ONE of Mandurah’s longest standing community facilities could soon make way for shopping giant Aldi.
The Mandurah Mail received reports on Monday the discount supermarket chain had its eye on the scout hall on Anstruther Road and the City of Mandurah later confirmed it was considering an application by Aldi at this address.
According to its website, Aldi has an “ambitious investment program for Australia, which builds on our successful international operation”.
In February of 2013 Aldi announced its expansion into South Australia and Western Australia.
Kwinana was set to host the first Aldi site in Western Australia, but with this project stalled, Mandurah could take the honour.
Aldi is a discount supermarket which claims to offer "smarter shopping, providing customers with incredibly high quality items at the lowest possible prices".
The scout hall sits on 7050sqm which runs between Aldgate and Elizabeth streets.
It is currently used by a Mandurah scout group and is a frequent site of weekend market stalls.
A spokesperson affiliated with the scout group confirmed the City had given the group until June 30, 2015 to re-locate.
The block size lends itself to Aldi’s site preference of stores with “an immediate catchment population in excess of 20,000 and … situated on major roads with good access and exposure”.
"As the City currently owns the land over which the application has been made, Council at its meeting of 23 September, 2014, resolved that the application should be determined by the Peel Joint Development Assessment Panel (Peel JDAP) and that request is now with the Department of Planning," a City of Mandurah spokesperson said.
"This will mean that Council is not the decision maker in regard to this application."
The spokesperson also said the consultation period had closed, but if residents wished to make a submission it would be considered up to the time a report is prepared by Council.
The application was advertised to 84 properties surrounding the site but was not widely publicised.
While Council was in the process of negotiating the sale of the land to Aldi, negotiations were kept confidential due to the "commercial nature of the deliberations", according to the City spokesperson.
Now the decision has been made to sell the land to Aldi the public has the opportunity to comment on the sale under the Local Government Act.
Aldi regional managing director Viktor Jakupec said the shopping giant was eager "to bring the Aldi difference to Western Australia and provide local residents with our Smarter Shopping offering: a convenient in-store experience with a clearly defined product range of the highest quality products at permanently low prices".
"We can confirm that a development application (DA) has been submitted to Mandurah City Council to establish an Aldi store in the region," he said.
"The DA is currently being reviewed by Mandurah City Council and we are awaiting the outcome.
"Aldi will be in a better position to comment further once we have received a response from the council.
Aldi's plans to open in Mandurah have been well received by the local community, with a high level of interest from customers, suppliers and businesses, according to Mr Jakupec.
The Mandurah Mail's story attracted a reach of more than 40,000 people when the initial story broke with hundreds of positive comments flooding social media.
