs and reasonable commuting times to Melbourne.
The townships of Harcourt and Chewton, supported by residents across the shire, have opposed the plan and have been campaigning since March to save their local pools.
Why should our community assets be eroded?
Our pools provide learn-to-swim classes for our schools, a place for families to meet, for teenagers to hang out in the summer and a great relief from the heat in central Victoria.
They were provided by local communities fundraising for years to provide a safe place for young ones, as one pool volunteer from Chewton has observed.
Commenting on the local pool in Harcourt, the Harcourt 2020 committee has big plans for the local pool: "We want to establish tourism facilities that are focused on our pool. It is a great magnet for families and travelling visitors in summer".
Recently, a shire-wide rally was held at Western Oval in Castlemaine, slated as the location of the proposed aquatic centre.
Chewton people marched to Castlemaine led by a Lady Godiva lookalike.
Harcourt people marched in from the northern end of Castlemaine.
Other groups representing Castlemaine and across the Shire converged.
The rally challenged the mayor and councillors to save money and the chant was "only fools close pool".
Several councillors spoke and listened to people's views about village life, energy costs, time and cost of travel, as well as safe, healthy places for children to learn to swim, relief from heat in outdoor settings and the need for a different approach to recognising the aspirations of smaller towns.
The rally underlines the need for those of us who choose the great lifestyle of country villages to value and protect what we have and to be prepared to fight for it.
Rose Darling, address supplied
