Old Quirindi TAFE could be turned into short-term homes

LPSC mayor Doug Hawkins met with the Member for Tamworth Kevin Anderson and NSW Nationals leader Dugald Saunders on August 10 to discuss the viability of the plan for the former polytechnic college at 10 Gamble Street in Quirindi.

Mr Anderson supports the idea and said he would write to the NSW Minister for Skills, TAFE and Tertiary Education Prue Car to "request" she get in contact with the council and investigate its proposal.

"I know the Quirindi community is keen to see its old TAFE campus used for the benefit of the wider community," Mr Anderson said.

"Regional growth and economic development are the keys to thriving regional communities, and that requires housing for the workforce that keep our region's businesses successful."

The TAFE building closed when the new TAFE Connected Learning Centre (CLC) - a satellite site for students studying remotely - opened in nearby Hawker Street in 2017.

The empty TAFE building has nine single-level blocks sitting vacant on a 21,400 square-metre parcel of land Cr Hawkins describes as "plum in the middle of town" and within walking distance from the main shopping centre, swimming pool and other amenities.

"We're desperate for temporary housing," Cr Hawkins said.

"Often when people come here to work - such as tradesmen - on various projects, where there's 40 or 50 of them at a time, they're always struggling for places to rent, and when we have the military tattoo each year, the entire Liverpool Plains is booked out.

"So there's a good reason to have a temporary accommodation site there."

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The former TAFE building has a lot of infrastructure requiring major investment to reconfigure the lecture rooms into accommodation, Cr Hawkins said.

Cr Hawkins said, however, the task "would not be impossible".

"It irritates me every time I walk past and see it going to rot," he said.

"There's been no movement to do anything with it, so I was keen to get Dugald [Saunders] and Kevin Anderson on the case to find out what could be done.

"Maybe they would need to sign it over to us and then we [LPSC] could sell it to a developer."

The Leader contacted Minster for TAFE and Education Prue Car's office for a response.

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