By Cara Waters
The trust overseeing public space at Caulfield Racecourse is running out of money and is warning that public access to the land at the centre of the track could be limited if it does not get funding.
The Caulfield Racecourse Reserve Trust is calling for annual funding of $1 million a year and $2.96 million to cover additional one-off costs requiring urgent action, including the removal of unsafe legacy assets – including a horse pool – from the Melbourne Racing Club.
Bruce Cutts of the Glen Eira Emergency Climate Action Network and local residents Sally Clarke, Rachael Vassallo with her mother Helen Fischer, in front of the Southern Lake inside the Caulfield Racecourse Reserve.Credit: Eddie Jim
It is also looking to sporting organisations, including the Melbourne Football Club, to help fund the public space, with the AFL club one of several organisations submitting an expression of interest to establish a standalone training facility at the racecourse.
In 2021, the trust unveiled plans for a $570 million redevelopment of Caulfield Racecourse to transform it into a sporting and entertainment precinct more than 10 times the size of the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
Sam Almaliki, chairman of the trust, said the trust requires ongoing operational funding to keep the reserve’s 23 hectares of parkland open and provide community infrastructure.
“The trust is solvent and meeting all its obligations, but cannot continue community access without committed funding,” he said. “Public access faces closure without immediate funding.”
The $2.96 million one-off costs include $500,000 to remove the horse pool that it says poses a public drowning risk and $1 million to remove the abandoned western stables that it says are now dilapidated.
A major source of revenue for the trust is a 65-year lease to the Melbourne Racing Club for up to 45 race days.
The club pays $370,000 a year but has proposed reducing this to $100,000 a year, which Almaliki said was “completely insufficient”.
The trust claims the racing club generates “tens of millions of dollars” within the racecourse reserve each year through wagering commissions, sponsorships, ticketing, memberships, hospitality and gaming, including a gaming venue that operates 20 hours a day that generated over $9 million last year.
Inside the Caulfield Racecourse Reserve. Credit: Eddie Jim
“Anything less than the current rent would be a catastrophic outcome,” he said. “It just does not pass the pub test that the rental value would be going backwards.”
Almaliki said the trust met on Thursday with Victorian Environment Minister Ingrid Stitt to ask for more funding.
The minister’s office was contacted for comment.
Spokesman for the Melbourne Racing Club, Jared Newton, said the club’s rent for the racecourse was determined independently.
An artist’s impression of the proposed Caulfield Racecourse redevelopment.
“By exiting training in November 2021, two years ahead of schedule, the MRC handed over 15 hectares of horseracing land back to the trust for greater community use,” he said. “The Caulfield Racecourse Reserve is now available to the public more hours each week than ever before with more non-racing community land available.”
Newton said the MRC and the trust were working together to deliver on the long-term vision for the Caulfield Racecourse Reserve.
“Work is already underway at Caulfield which when complete, will make the reserve more accessible with improved amenity for the local community.”
Glen Eira Mayor Jim Magee said the MRC needed to pay more rent and that he was concerned that if the trust failed to raise more money, the local community would lose access to what is public land.
“The trust has almost been set up to fail,” he said. “It is almost bankrupt. If you are not going to fund it properly, then be honest about it.”
Residents including Bruce Cutts, co-convenor of the Glen Eira Emergency Climate Action Network, were planning to attend a public meeting held by the trust on Thursday night to voice their concerns.
Cutts said the trust needed to focus on preservation of the southern lake in the centre of the racecourse, which is listed as “sacrificial” on the plans for the racecourse reserve.
“They regard the lake as sacrificial and we regard it as an important part of Glen Eira,” he said. “It was an area of marsh land or, as the land management plan puts it beautifully, ‘a snake infested swamp’. So, that can give you a little clue to [the trust’s] mindset. But snakes equals frogs, equals insects equals biodiversity.”
Local heritage groups are also watching plans closely after the racecourse was successfully nominated to the Victorian Heritage Register in February following the destruction of 100-year-old trees in redevelopment works.
”There is a master plan, but there is no money being put aside for it, so it is hard to know where it is going,” Anne Kilpatrick, from the Glen Eira Historical Society, said.
“It is disappointing that the MRC is not taking responsibility for making good their now abandoned assets; even more disappointing if that cost essentially falls to the Victorian taxpayer through the state government needing to cover those costs via the trust,” Kilpatrick said
The Melbourne Football Club declined to comment.
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