Hakoah misses out on new home
THE future of the Hakoah Club in Bondi remains unclear following an unsuccessful attempt to purchase the White City Tennis Club.
ASHLEY BROWNE
THE future of the Hakoah Club remains unclear following an unsuccessful attempt to purchase the White City Tennis Club in Paddington.
Hakoah president Phil Filler refused to comment on speculation the club would close the doors of its premises in Hall Street, Bondi in November while it continues to search for a home elsewhere in the eastern suburbs.
“It wouldn’t be fair to say anything at the moment,” he said. “If there was anything major to announce, we’d call an extraordinary meeting of our members to break the news.”
Filler did confirm that some Hakoah staff had been retrenched earlier this year as the club prepared to move in a new direction.
“It was the same attrition as you would find in any business and the people we let go weren’t going to be required even if the White City deal had gone ahead,” he said.
The deal to purchase White City failed last month after the NSW Appeal Court ruled against tennis great John Alexander in a dispute with the White City Tennis Club over who owned the historic club.
The AJN understands that had the court ruled in favour of Alexander, he in turn would have sold the property to Hakoah for more than $12 million.
Hakoah is reportedly losing money every week and eating into the $18 million windfall it received after selling the property to the Toga Group in July 2007.
“We were on the verge of something wonderful, but it fell over because of events out of our control,” Filler said.
“So now we’re back looking at other options in and around the Eastern Suburbs and when we have some news, we’ll be making an announcement.”
Meanwhile, the Wentworth Courier is reporting that the Toga Group and Waverley Council are in dispute over plans for the redevelopment of the site after Toga attempted to bypass the council and deal directly with the state Government.
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