good evening councillors and gallery and
welcome to the council meeting of the
second of may 2022
my name is councillor Jami Klisaris
mayor of the city of Stonnington
i would like to start to start by
acknowledging that we are meeting on the
traditional lands of the Wurundjeri
Woi Wurrung & Bunurong people of the East
Kulin nations and pay our respect to
their elders past present and emerging
we extend that respect to all aboriginal
and torres strait islander peoples and
acknowledge their living connection to
country relationship with the land and
all living things extending back tens of
thousands of years
we are reminded that as councillors we
are bound by our oath of office to
undertake the duties of councillor in
the best interests of the people of the
city of Stonnington and to faithfully and
impartially carry out functions powers
authorities and discretions vested in us
under the local government act and any
other development act
i would like to welcome those in
attendance in our gallery this evening
is the first time we've had a gallery in
probably more than six or even eight
months it's great to be able to open our
doors um to to the community and i
welcome anyone who may be watching
virtually from home
i'd like to begin by introducing my
fellow councillors to my right
councillor Kate Hely from northward
councillor Nicki Batagol from south
florida councillor Alexander Lew from
eastward councillor Marcia Griffin from
north ward
councillor Matthew Koce from northward
councillor Melina Sehr from southport
councillor Mike Scott from southport and
councillor Polly Morgan from eastwood
and to my right is the chief executive
officer miss Jacqie Weatherall we are now
asked to please introduce our staff
thank you madam mayor to my right is
Judy Hogan city support
Mr Martin.......
senior finance officer
galachi chief finance officer we've got
Miss Alex Santiagos who is acting
director planning advice Mr Greg Curcio
who is
chief customer and transformation
officer to my left is Mr James ....
acting director of the community
wellbeing it's Tracy Limpens who is
acting director of organisational
capability and Mr Ian Mclaughlin who is
acting director environment and
infrastructure and to my left is mr
david
executive manager
thank you newsworthy we'll move to
apologies there are none this evening
but are there any apologies to note for
future council meetings councillors
councillor scott thank
any other apologies for council meetings
no fantastic move to item five
confirmation minutes of the previous
meeting we've got minutes from the 11th
of april 2022 is there a mover for those
councillor healy and the secondary could
i
[Music]
uh so i'm just trying to find the right
page in item 8.3 it says that i seconded
the motion for nine uh until growth it
was actually council more than their
second edition so thank you we'll check
that any other corrections or questions
to the minutes
no i will take a vote all those in favor
of adopting those with the change that's
been raised please raise your hand
anyone against that no that's harry
thank you councillors item six
disclosure of conflicts of interest are
there any to disclose this evening
councillors
fantastic i can send these questions
from the community we haven't received
any questions for tonight's council
meeting so we moved to item 8 our
general business 8.1 is the draft budget
2022-23 release for consultation i do
know that we have an officer
recommendation and an alternative
recommendation but first i'll ask um the
remover of the officer recommendation
that oh
scott
recommendation that's before us and if
you are you moving that counselor
scott thank you councillor roofing is
there a secondary for the alternative
council
um so council griffin can you just
highlight what your change is um yes
thank you mayor
what i'm proposing
is uh that we receive a report on the
numbers who engage in the consultation
and details around the demographics
including the number of rate payers
prior to budget adoption at the council
meeting on tuesday the 14th of june
thank you and would you like to speak to
them
thank you um i'll speak firstly speak to
that and then i'll go back to more
substance of the motion
may the reason that i'm suggesting this
is because in the past we've had
consultation people coming into the
council chamber we had greater
oversight really of the type of
consultations we were doing and i always
get concerned about online consultation
because i don't know exactly how we
define
who is being consulted are they
identifying themselves as residents and
rate payers
so that's really what i want to be
assured of because this budget is really
important and after all rate payers
contribute 100 million to our income at
council so i'd like to know that we have
a very good uh showing of rate payers in
the consultation
um with regard to the draft budget
itself
and thanks to the finance department for
the detailed clarity i mean this is the
budget
this is incredible a credible amount of
work it's it's sorry i'm such a paper
person but i am
um
so this motion is just putting this
draft budget out for consultation and
inviting submissions from the community
i'm in favor of that
but my concern around the budget is
although we keep hearing about more
challenging economic and financial
environment there are no signs here of
any focus on cost cuts or increased
productivity yet again council is
relying on general rates increase and
yes i understand that stonington has a
lower rates in the dollar than
neighbouring council councils but i
