July 13th, 2026Your Say…

I wish to respond to your article in the June 29, 2026 edition headed: ‘HSC: No geese, no Rex and now no indoor pool’.

In your article you state re consultancy/study costs: “A spokesperson said the council had spent in the order of $70,000 over three financial years which included the original scope and some additional investigation”.
I suspect the figure is far more substantial than this. The Aquatics Strategy cost $80k ($50k council & $30k state government). This strategy fed into Indoor Aquatic Feasibility & Business Case study.
In the 2022-2023 Budget I understand there was an allocation of $160k to undertake ‘The Indoor Aquatics Feasibility/Business Case Study’. It is unclear how much of all this is related to consultant fees. On top of this, have there been other related costs?
At the June meeting of council, the outcome of the long-awaited feasibility study was finally released. It concluded what many of us already knew – the fact that an Indoor Aquatic Centre for Hepburn Shire was financially not viable. This is the same conclusion of an earlier study undertaken in years gone by.
Council officers wisely recommended that council cease the pursuit of such a facility because it would be too costly to construct, too costly to operate and the unlikelihood of receiving the required funding.
But despite this, councillors, led by Cr Lesley Hewitt, chose to override this sensible advice and instead decided to keep the unlikely prospect of an Indoor Aquatic Centre alive.
It is worth noting a public question was tabled at the meeting in relation to option ‘D’ (a completely new indoor aquatic facility to a minimum service level) of the Feasibility Study. The question related to the funding allocated in the 2026-2027 budget for outdoor pools and queried the possibility of it being redirected towards option ‘D’.
The following was part of the answer provided by the Deputy Mayor Cr Shirley Cornish, as recorded in the minutes. “… If these funds were to be reallocated to financing an alternative project (such as an aquatics facility as outlined in option D) it would require the closure of all three existing outdoor pools and the Creswick Splash Park…”
In this latest budget, council has allocated $45k for the establishment of the community panel referred to in your article. It will focus on the financially feasible and responsible options for aquatic service provision.
Yet the costly recent feasibility report has concluded that an indoor aquatic facility is financially not feasible.
Any glimmer of possibility would require an outlandish financial commitment from council in future budgets for many years to come. And concerningly, the closure of all our outdoor pools to fund it.
Despite all of this, it seems, the proposed Community Aquatics Panel will be permitted to waste time and money continuing to discuss the pursuit of an Indoor Aquatic Centre. It does not make rational or responsible sense.
Members of this panel will likely include representation from influential organisations such as the Daylesford Indoor Aquatic Centre (DIAC).
It was time at the June meeting to ‘pull the plug’ on this ‘pie in the sky’ project, regardless of how well intended and desirable it might be. Like the $20m plus Daylesford Town Hall project, councillors have chosen to keep on giving false hope and wasting valuable time and public money. It beggars belief.
– Heather Mutimer, Musk