Carisbrook Stadium Trust chairman Malcolm Farry has criticised a Dunedin City Council staff report on several aspects of funding and building the proposed Awatea St stadium, saying it ‘‘creates public uncertainty and fear'', and claimed last night the trust has been treated in a ‘‘cavalier manner''.
Mr Farry said the trust had done all it could to provide the council with the information necessary to make a decision on the proposed development, and many questions asked by council staff in the report had already been answered.
‘‘In my view, the report will add to public uncertainty and fear. There is no place for fear but there is a place for robust debate centred around the facts as known,'' Mr Farry said.
The council's finance and strategy committee meets today to determine whether the council will back the project. Councillors were last week provided with a staff report containing information on whether it should help fund the stadium. The report was signed by council chief executive Jim Harland.
Mr Farry was at a loss yesterday to understand why council staff were raising questions, when information answering them had already been supplied by the trust.
‘‘It is quite disturbing that more than two years of hard work by the trust and its advisers is treated in such a cavalier manner at the 11th hour, and moreover, without the opportunity for timely clarification by the trust.''
Mr Farry said the trust had answered queries over construction costs increasing. It could not progress private and corporate fund-raising until the project was confirmed by the council.
He said there were only two options: decline support and the project would cease, or give support of $79.9 million, subject to other funders coming on board and agreements being signed, including with the University of Otago, Community Trust of Otago and Otago Rugby Football Union.
The council staff report said a plan change to get the stadium built presented a number of obstacles, but Mr Farry said the trust had always seen an obstacle as ‘‘nothing other than a challenge to overcome''.
The trust knew the plan change was critical, but innovation and progressive negotiations were required rather than accepting what some parties considered to be the ‘‘end game''.
Councillors were being asked to form a view after a series of questions at the end of the report, ‘‘yet the report answers these questions in the negative'', he said.
Mr Harland could not be contacted for comment last night.
Cr Richard Walls, who will chair the finance and strategy committee meeting today, said, when contacted, he had not changed his opinion that he did not expect to use his casting vote, reiterating he believed the council would probably reach a consensus.
However, he did say to ‘‘expect the unexpected'' and what might emerge from the meeting might be something that had not been discussed yet.
‘‘There are other options out there that had not been considered,'' Mr Walls said, but declined to elaborate on them. He said much of the debate had been about issues such as rugby and rates, which were not the main issues.
