Ratepayers left with $375k bill for scrapped Shire office plan

A multimillion-dollar two-storey office block has been scrapped by the Shire of Broome because of escalating costs and the potential impact on ratepayers.

But expenditure on the Kimberley Regional Offices project over the past three years has spiralled to about $375,000 with nothing to show except a mountain of paperwork.

The $6.4 million development was granted planning approval and had gone out to tender before being suddenly dumped behind closed doors at the last ordinary council meeting on October 27.

The Shire-owned KRO on the corner of Frederick and Weld streets are leased to a range of government and private agencies.

The grey concrete block buildings were considered by the council as “needing renewal and redevelopment”.

The proposal was one of the Shire’s biggest capital works projects in recent years.

The council said the accumulated costs were associated with investigation into redevelopment options, financial modelling of the options, development of a business case, project management, architectural concept designs and engineering advice.

Shire president Ron Johnston said the plan was “over budget” and not one of the tenders was acceptable in terms of cost.

“The shortfall would have been a further burden on the ratepayers of Broome, which was not acceptable,” he said. Broome Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Peter Taylor said the decision to refuse the redevelopment was “very sensible”.

“Apart from the issue that the development would have provided little or no returns to ratepayers, it should not be the role of the Shire to enter into the private market to compete with the private sector unless there are compelling reasons to do so,” he said.

“In this case, there were not.”

The council would have been responsible for the construction and funding of the new 1164sqm office building and 24sqm lunch bar.

The development would have been located towards the Frederick Street part of the site as an addition to the existing two regional office blocks.