University of Tasmania outlines plan to fund $500m STEM precinct at Sandy Bay

The University of Tasmania’s proposed new STEM facilities are going to require significant government funding – but that’s not all it’s going to take to get the project off the ground.

UTAS wants to build a $500m new STEM precinct at its Sandy Bay campus. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

The University of Tasmania is willing to sign a legally binding document that would require it to commit all proceeds from the development of rezoned land at its Sandy Bay site to a $500m STEM precinct below Churchill Ave.

In a letter to Innovation, Science and Digital Economy Minister Madeleine Ogilvie, seen by the Mercury, Vice-Chancellor Rufus Black said that the university was prepared to enter into a “deed of undertaking in the form of a deed poll”, which UTAS’s legal team had already drafted and sent to the state government in order to begin negotiations.

“This draft commits the university to keep the funds arising from development above Churchill Ave quarantined and to only use those funds for the purposes of financing the STEM [science, technology, engineering and mathematics] precinct,” Professor Black wrote in the November 25 letter.

UTAS Vice-Chancellor Rufus Black. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

“The university would also be open to making commitments around affordable housing in the deed poll, given our longstanding commitment to ensuring any developments on university land include a range of price points to allow for key worker accommodation.”

Prof Black told Ms Ogilvie that there may also be the potential to include social housing and supported living options for older people.

He said there was a “STEM educational crisis” in Tasmania and that it was imperative that the development of the proposed precinct at Sandy Bay went ahead in the next 12-18 months, otherwise the facilities wouldn’t be built until “well into the 2030s”.

It’s expected the bulk of the funding for the project will need to come from Canberra.

UTAS announced earlier this month that its future in Hobart would be centred on four key sites: a STEM campus at Sandy Bay, a historic campus at the university’s original home on the Domain, a waterfront campus comprising the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies at Salamanca and Taroona, and a city campus encompassing the schools of humanities, social Sciences, business and economics.

The university originally planned to develop a new STEM hub on Melville St, for which Infrastructure Australia approved a business case in 2017.

Madeleine Ogilvie MP. Picture: Linda Higginson

But the state Liberal government this year pushed the university to shift its focus to Sandy Bay and develop the STEM precinct there, also moving to require that both houses of parliament approve any sales of UTAS’s Sandy Bay landholdings, which were gifted to the university by the government in 1951.

The Rockliff government was last week accused of “betraying” the Save UTAS Campus group by announcing a plan to rezone more than 20ha of the Sandy Bay land above Churchill Ave for housing, which could facilitate the development of hundreds of new homes.

Save UTAS spokeswoman Angela Bird said the group was “stunned” by the move.

“Once hollowed-out, in line with UTAS’ plan, there would be no logical reason to retain any Southern university campus and Sandy Bay would close,” she said.

The Liberals denied they had abandoned their election policy to require the parliament to approve such a sell-off.

The government will seek to pass an amended version of its University of Tasmania (Protection of Land) Bill in this final sitting week of state parliament for the year, including the rezoning amendment.