By REBECCA BILLS and MELISSA MEEHAN
Foreign invaders have prompted residents to take back their high street…
BREAKOUT QUOTE
“I don’t like to say this but it is like McDonald’s was the catalyst for getting the community activated in asking ‘what do we want in our community?’” Fat Space volunteer Jenny Rowe.
TECOMA residents are claiming back their town.
Famous mainly for their fight against the controversial McDonald’s development – shop-keepers and resident alike are working together to find another reason as why visitors should come to their town.
It’s based on the premise that they can buy back their town.
Reclaim Tecoma co-ordinators Paul O’Halloran and Darryl Shatte with the help of Fat Space co-ordinator Joy Serwylo are calling on local business owners and investors to raise funds to buy the DVD Destination building at 1535 Burwood Highway, Tecoma.
And while neither would confirm this, the Mail has seen documents calling on investors to fund the purchase.
“We are seeking 20 investors to purchase the building on the corner of Burwood Highway and Sandells Road, currently housing Parents Without Partners shop (PWP), and Fat Space Art Gallery Shop,” the three page document said.
“Purchase of 1535 Burwood Highway, Tecoma, provides an opportunity for local residents to take community ownership and control of Tecoma township reclaiming it from multinational corporate interests.”
Rumours around town suggest that a local family has already offered up to $10,000 towards the project.
Ms Serwylo said that the community already had decided that it didn’t want multinational fast food restaurant McDonald’s to be the hub of the town, and had set its sights on other international investors.
She said investors from New Zealand and China had already built too many shops in the town and said the disjointed and often empty shop fronts was already a concern.
“I think a big problem in Tecoma is it has been over built up by people who don’t belong in the community,” she said.
“We have all these excess shops that can’t really be handled by the small community that is here.”
Posters up around town, including the former DVD Destination building, encourage the community to share its vision about what the building should be used for.
Mr O’Halloran remained coy on the plan to purchase the building, instead insisting that the poster was not about purchasing the property at all.
“You’ve only got to look around Tecoma to see where the possibilities are at the moment,” he said.
Other commercial spaces in town include the Tecoma Pizza shop and another space in the same complex – both are estimated to be worth between $250,000 and $320,000.
“What we are really trying to say is it’s not just this property, it’s the whole area we are trying to find uses for,” Mr O’Halloran said.
“At the end of the day you might get three or four people who all potentially have the funds to support something like that and then it essentially becomes their private operation and you’ve lost the community.
“So the difficult thing we are going through at the moment is this whole idea of keeping the community involved, engaged and owning the vision and the use.
Fat Space volunteer Jenny Rowe said she believed purchasing the DVD Destination building was a fantastic vision for the the community.
“I don’t like to say this but it is like McDonald’s was the catalyst for getting the community activated in asking ‘what do we want in our community?’,” she said.
Ms Rowe said if the building was to be bought by the community it would be used as a space with a gallery and micro businesses.
“It’s a very exciting thought,” she said.
