A 50-year lease for a bowling club and rumours of a brewery have sparked heated debate in Melville council, 15 months after a wave park was shelved.
A 50-year lease for a bowling club and rumours of a brewery have sparked heated debate in Melville council, 15 months after a wave park was shelved.
At a July meeting, the City of Melville granted the Melville Bowling Club a 50-year lease on its Alfred Cove property.
The club was not asked to pay rent under the lease, just a $681 annual administration fee.
But 159 residents have signed a petition asking for the deal to be reviewed.
The council discussed the issue last Tuesday and was unable to come to a resolution. It is expected to continue the debate this evening.
The waterfront bowling club property was once earmarked for a $10 million wave park development, which met with fierce community opposition.
Business News has sighted an email from Melville Mayor George Gear to the chief executive and councillors about draft plans for a brewery, which had been drawn up by a member of the club who was an architect.
Mr Gear wrote in the email that he had received the plans and delivered them to the CEO by hand. The plans were later leaked.
He told Business News that there were no serious plans for the brewery, however.
“I’m not pushing [a brewery] at all,” Mr Gear said.
“It's not even a serious consideration … it will never happen.”
He said any brewery would need to go through the council for approval, and he intended for a community hub to be built at the site, with offices for local community groups.
Member for Riverton and former WA treasurer, Mike Nahan, told Business News he had heard there had been talk among bowling club members about a brewery plan.
“They were pretty aghast, turning a bowling club into a brewery,” Dr Nahan said.
He said residents had voted against a commercial development at the site last year at the city council’s elections.
If a brewery was built, Dr Nahan said, the club would benefit from the revenue with minimal flow through to the council, because of the lease arrangement.
He said there were concerns other bowling clubs were also missing out on investment opportunities with the city focusing on the Melville Bowling Club.
While the council had previously planned to amalgamate the club with a nearby organisation in Mount Pleasant, the Mt Pleasant club was missing out under the new proposal, Dr Nahan said.
Lease battle
City of Melville councillor Matthew Woodall said the decision to grant a new lease to the Melville Bowling Club was highly unusual.
Mr Woodall said other sporting clubs based in the City of Melville may now seek very long leases, raising issues of fairness and equity.
“The main reason I am against 50 years is because it is such a lengthy period of time,” he said.
“We do not know what the demographic and the sporting trends of the city will be in 50 years.
“The big risk for the community is that bowls become less popular, there are fewer bowlers and the club is less sustainable, but the club still has this 50-year lease.
“This is a problem in my view because it locks up that land with a small private club instead of allowing the community to make use of the land for whatever purpose the community would like to see it for.
“The council should really be the organisation in charge of managing the community's land in the long run for the best interest of the community.
“It’s not really a valid argument to say that a private, member-only club is representative of the city of Melville as a whole, because it’s not.”
However, Mr Gear has been an advocate for the 50-year lease, arguing the club operates as a de facto community centre.
“At least 20 clubs use it unofficially as their home base, it's where the people go when they want to celebrate, it’s not just a bowls club, it’s much more than that," he said.
“Basically, we are giving the lease to ourselves, it is the council giving the Melville community a 50-year lease.”
Former City of Melville mayor Russell Aubrey has also been critical of the lease deal.
“The decision should be rescinded now before the final decision is made (on Tuesday) and if it is not rescinded and the lease is signed, I believe it would be an unlawful decision and would have to go to the Supreme Court to have it reversed," Mr Aubrey said.
“It should be a five-year lease with a five-year extension as this club has done nothing to show that it deserves a warrant beyond 10 years.
“It is one of the weakest clubs in the city, it’s not doing well financially.
“There is nothing about it to indicate that this is a good community club that is there for the benefit of the wider community, it is just a club making a grab at ratepayers' funds."
