ARARAT - Ararat's community was out in full force of Friday night to support an iconic town landmark.
More than 1000 residents, ranging from six to 86 years old, packed the grandstand at Alexandra Oval not for a football or cricket match, but to show their support for the neglected Ararat Solar Olympic Swimming Pool.
The 'Save Our Pool' meeting was organised by passionate users of the facility Ambrose Cashin and Maddy Vernon, who had arranged the meeting to gauge public interest in the campaign.
"We just thought bring it back to the people, the people built it in the first place and we wanted to ask do the people of Ararat still want it to be here, and obviously by the looks of tonight and the numbers that have shown up that answer is yes," Mr Cashin said.
"We had a bit of a plan and the first part of the plan was just to see if people wanted a pool, now that we have achieved this goal quite comfortably over the next week or two we will be looking to set up a committee, organising a trust fund and keep people informed via the internet, Facebook and also with regular updates in the Ararat Advertiser."
Ms Vernon said the support that was shown at the meeting had exceeded her expectations.
"I would have been happy if 50 people were here, then when everyone kept rolling up it was very overwhelming," she said.
"I knew the support was out there and people kept saying they were going to come, but until we had people in seats we really weren't sure what to expect. To see how many people are here tonight I could have a little tear."
Mr Cashin told the huge crowd, which included a large portion of senior residents from the community, that he and Ms Vernon had received letters of support from Swimming Victoria, Wimmera Swimming and Marian College, Ararat West and Ararat College.
Ms Vernon has also been in regular contact with Federal member for Wannon Dan Tehan, who has pledged his support to the cause.
“Maddy’s mate Dan Tehan apologises for not making it, he had a prior engagement he couldn’t get out of, but he has written a letter of support and he is going helped us set up a trust fund so we can make any donations tax-deductable,” Mr Cashin said.
“The trust fund will be set up so that every dollar is accounted for.”
At the meeting the crowd was asked to sign a registration form, which included details on the skills and services they are willing to offer towards the pool’s refurbishment. A final tally saw about 800 signatures recorded on the night.
Mr Cashin said he and Ms Vernon understood that council needed to ensure economic stability, however with the number of people volunteering their time towards the restoration, the cost of the project would decrease greatly.
“The next step is now to take away this list and work through what contractors we’ve got and go back to the council and say okay you are saying it is costing $100,000 to dig around the pool, well we can now wipe that off, the $24,000 for the fence, we can also wipe that off and all of a sudden it becomes more realistic,” he said.
With Mr Cashin and Ms Vernon setting themselves the goal to have the Ararat Solar Olympic Swimming
Pool up and running in less than 12 months time, hundreds of hours of work lies ahead.
“I’ve been told the hard work starts now, but we’ve been going for a couple of months and we’ve gotten this far so I can’t see why we can’t keep going,” Ms Vernon said.
“If the hard work does start now I am more than happy to do it, I will go to any length to see that the pool is re-opened. It means a lot to me and my family, so my aim is for Ambrose and I to cut that ribbon on December 1, there is a bit that needs to be done though between now and then to achieve that goal.”
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