Sandown saved: Why rebel board victory secures iconic racetrack’s future

The future of Sandown Racecourse has all but been assured after a rebel group, headed by John Kanga, seized control of the Melbourne Racing Club board on Thursday.

Kanga was voted in as the new MRC chairman at a special board meeting, following the shock resignation of vice chairman Nick Hassett, who had also nominated for the top job.

Melbourne Racing Club board member John Kanga.

The 10-person MRC board, which oversees the running of Caulfield, Sandown and Mornington racecourses, had been locked in a 5-5 vote between Kanga and Hassett for the past week.

The election result has significant ramifications for the future of Sandown Racecourse. Kanga and his Save Our MRC Group are opposed to selling the 112-ha parcel of land to developers so that it can become a 7500-home suburb.

The MRC’s application to have the site rezoned is currently with the Victorian government-appointed Sandown Racecourse Advisory Committee.

The committee has conducted a six-month review, which included a month-long public hearing, and is expected to hand a final report, containing advice and recommendations, to State Planning Minister Sonya Kilkenny next month.

But Kanga’s Save Our MRC movement, which was formed in August and consists of fellow MRC board members Caitrin Kelly and Alison Saville, has vowed to keep racing at the site regardless of any rezoning decision.

They have also vowed to move the new Caulfield mounting yard back to its original position in front of the members’ stand as well as scrapping plans to build a new $250 million grandstand at Caulfield.

“I am honoured to have been selected to this position,” Kanga said on Thursday. “I am committed to taking all necessary actions to ensure there is a united board that focuses on the needs of members.”

The State Government said costs associated with the Sandown Racecourse Advisory Committee would be covered by the MRC.

Even if the MRC board wants to sell Sandown in the future, the decision has to be put to a members’ vote.

The sale of the entire site would be worth hundreds of millions to the club, which recently spent $160 million upgrading its Caulfield facilities, including a $60 million mounting yard area, a new inner track and a new office building.

The Sandown rezoning process was also made exempt from the state government’s new “windfall gains tax”, introduced in July last year, which is worth more than $100 million to the MRC.

The Save Our MRC group’s position on key issues was strengthened by new MRC board members Sheamus Mills and Cameron Fisher, who were elected at the club’s annual general meeting last week on a platform of saving Sandown and opposing the new grandstand.

The board will meet again next week to finalise the remaining office bearers for the coming year.

Kanga filed a motion in August for a special general meeting to remove board members Matt Cain, Nick Hassett, Mark Pratt, Brooke Dawson, Scott Davidson and Jill Monk. While the club ruled the motion was not “legally valid”, former chairman Cain, Pratt and Hassett have since walked away.

At the time of filing the motion, Kanga said: “All I want is to have a board that is aligned on the key issues that members continually tell me they want resolved: the mounting yard, keeping racing at Sandown and ensuring we don’t waste more money by building a white elephant grandstand.”

This masthead reported in June that the male jockeys room at Caulfield Racecourse - part of the $160 million upgrades - was going to be renovated only three months after it was unveiled because it was too small to accommodate riders on busy race days.

The new $60 million mounting yard facilities, which included subterranean tie-up stalls, were also heavily criticised by the Australia Trainers Association as well as prominent owners.

Rupert Legh, who raced Chautauqua, said the new mounting yard at Caulfield lacked “atmosphere and has no soul and that defeats the purpose of being at the races”.

Another well-known owner, Colin McKenna, added: “What they have done to Caulfield Racecourse is a joke and the people responsible need to be sacked.”

The MRC’s executive committee was thrown into further turmoil in August when Kelly and Saville accused the board in August of having a “longstanding poor culture and toxic atmosphere”. The MRC denied the allegations.

“We have resolved not to let this continue and to stand up against it,” Saville and Kelly said.

This masthead reported that the club even introduced a safe word – “pineapple” – for board members to use in meetings if they felt threatened or ill at ease.

Kanga won a crucial legal battle last week in his bid to become the chairman by having a club disciplinary hearing against him pushed back until October 16.

Kanga, Kelly and Saville were asked to appear before the disciplinary committee for allegedly breaching the club’s code of conduct, but they successfully sought a Supreme Court injunction to have the hearing postponed.

The MRC came under fire from club members in January 2022 when builders destroyed heritage buildings at Caulfield and cut down 42 trees, including an Aleppo pine grown from the seed of Gallipoli’s Lone Pine, as part of its new development.

Members were also shocked on Thursday to see that demolition work had begun at Caulfield on the community stables on Booran Road, next to the dog park.

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