Cobar Shire Council will sell a block of land in the CBD to the Cobar Senior Citizens Amenities Organisation Inc for $1 to build more units for the Brennan Centre.
Councillors discussed the motion to sell the block of land, owned by Council, at 1 Broomfield Street at Thursday’s Ordinary Council Meeting.
The block of land on the corner of Broomfield and Linsley streets once contained a Council staff house that was demolished in 2020 due to its poor condition.
Council’s general manager Peter Vlatko put forward the motion to the meeting after discussions with Brennan Centre Committee president Barry Knight.
“The Brennan Centre has approached the Council and spoke about their need to expand the accommodation they provide to our community,” Mr Vlatko told councillors.
He said the Brennan Centre committee desired the block of land due to its close proximity to the main street and shops, to build more units to house elderly residents.
Mr Knight said the Brennan Centre committee had originally planned to build more units over a road that connects two blocks of units at the Brennan Centre however there were too many services under the road, including a water main, a sewerage line near the boundary, optic fibre cable under the footpath and powerlines.
“We would have had to spend a lot of money before we started to build and it would have been restrictive as well,” Mr Knight explained.
When he met with Mr Vlatko, Mr Knight requested that Council consider gifting the block of land to the Brennan Centre to build more self-contained units to provide affordable housing for Cobar’s elderly residents.
The Bill Brennan Centre (Cobar Senior Citizens Amenities Organisation Inc) was founded in 1966 and, with the generosity of the Cobar community, they have built a meeting hall and 18 units in four stages.
Mr Vlatko said the committee has indicated their need to expand and build more units due to demand from the community.
Councillors were all in favour of gifting the land for the purpose of constructing more units for the Brennan Centre with Cr Bob Sinclair saying it was a “tremendous idea”.
“I can’t think of a better organisation in the Cobar community for it to go to,” Cr Sinclair said.
Cr Wayne Phillips said he initially had a concern that the community wouldn’t be protected in the event that the Brennan Centre committee was wound up and “there is an opportunity to sell it off”.
Cr Phillips said after speaking with the general manager and Brennan Centre committee president he was “fairly satisfied with the answers” he was given.
He said he hoped “the community does recognise that the council is a partner and has donated this land free of charge”.
Mr Knight said they were very happy with the decision of council.
“It shows they are willing to support our community,” Mr Knight said.
