Tooradin Tractor Pull organiser Trevor Van der Heyden at Rutter Reserve, where $30,000 of copper cable was wrecked. Picture: Luke Plummer
By Glen Atwell
THE future of the Tooradin Tractor Pull is in peril after $30,000 of copper cable was wrecked by vandals at Rutter Reserve.
An electrician has assessed the damage as irreparable, and the entire cabling network will need to be dug up and reinstalled before the lights can be switched on.
The vandals cut out large chunks of cable connecting each of the reserves eight light towers to the underground network.
Police and event organisers are unsure when the damage occurred, and believe it could have happened progressively since the last tractor pull in January.
Event organiser Peter McGrath said the annual event faced an uncertain future.
“We’ve been going 11 years and now it could be all over,” he said.
“Unless the committee can get the lights fixed, there won’t be a tractor pull.
“We’re a not-for-profit group and pump all our profits back into community groups. We don’t have $30,000 sitting around.”
Mr McGrath said the truck show could still go ahead without the flood lights but the event would lose considerable appeal.
“People come to see the tractors under lights, it’s the main attraction” he said.
This year’s tractor pull attracted more than 4000 people and in 2006 the event won the City of Casey’s Community Event of the Year award.
Councillor Colin Butler said thieves had cost the organising committee $30,000 but community groups were the real victims.
“The indirect financial damage is endless,” he said.
“It will cost $30,000 to fix, but the committee usually distributes around $50,000 a year to community groups.
“To pay for the damage, the community funding will be cut drastically in the next few years,” Cr Butler said.
Cr Butler said the organising committee had done an amazing job reinventing one of Tooradin’s iconic events.
“They’ve doubled the crowds, doubled profits and poured all the money back into the community,” he said.
“The work to install all the cabling underground was done last year. Now it’s all been undone.”
Council officers had been scheduled to install vehicle control gates at the entrance to Rutter Reserve last week but heavy rain prevented the works from going ahead.
Mr McGrath said the reserve was regularly used and abused by hooning vehicles.
“It’s been fenced off before but the gates either get smashed off or stolen,” he said.
“We’ve had rubbish dumped and vehicles turn the reserve into a mud patch.
“We never expected the vandals to go this far, though,” he said.
