PLANS for Warracknabeal’s education precinct might come to a halt after stage one is completed.
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Warracknabeal Secondary College, Warracknabeal Primary School and Warracknabeal Special Development School created a master plan to develop a new education precinct that has the three schools combine at the primary site in Werrigar Street.
The three schools used the funding to move forward with co-location plans rather than invest the money at its current sites.
Warracknabeal Secondary College acting principal Melissa Twaddell said the budget allocation funded stage one of the master plan, which would be completed at the end of the year.
This stage involved constructing half of the special development school and a third of the secondary school at the new site.
However, the project missed out in the 2018-19 state government budget allocations for stage two funding.
Ms Twaddell said the schools were working through negotiations on what needs to be achieved. The principals from each school also meet regularly with architectures and builders to work through the process.
Yarriambiack Shire Council mayor Graeme Massey said it was a concern of council when projects funded from the state government are not funded to its completion. He said the uncertainty of the project’s completion was not ideal.
“It leaves communities in the lurch as to whether the next stage is going to come and it certainly leaves the contractor in a difficult position,” he said.
Cr Massey said the community’s excitement had depleted since hearing the project might come to a halt.
He said people feel anxious – particularly for the special development school – because students would be surrounded by incomplete buildings if they move to the new site.
Cr Massey said it was not satisfactory for students to be caught in the middle of a construction site if the work moves forward.
Member for Lowan Emma Kealy said there are escalating concerns about the half-completed project.
She said the state government provided only a fraction of the funding that is required for the project to be completed.
“(It has left) the schools with the impossible decision of working over split campuses or just staying put and leaving brand new school buildings empty until the required funding for this important infrastructure flows,” she said.