Irresponsible to ignore it: Cr Tammy Greenhalgh brings Orange Function Centre's future back to agenda

Built in Eyles Street in the late 60s by Orange tradesmen after community fundraising, few people would argue the Function Centre is in need of an upgrade and Cr Greenhalgh brought the matter up at Tuesday night's Orange City Council meeting.

"I'd mentioned it to a few other councillors in passing and they've said 'you don't want to rip the band aid off that one' but you know what? We actually do," Cr Greenhalgh said.

"When I saw the draft budget had come out and we hadn't allocated anything to it ... it's not responsible to just leave it sitting there."

With the full support of her fellow councillors after the discussion, Cr Greenhalgh asked for council staff to engage with the community on the future use of the building after which a masterplan for the building be drafted, for a 28 day exhibition period.

Cr Jack Evans, who also sits on the board of Business Orange, said his conversations with the business community suggested an upgrade was long overdue.

"There is a need for significant investment in this area," he said.

"You talk to the people who operate and run the events there, particularly the audio visual guys, they say [a function] is do-able but it's getting really difficult."

Cr Evans said caterers had made similar comments on the kitchens with users stating the building, which is the only venue in Orange capable of seating around 700 people, has potential.

"We need to have that conversation with the community, get a masterplan so that when we finish the jobs we are doing, we've got the vision, we can start applying for grants, and we can get into it," he said.

Cr Greenhalgh said she understood older community members had strong sentiment for the building.

"It's not about saying let's bulldoze it, I know people have an emotional attachment to it but we need to start the conversation now so that should funding come up, we can jump on it."

"If we fail to plan, we plan to fail, it's not responsible to leave it sitting there because it's in the too hard basket."

The building has been a topic of discussion in several council terms over the years.

It is not listed has having heritage value and does contain asbestos materials.

There was a suggestion the new sports stadium plans contained a function facility but council CEO David Waddell said that was not the case.

"The design is for a sports stadium. Full stop," he told Tuesday's meeting.

Cr Greenhalgh said she looked forward to resident's thoughts on the building's future.

"It's not going to be an easy one, this one, but let's see what we can do with it. We've got to be a bit more proactive."

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