always ask why can't stonington be a
leader not a follower it seems ironic to
me that the proposed increase in rates
will bring an additional 1.75 million
into general rates but simply halving
the expenditure on legal and consulting
fees of 3.2 million would save 1.6
million i'm just putting that into
perspective almost the whole of the
rates increase and therefore the need
for the rates increase i think smart
budgets budgets look at two sides of the
ledger and i feel that this budget is
not sufficiently concerned with the cost
cutting and i know that our community is
still suffering from covert and the
effects of covert businesses are still
being impacted
but i'll speak more to that detail when
the draft budget returns from community
consultation and i support this draft
going out for consultation with that
amendment thank you councillor griffin
councillor
as the second guy would you like to
speak i'll just reserve my right at the
moment
the
amendment asks to receive a report on
the numbers who engage in the
consultation
is that the whole constant consultation
like all steps or just the from now
going out to
unlike this total number of people that
engage in any any platform any capacity
can i ask the questions yes
i just note that the
amendment um looks at including the
number of rate payers are we also
looking at the number of businesses and
residents as well or is it only
ratepayers at this amendment we're
saying reports on the numbers who engage
in the consultation yeah and details
around the demographics including the
number of ratepayers but not exclusive
too no no including them
i'll go through the ceo um we would get
that sort of information from the
consultation correct yes that's correct
any discussion on the draft budget
council
thank you um because of publix here i'll
stand
um
i'm voting against sending this budget
out for release my reason for this is
that the budget delivers a 1.75
rate increase
at a time when inflation and the cost of
living is skyrocketed governments at
every level need to do more to place
downward pressure on inflation and
decrease spending local councils across
victoria are not even attempting this
task here at stonington during my term
rates will have risen by 5.25
this despite many councillors being
elected on platforms to keep rates low
for increased value for money
the rate rise comes on top of
stonington's new developer contribution
tax which is a local government tax that
will be disproportionately passed on to
new first home buyers as well as the
removal of covered rates concessions for
pensioners and low-income earners yet
again those who can afford it the least
will be hit the hardest
i do concede that compared to burandara
glen ira and port phillip our rates are
relatively low
however only councillors see coast and
clozaris can take credit for this
our low rates come from the hard work
council has put in prior to rate capping
being introduced
we've given up completely on this task
this task has now been completely
delegated to the state government
the fact that our neighbours are also
charging exorbitantly high rates is not
an excuse for stonington to continue to
keep putting rates up
we should aspire not just to have low
rates but to be the lowest rate in
council in victoria
what is it that monash can do that we
can't
rate cuts will not necessarily result in
a revenue drop as low rates will serve
to drive investment boost business
confidence and make stollington a more
desirable place to leave and shop
this in turn will deliver lower
residential rents more economic activity
in the municipality and will increase
our revenue from fees and charges
this budget is not ready for committee
consultation because it's been designed
with the wrong instructions from
councillors
i would send the draft budget back to
offices and tell them to design a budget
which removes long-term dependency on
rate increases
i would also tell the ceo to finalize
the eba negotiations before sending the
budget out to the community so as to
deliver so as to deliver much-needed pay
rises in exchange from productivity
gains
morale is always low when ebas remain
unresolved
finally we need to restructure our
service delivery model we need to be
less heavy more customer focused and get
back to the core business of local
government
we have no money to waste on white
virtue signaling or counsellor invited
which has to date dominated the
attention of this council and distracted
us from our call of duties
let's get back to basics we need lower
rates smaller government and a stronger
focus on our local community
thank you council luke any further
discussion on the budget counselor kelly
thank you um i'd like to acknowledge and
i think it is indicated somewhat on the
alternative as well the significant
stakeholder consultation that's informed
this budget so officers work directly
with the community throughout the
process to ensure that the concerns and
aspirations understood and considered
and provided feedback on public and how
public inputs influence those decisions
and this included drawing upon nine
months of in-depth conversations with
the community that informed our council
plan for 2021 to 25
community participation in the budget
simulation program empower people to
help prioritise spending across
operational capital
initiatives
and the engagement program has so far
reached 85 over 85 000 people and
presented key priorities which have been
integrated into this draft budget
following this draft being approved
