About 200 people turned up to the meeting at Edgewater, hosted by the Wanaka Chamber of Commerce.
Several Wanaka Community Board and Queenstown Lakes District Council Wanaka ward candidates highlighted the sports facility's key role in Wanaka's economic and social development.
However, council candidate Calum MacLeod referred to the council's handling of the sports facilities project to date as an ''omnishambles''.
He suggested the council abandon its $16.7 million Wanaka sports centre proposal in favour of a scaled-back $5 million facility, similar to Gore's MLT Event Centre, so the remaining budget could be spent elsewhere.
''Is that the best bang for our buck? Turns out no,'' Mr MacLeod said of the current proposal.
The QLDC voted two and-a-half years ago to build the town's sports facility at the Three Parks subdivision on the outskirts of town, instead of at a town centre site incorporating the Wanaka showgrounds, Lakeview Holiday Park and Pembroke Park.
Audience member Steve Schikker asked the candidates whether they would consider revisiting the town centre site.
Cr Leigh Overton, who is seeking re-election, said he would not, but noted the council was looking at expanding the area around the Three Parks site to cater for more activities.
Fellow councillor Jude Battson, also seeking re-election, remained in favour of the Three Parks site.
''However, if ... you could get the whole community to say they wanted it to be there [showgrounds site] ... it could be revisited.''
Wanaka Community Board member Mike O'Connor, standing again for the board, said it was unlikely residents of the Meadowstone subdivision, next to the showgrounds and camping ground, would welcome a sports complex which included an aquatic facility ''casting a great shadow over them''.
Current community board member Bryan Lloyd, standing for the board again as well as the council, said he had been ''strongly in favour'' of the Three Parks site at the time it was chosen.
''Only fools can't change their minds,'' Mr Lloyd said.
''I'm somewhere in the middle at the moment.''
