Council defers future of Wodonga's historic racecourse grandstand

One councillor said the city "was in a pickle" over the contentious issue after rejecting Racing Wodonga's bid to demolish it in December, but then faced criticism over a projected $1.5 million cost to ratepayers to restore the 97-year-old structure, while another said too many historic buildings had been lost.

A recommendation to spend $150,000 to approve "preparatory and investigative works" to determine whether the building should be demolished or restored was thrown out on Monday night, with Wodonga mayor Ron Mildren concluding the debate by saying he was torn over the issue.

Councillors Danny Chamberlain and deputy mayor Libby Hall voted for the recommendation while Danny Lowe, Graeme Simpfendorfer, Olga Quilty, Kev Poulton and mayor Ron Mildren voted against.

Councillor Lowe said: "I'm sitting on the fence ... I'm for preserving historic buildings but struggling to justify spending the community's money on a project that has had that many facelifts that there's few parts that I believe have historic value.

"How best are we spending our community's money? To make right an original grandstand that won't be accessible to people in wheelchairs? I'm not even sure the staircases would meet code. Sometimes it costs more to rehabilitate something that can only be used by a small part of the community."

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Councillor Poulton agreed.

"I don't want to be the grinch that the historical society comes after, but I just can't see it ... there's better ways we can spend $1.5 million on our 43,000 people as a council," he said.

"When we think of the entire community, we're in a bit of a pickle there, but I think that by supporting that motion (to spend $150,000) is not going to give us an outcome tonight."

Cr Hall supported the recommendation.

"Wodonga has very little heritage buildings in our city ... in the past it's knocked them all down," she said. "I see the value, but ... you have to check things out and get things priced before you go forward with it, so I see that $150,000 as an investment to our community."

Cr Mildren said the building had been "modified significantly".

"Those modifications have significantly impacted on the value of the building as a heritage building - there is no doubt about that," he said. "It almost appears hypocritical if we're not returning the building to its total heritage situation."

Cr Mildren suggested deferring the matter, a motion which was carried unanimously.

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