Towong Shire votes unanimously to keep Corryong pool open until April 5
THE Corryong pool will remain open until the Man From Snowy River Bush Festival weekend in early April due to the season being impacted by the bushfires in the Upper Murray.
The pool was due to close on Monday, but will stay open with Towong Shire providing free entry for the season extension to April 5.
It was off-limits for a large part of January due to damage from the bushfires which began in the Upper Murray on New Year's Eve with heavy smoke also forcing its closure on other days.
But the pool will shut on days considered too cold in a policy to be formulated by council and in a further act of goodwill Corryong pool 2019-20 season pass holders will be provided a free pass next summer.
The estimated cost of keeping the pool open until early next month is more than $20,000, but Cr Andrew Whitehead said the additional cost was justified.
"It was three weeks at the hottest time of the year," he said.
"If people think this is too far out being next year, the recovery is not going to take two months.
"It is going to take several years and this is a way giving something back to the community that has been affected."
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Meanwhile, the council has back-tracked on imposing a $500 lane hire fee on Corryong and Tallangatta swim clubs this summer with a $450 charge imposed on Tallangatta for 2018-19 also being waived.
A review of the pools fee schedule will be completed before next summer with council to re-visit the issue in July.
Corryong Crocodiles swimming club president Nicole Martin spoke before the meeting about the impact lane hire fees would have.
"None of the Ovens and Murray swimmings clubs in the Albury-Wodonga area or anywhere else I can find pay lane hire," she said.
"If you are going to charge us lane hire are you going to provide lane ropes because the swimming clubs actually own the lane ropes and not Towong Shire.
"We are the largest stakeholder users of the pool so you get family memberships out of all of us every year.
"I think we contribute financially to the pools already.
"It's probably going to be the demise of our two swimming clubs if we add lane hires onto those two clubs."
The clubs operate within the regular pool opening hours when lifeguards are on duty and acknowledge on hot days more space has to be made available for the general public.