The vice president of the Toowoomba United RSL is hoping to overhaul what an RSL looks like and how it operates, when the historic Toowoomba Soldiers Memorial Hall closes for two years due to a complicated restoration process.
The Soldiers' Memorial Hall was erected in three stages — 1923–24, 1930–31 and 1957–59 — as a tribute to all those from Toowoomba and surrounding districts who served in World War I.
In the next two months it is getting another facelift, which means the Toowoomba United RSL is looking for a new home base.
Vice president Scott May said he saw it as an opportunity to overhaul the entire welfare, advocacy and social system for veterans.
"They [veterans] come along and they talk about their problems and just through conversation, little snippets of information are gained," he said.
"It's a common focal point for veterans to gather."
However Mr May said the modern RSL needed to offer more.
"We want to see a location that caters for people that want to get into the garden — people that want to do scrapbooking or cooking classes or anything that they can think of, and we want to be able to facilitate it at the subbranch," he said.
While the RSL does not want to let go of the connection with the hall in Toowoomba's central business district, Mr May said the building cannot cater for the social needs of younger members.
"The RSL sub-branch wants to maintain a footprint at the soldiers memorial hall, but I also want to see something reimagined in a house with a garden," he said.
"The average age of the contemporary veteran is 30 years old and they don't want to sit around in a dusty old hall."
