COUNCILLORS have taken steps to reverse Bathurst Regional Council's decision to take out a loan to help fund construction of the go-kart track on Mount Panorama.
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On Thursday, councillors Jess Jennings, John Fry and Monica Morse submitted a rescission motion after they, along with Jacqui Rudge, voted against a mayoral minute put to the council meeting the previous night.
Cr Jennings said the decision to get a loan for $2.25 million, half the cost of the project, was "a monumental mismanagement of council funds".
He said it went back on the promise in the 2020-21 council budget, which stated that council would seek grants to fully fund the project.
He also felt it was a precarious position to put the council in, when it was already dealing with the economic fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"Ratepayers are being robbed blind by this mayor and his backers on this issue, because not only are they now going back on their word and committing $2.5 million - more than 50 per cent of the cost of the project - they are also risking council's money by putting it in the form of a loan," Cr Jennings said.
The $2.5 million he referred to included the approximately $250,000 in interest that council would have to pay on the loan.
He also took issue with the very short notice councillors had been given of this mayoral minute.
They were given several minutes in the chamber on Wednesday night to read the document before discussion commenced.
More than an hour later, the vote was cast.
Cr Jennings said the matter of committing council funds should have come to a meeting in the form of report from senior staff, which they would have received days in advance.
"We would have at least had a better opportunity to consider it, but having said that, I dare say the four of us would have come to the same conclusion, because not only was it suggesting we take out a loan, it's also now committed council money to this project, whereas before it was expected to be 100 per cent funded by external grants," he said.
Cr Jennings has also called for a business case from the Bathurst Kart Club to "verify their credentials, their ability to manage this, and to get some projections on usage levels".
When asked whether the rescission motion and business case were about the financial implications or about moving the track, Jennings said it was purely financial.
"The rescission motion strictly deals with the contents of the mayoral minute, that we essentially reject that decision, so that deals with the financial side only, and that is now the central issue here," he said.
"This is improper practice, this is absolutely dysfunctional, backward economic management, and because that process has been so poor, that is now the issue.
"That's what we're really fighting in that rescission motion and the idea of changing the location is a further battle yet to be completed."
Mayor Bobby Bourke has called an extraordinary meeting for 2.30pm next Thursday to deal with the rescission motion.