hopefully tonight it will also conduct
online focus groups and and still invite
informal submissions by armstrollington
kenneth strongton
so it could be argued that this draft
budget has been created with more
community involvement than ever before
while still seeking even more input
on another point as part of assessing
the robustness of the budget we look at
a lot of ratios and benchmarks with um
comparison other councils and with
election times coming up i think it's
therefore worth pointing out how little
stonington has historically received in
grants versus other neighborhood
neighbouring council areas so on average
something's grant's income was about
five six percent of total income whereas
burundara and port phillip are about six
to eight percent and yara glenara and
monash have about 10 to 15
in other words some of our neighboring
council areas receive up to three times
more grant funding from state and
federal than stonington does
and this is especially significant as we
have this
you know some of the lowest rates in in
victoria still therefore i really will
be very keenly interested to see what
support for stonington comes forth in
the upcoming federal and state elections
so over the last two years um as primer
and our current may have been working
quite hard to make it clearer to state
and federal candidates and members what
investments we'd like help with
achieving through our endorsed advocacy
priorities and we've already heard that
the liberals have committed about 2.1
million dollars and labor has committed
about 1.25 million and i expect there
will be more announcements in the next
few weeks and that state elections will
be key to finding more funder support
funding support
generally i still really look forward
like this is this is a motion to let the
community give us more feedback so i
really look forward to hearing from
residents and ratepayers and this next
round of feedback to help evolve the
budget to suit the needs and aspirations
of our community before it's actually
adopted thank you thank you
will any other councillors like to speak
to the draft budget
just a couple of quick things to say and
the council we made a good point we've
always been a low-rated council so when
rate capping came in we were coming off
a lower base
some councils like white horse put their
rates up i think it was like nine
percent or eight percent just before the
rate cap came in to get their base up
and that keeps giving once you've got a
higher rate in the dollar
you know a two percent increase on on
that is higher than a two percent
increase on a lesser rate base so you
know we're lower rated than pretty much
every case i think we're even lower
rated than the city of monash i know
perhaps i'd seen at the last budget
indicated we had been lower than the
city of monash and don't forget we rate
separately for commercial and
residential so sometimes there is a bit
of a shift between the two based on
property valuations
the end of the day
rate capping is a very arbitrary process
so it doesn't take into account the
historical aspect of us always being a
lower rated council and coming off a
lower base it's set by the essential
services commission that basically says
to keep your head just above water on an
even keel this is the absolute minimum
the essential service commission is
going to let you have and given the
given the inflation
on on input costs like concrete on
construction materials for our roads
like asphalt and so forth the
inflationary that they are going up at a
much higher rate than the essential
service commissioner is allowing rates
to go up and that's that's a key
challenge for the city i don't think the
city of stonington necessarily wants to
have the lowest rates you've got to be
careful what you wish for sometimes the
lowest rates can mean you've got the
poorest services you don't have the best
infrastructure you're behind on your
sports facilities your recreation
facilities
some of the social services that are
available in the city so you've got to
be careful what you wish for you've got
to try and get that balance right
between providing really quality
services that our residents expect and
meeting their expectations is also being
prudent which i think the city of
scotland has always been proven
financially
and that's been shown we've already
surveyed our community quite extensively
we know that a couple of the key
priorities is open space that's one of
the key priorities the other key
priority that our community is telling
us is climate change that's another one
and that's done through um
through sort of surveys that have been
run through council so we've got to
listen to our community we've already
started consulting we've gone through a
couple of strategy sessions with staff
and most councillors have participated
in that this has come up with a draft
the draft then goes out to community
consultation and we see what comes back
and i'll be really interested to hear
what the community has to say on the
draft thank you council hosts what any
other council would like to speak to the
motion
would you like to exercise your right
the second council said um thank you
madam men i will stand um also following
councillor lou some
suggestion uh so madame
look i'm happy to second this alternate
motion so firstly
i think most speakers have spoken to the
budget itself um this council hasn't
formed a position on the budget
um these are this hasn't been put
together by wrong instructions from
counsellors this is um a good balanced
approach at this point in time
