The good, the bad and the ugly

Public toilets are desperately needed in the town centre of Churchill. The toilets that used to be in the south end of the West Place shopping complex were removed when the Reject Shop arrived. Now, shoppers have limited options if they need to go - run up to the toilets near the bakery in the old complex or hold on.

The public toilets should never have been removed from West Place, but they were. What is intriguing though, is the way in which Ferguson's messaging on this is all over the place on this, and is complicating a speedy resolution.

Here's what we know so far:

THE GOOD. The CDCA (1) has pulled the community together over the desperate need for public toilets and is working with Council to find a solution. They have a petition of over 900 signatures (2) and rising. Although LCC has taken a long time to chase this up (3), they are looking at all avenues to force the developer to reopen the public toilets. We understand that this could include legal intervention, and amendments to the building permit that was originally issued (3).

THE BAD. Ferguson dropped the ball. On 5 Sep 23, Ferguson announced that the LCC Public Toilet Implementation Plan had passed in the Chamber the day before (3). She mentioned at this time that the public toilets in West Place should be reopened in Dec 23, and that she would keep the community informed of developments along the way. We, as a community, have heard nothing from her on this issue until recently - that's 8 months of inaction on an issue that is of critical importance to us.

THE UGLY. What is emerging is that Ferguson is jumping on the CDCA's push for action - possibly so she can hide the fact that she dropped the ball on this and to pretend that she is doing something. Rather than work with Council to support their efforts for a speedy resolution with the developer, Ferguson is whipping up support for an alternative that will take longer and cost more. Her idea now is for Council to allocate $450k for funding these public toilets.

Last weekend, she claimed that she had secured funding for a new toilet block in the next budget (3) knowing that she hadn't.

She had, in fact, missed the deadline for submissions to the draft budget and requested an extension (4). This is what happens when you spend all of your time on social media instead of in your community.

I am not sure where these proposed Council owned public toilets will go, as I thought that the shopping precinct was privately owned. In addition, Council already have public toilets in their nearest facility - being the Churchill Hub. So why do we need a Council public toilet when it should be the developer's responsibility?

References

(1) -The Churchill and District Community Association (https://cdca.org.au/)

(2) - Post on the CDCA Facebook page as of 2 days ago, also showing Ferguson signing the petition. Why did it take her so long to sign?

(3) - See photos

(4) - LCC graciously granted the extension.