OBERON ratepayers will be sent a cost grid comparing the different options for the proposed multi-purpose community centre and multi-purpose sporting facility before being asked to complete a phone survey about future infrastructure for Oberon.

The issue of the survey of 200 Oberon ratepayers to determine whether they are willing to contribute financially towards major infrastructure plans resulted in heated discussion at Tuesday night's council meeting.

Oberon Mayor Keith Sullivan has said that the survey does not ask ratepayers which facilities they want, but whether they are willing to make contributions, through increased rates, to a range of facilities with an order of priority decided by council staff.

“We know what they have asked for,” he said. “If we want to borrow some money for a facility, we want to know we have their [the community's] support and also what they are willing to pay.”

However, councillors have now decided that the costs of the two main 'competing' projects - the multi-purpose community centre and multi-purpose sporting facility -should be presented to ratepayers with all the different options, including covering the Oberon pool with the plans for the sporting facility and the price of a community centre not co-located with the library. Councillor Ian Doney said the community should be presented with a price comparison of the competing projects so they can be informed.

“Both I and the community need to see it,” he said.

Councillor John McMahon was sceptical of surveying the community about infrastructure projects, saying that he does not feel it is fair to get the community's hopes up when the council does not have the capacity to fund the facilities.

“We've gone on about this months and years. Isn't it time to be honest with the public and say: ‘We can't afford these'?” he asked.

Councillor Zsuz-sanna Handelsmann was also sceptical of the survey, saying that the council had already ignored the results of a number of surveys carried out in the community regarding preferred facilities because they did not state what the council wanted to hear.