we're yet to hear from our community and
that is what this motion is about it's
about putting it out to our community to
exhibit it as required under the act
invite the submissions last year we had
a very long evening listening to a
number of submissions which we many of
which we took on board and adopted in
the budget that we adopted last year so
this is an opportunity
as we said hear from the community
and um and we may make changes to what's
proposed that's the whole intent of this
motion so let's not jump the gun and
assume that this is where we're going to
land
um and also in addition to the amendment
as proposed by councillor griffin
to receive the report we get that
information anyway but it's just nice to
reiterate it for those residents that do
do have an interest in our budget
but they do you know understand that
their feedback is respected we do look
at it in great detail and then it's
called out specifically in this amended
motion
thank you council said would any other
speakers like to speak
counselor griffin oh just very quickly
me that this is about sending the uh
draft budget out for exhibition
uh and inviting submissions and i'm
particularly interested to know about
the details of how many rate payers etc
because i'm firmly have a belief that
it's their money uh and as i said i will
speak uh at greater length about the
budget when we get those submissions
back from our community thank you
thank you okay so counselors will
proceed
and the division has been called
so all those in favor please raise your
hands and all those against and we'll
cast it again to the division so all
those in favor
councillors healey babagal griffin coast
ser scott morgan and osiris and all
those against councillor lou so the
draft budget is carried for public
consultation
thank you councillors we move to item
8.2 the best value program
of which i also know we have an
alternative recommendation um counselor
healy or would you like to move the
officer recommendation and is there a
seconder for the officer recommendation
council of coasts so thank you
councilman thank you
um i'm really excited to see the
proposal that i developed during the
council election campaign in 2020 come
to life through the best value program i
recall in the first week of becoming
counsellor taking my little white paper
for this program around every council
around this table and to the ceo
describing as one of the key areas i
want to see implemented whilst in
council
its delivery is also reflected in our
council plan and our annual plan and it
responds proactively to the local
government's act requiring continuous
improvement
and now we have it before us to endorse
the program is a thorough best practice
approach to improving the efficiency of
services that we provide to our
community i believe it's also a first in
the victorian local government
much of the plan is being taken from
international best practices with
learnings from councils like auckland
city council who have seen extremely
strong benefits from the process and the
efficiencies of many millions of dollars
the stollington team have refined this
program to better deliver on the
aspirations of our community
to ensure that we're not only looking at
financial benefits of service
improvement but also evolving community
expectations and environmental
sustainability
the desire for a balanced multiple
bottom line approach to value for money
is really important it recognises that
procuring goods and providing services
does not necessarily mean simply
stripping out costs but rather the
pursuit of the best possible outcome for
the total cost of ownership and
acknowledges our responsibility to care
for our current and future residents to
value our employees and to protect the
environment and deal fairly suppliers
this balance is now expected of any
australian corporation and is especially
important as a local government
the best value program will give the
people of stonington confidence that
they are getting high quality services
for good value for money and ensures
that we embed continuous innovation and
keep striving to be a cost-effective
organisation continually questioning of
questioning if there's a better way to
do something
i understand that once this approach is
approved officers will begin to look to
appoint the independence reference group
and this reference group is likely to be
filled by local experts who wish to
provide their business expertise to
council they could possibly include
highly experienced retired big4
consultants engineers asset managers who
are able to challenge business
assumptions in the local government
sector and encourage a culture of
continuous innovation
i really look forward to seeing who's
appointed into this inaugural into these
inaugural roles
i congratulate all those who've worked
so hard to bring this program to
fruition and look forward to seeing the
results of the program thank you
councillor
councillor coast as the secondary would
you like to see i'll reserve my ride
open it up for discussion is there
discussion with questions counselor
um thank you madam um
in george orwell's book 1984 he
introduced the term double thick
so double think
means
simultaneously accepting two conflicting
beliefs as truth this best value program
of madame merc is double thick it's
saying let's spend
five hundred thousand dollars
with no guarantee as to what return we
will ever get
on a speculative exercise
to determine whether we can get better
value
councils have an obligation
to act
in best value
