People demand progress
Progress needed: Korumburra resident Maurie Thiele thinks the saleyards would have been an ideal place for a shopping centre.
KORUMBURRA may be falling behind in a commercial sense.
Maurie Thiele, the editor of Korumburra’s Community Newsletter, the BurraFlyer, thinks South Gippsland Shire Council is holding back development.
Mr Thiele believed the old saleyards site would be the perfect spot for a shopping centre.
“The council say that the shopping centre should be between King Street and Bridge Street and said that if you start building shops down here you’ll be splitting the town. I don’t think it will make a difference,” he said.
“Looking ahead Korumburra is going to grow and you’ve got nowhere to build a supermarket in that area, not a 1000 square metre shopping centre.”
Korumburra is growing residentially but nothing seems to be happening on the business side, according to Mr Thiele.
“It (Korumburra) is going to grow, at the moment we’ve only got one estate where you can buy land and the rest are already all sold pretty much,” he said
“I think that they (council) don’t want Korumburra to have a decent shopping centre.”
Mr Thiele said an estimated $25 million is spent outside of the Korumburra by each year.
“The way I see it is that it’ll (shopping centre) be competition to Leongatha and that’s not what they (council) want,” he said.
“We should build a shopping centre at the saleyards and connect the two parts of the town with a footpath.”
South Gippsland Shire Council acting CEO Phil Stone said plenty of growth was happening in Korumburra.
“We’ve got lots of things happening in Korumburra. Council is seeking authorisation from the minister to rezone 25 hectares on the western part of Korumburra,” he said.
“We’ve also got a Korumburra Town Centre framework plan that is kicking off this financial year that is looking at how we will manage the traffic through Korumburra and also look for development opportunities to cater for full line supermarkets.”
Mr Stone said the saleyards have been rezoned as Industrial 3, with development applications on the way.
Council is also working on a new development contribution plan across the shire.
“This will mean allowing developers to bridge the gap in funding for new infrastructure such as footpaths and social infrastructure such as day-care centres and the like, along with roads and things needed for a growing community that Korumburra is,” Mr Stone said.
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