There’s A Track Winding Back To An Old Fashioned Shack: Gundagai May Join Merger!

Councillors from Harden and Cootamundra Shire Councils unanimously agreed at a workshop in Harden on October 29 to go forward with a merger between Cootamundra and Harden Shire Councils. However, they did agree to leave the door open for the possible last minute involvement of Gundagai Shire Council. Gundagai has until 5:00 pm on Monday, November 16, to make a decision. Councils have until November 18 to formerly respond to the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal’s (IPART) ‘Fit for the Future’ findings, which deemed the Cootamundra-Harden merger proposal ‘fit’, and Gundagai’s Rural Council model ‘unfit’.

IPART also recommended a four-council merger including Boorowa and Young. “IPART recommended the four-council merger based on the findings of the LKS Quaero Hilltops Council report, which Harden Shire Council deemed flawed.” said Harden Shire Council General Manager, Trevor Drowley. “We believe that the model proposed was flawed and didn’t explain where the supposed savings would come from.” Cootamundra Shire Council will formerly vote to proceed with the merger with Harden at its Council meeting on Monday, November 16.

Harden will hold an extraordinary meeting the next day on November 17. According to Drowley, Gundagai Shire Council finds itself in an awkward position after its Rural Council submission was deemed unfit. “Only nine Rural Councils were deemed viable out of 22 Rural Council model submissions,” said Drowley. “But none of them were deemed fit under broader Fit for the Future Criteria.” “The state government is also yet to endorse the Rural Council model,” he added. Gundagai Shire Council Mayor, Abb McAlister, has been vocal in his opposition to amalgamation. “In my personal opinion, if we have to merge, they [the state government] will be doing it from their end because we won’t be doing it off our own bat,” he is reported by the Tumut & Adelong Times as saying. Gundagai Shire Council met with their Tumut counterparts on Monday, and a joint meeting between Gundagai, Harden and Cootamundra Shire Council is expected to take place sometime next week.