to not waste rate payers money in any
event
so this idea that um that we go and we
spend half a million dollars looking for
savings not knowing whether there are
any savings
it just
doesn't make sense i think it could be
renamed the worst value program let's
spend five hundred thousand dollars on
council officers looking for savings and
they may or they may not come up with
something
thank you
actually like i'm rising to request a
deferral on this matter i think it
requires further discussion around the
council of the table
um i think i'm concerned i think it's a
good point that's made
we all we're all in here for the right
reasons to get the best value for our
dollar so if it requires a further
discussion and briefing that may ask um
and take a second to also be deferred
for one cycle let's say the guy comes
if i'm allowed to
yes
how long sorry one or two cycles thank
you
i suggested
yeah where it makes sense i know we've
got some very paint agendas coming up so
so
essentially we give it the time when it
deserves in a breathing matter we'll say
for up to two cycles and so cancel it
close
um i know that there are upcoming
programs planned for this is this going
to negatively affect those programs
which are in the pipeline
i swear we'll be able to answer
yeah
[Music]
i think it's got merit but it's worthy
that i'm taking back to briefing having
heard some of the concerns councillor
lou has mentioned i know there's another
um alternate to support this as well um
so clearly other councillors are
supportive but maybe we just need to
thresh it out a little bit more at
briefing
with offices okay are there any other
comments in relation to the deferral
oh no just that i'm very happy about it
deferral this is a this is a huge spend
and i've given i've read through this
plan very extensively it's very
complicated
and i'm just not clear that where it's
worked and what sort of return on
investment it has achieved and so we're
just being thrown into this with you
know nearly half a million dollar 500
000 spend without sufficient
understanding of where this has worked
what it has returned and what it could
possibly return to stonington
any other views on the referral
counselors
okay um council said you need to sum up
on the deferral
so we'll put the deferral to the vote
for
up to two cycles all those in favor of
the deferral
that's carried unanimously thank you
councillors we'll move to item 8.3
the hard waste collection service
and i please seek a movement for that so
i think i saw
councillor coast and seconded by
councillor griffin thank you council
post ah thank you mayor so
this report is basically to keep the
status closed so we're approving
retaining the biannual blanket hard
waste collection during autumn and
spring so twice a year
we undertook an extensive consultation
to see if there was a preference in our
community for an on-call service so
you know you just ring and book to have
your hard rubbish collected or whether
there was a preference for continuing
the the biannual service that we've
currently got
there was um actually very the survey
showed there was very strong awareness
of the current service so 91 awareness
and staggeringly an 89 satisfaction of
the current service so you really get
such strong figures if you're in
business and you get the
89
net promoter score or something similar
satisfaction score you'd be absolutely
wrapped so it shows our city works
people are doing a fantastic job we did
a combination of an online survey where
people could opt in and give their views
but we also did a telephone telephone
survey that was representative of the
community so i could get a really good
snapshot of what different age groups
and demographics thought across the city
we had
43 support on the phone survey for the
status quo and 46 online support so the
two sort of broadly married up and that
was the the largest response was in
favour of that the blanket collection
i'm really actually pleased that um that
the surveys have reinforced what i
suspected would be the result um i
thought the community would have a
preference for the biannual service you
know the two services a year the blanket
service
but um we do from time to time get
residents contact us and say they want a
you know
a service where they can call and book
and we do get some pressure from some in
the local community this reaffirms that
we're actually delivering the service
that most people really want
and look forward to so
we can go forward with a high degree of
confidence that this is what our
community wants that we're in tune with
their expectations on this
um there's a contract that was signed on
the 21st of in august 2021
um it's the value of approximately 1.2
million dollars per annum approximately
3.6 million over the three-year period
and so this is the service that will be
continuing
thank you
and council griffin
um thank you mayor just a couple more
points but that's pretty comprehensive
the way council of coast has put that
that this hard waste collection contract
has the flexibility to introduce a book
service should the situation change
um and that council officers will
continue to investigate hard waste
options to improve resource recovery i
think you know we're on this constant
improvement about resource recovery it's
very important i love the hard waste
collection
i'm a minimalist i have nothing to put
in it but i love seeing what everyone
else puts in it and i love the way
people drive around from other areas
collecting goods from our hard waste
collection
