Mid Argyll Swimming Pool Board puts Lochgilphead on the line with major demo plan
published this on 11:07 am, Wednesday, 18th November, 2009Community News| Local Government| Sporting Activities | Comments (rss) | Respond | Ping |
With support coming in from MSPs from all over Scotland, thanks to Jamie McGrigor’s Parliamentary Motion calling for the future of the Mid Argyll Swimming Pool to be assured, the Pool’s Board pla to show Argyll & Bute Concil just what the pool means to its community.
It is planning a massive public demonstration for the week before Christmas.
As we have reported, the pool faces an immediate shortfall of £10,000 in the budget before Christmas and an end of year loss. Together these threaten its future.
In our view, the funding arrangements for the Pool leave Argyll & Bute Council with a case to answer. The Board is appealing to the Council for help from the emergency fund and for a rise in its (low) revenue grant – for which the existing Service Level Agreement with the Council runs out in the Spring of next year.
The Board expects up to a thousand people are to demonstrate on the front green of Lochgilphead on December 19th – from 11.00am – in what is expected to be the largest ever public demonstration in the town’s history.
The Board has put itself on the line in declaring such an expectation. If it doesn’t deliver on the numbers it has said it expects, it will be damaging and may provide misleading evidence to counter the claims of community need and support for the facility.
The Board are volunteers who stepped in in the Spring of 2009 to save the pool whose organisation and finances had been allowed to slip into an indefensible chaos. Since then, the new Board members have found themselves actually running the facility – in response to a long standing management problem and to the current absence on maternity leave of two senior members of staff.
As well as lobbying the council, the Board is searching for sources of additional funding and is grateful for the ongoing support not only of the public but of local businesses.
It is calling for anyone with an interest in the pool – or who simply wants to see it remain open – to join the demonstration, sign its petition and demonstrate the strength of local need and commitment to the Pool.
This is a testing time for Lochgilphead – to show community solidarity and a will to act to protect ots opwn crucial resources. With support coming from all over Scotland, Lochgilphead – for the sake of its pool and for the sake of its tirelessly selfless Board – will need to show that its own energies can match that support and that effort.
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