and i want to really thank mr kiernan
because you know this last hard waste
collection he's not here tonight but i'm
sure he'll be if not watching um someone
will pass on the message the hard waste
collection was so efficient this year we
had a few issues last year because of
covert this year it was so efficient so
there wasn't stuff lying around
everywhere probably my only suggestion
would be to even tighten up the
timelines about when people can put
rubbish out and when it's collected
probably not a week a few days i love
the hard waste collection and i thought
this was one of the best surveys that we
had done in stonington it was really
clear
it was a great outcome thank you
here
um so essentially it just says how much
we really love our hardware selection um
because i know how exciting it is to get
one of those brochures in your litter
box twice a year it's this invitation to
dive into your home give us really great
clean out to cleanse the marine marie
cup combo yourself into the sort of
orderly bliss
um but the joy in this moment our
calendars is not really about seeing
your stuff on the nature strip it's
about cleansing your home things that no
longer start doing
and creating a sense of water and
control in your life
and we also know that a lot of what we
put on our nature strips is actually a
really good condition and it could be
used again we balance that knowledge
with this wistful hope that what you're
doing is providing a sort of offering to
your neighborhood with the expectation
that someone might possibly realize the
object's worth and take that take that
home with them
um and this is a bit of a hopeful
process and you sort of have conjure up
with some good done good karma and
brownie points if someone's picked up
something from your nature strip but
with this in mind i'd like to invite
people to imagine that the future of
hard waste collection could be a little
bit different instead of a grocery
litter box primarily focus on wanting
you to throw out your excess waste onto
the nature strip that we invite you to
participate in twice really big clean up
instead of the main message being about
depositing stuff onto the nature strip
for recycling landfill we prioritize
messages about how the output of your
big cleanup can be repaired sold donated
instead of throwing away a perfectly
functional
kettle or tv into the the offering table
of the nature strip we could provide
like a works okay drop off being used at
our town halls letting people you know
potentially take these items as well
instead of throwing their kids bikes on
the nature strip we can tell you about
how you could donate them to
organizations like back to bikes which
refurbishes used old bikes and gives
them to those in need and instead of
chucking that amazing wooden train set
because you don't know anyone with kids
anymore you can suggest that you donate
it to the local toy library
so culturally i think we need to move
focus away from the disposal
of the hardware collection being the
headline to a message of reducing
reusing repairing reduction and donation
we can still continue to celebrate the
joy of the big clean out twice a year
and it's beloved place in the calendar
of every household but we need to evolve
how we treat all waste and we need to
continue to see council take a
leadership position and that cultural
change so i see this report as a
confirmation about how beloved and
appreciative hard waste is in the
calendars of residents but offer hope
that
we can celebrate this as a festival of
the big clean up going forward in a
different way
thank you
thank you councillor haley um council
scott i have a question through you med
the third recommendation that council
know the hard waste collection
contractors flexibility to introduce a
book service
i'm just wondering if um that
would come back to council for a
decision
yes so you mean definitely council was
to a thing of a mind in the future to go
to a service then that would be subject
to a council resolution but we've built
the flexibility into the contract that
should the community's views change
while this contract is there that this
allows us the opportunity to take that
great thank you
would anyone like to speak councillor
morgan for you mayor um i just wanted to
encourage what other councils had said
but also to know and build upon our
guest that council griffin
mentioned that this will look at how you
can potentially reduce waste or look at
other collection options and one thing i
do know is that there's been a lot of
feedback about polystyrene and
mattresses and things like that and
perhaps in the future we might be able
to uh recycle them or dispose of them
more effectively or efficiently but i
also wanted to note that sonnington
offers uh
our wonderful hard waste transfer
station like sillington uh transfer
station where people can go
and local residents can often pull free
or a minimal cost dispose of any waste
in between collection times so encourage
community members if they've got things
they need to get rid of between the two
collection times they can make use of
that service there's no need to engage
in dumping of
your waste it's very simple to go and
take it down to that transfer station
and
save council money and also help the
environment by making sure these
materials are disposed of most
appropriately and with uh maximum
reduction in waste and
the most increase in reuse of those
materials
thank you would any other counsellors
like to speak to the motion
council about a goal
thank you mayor i won't repeat anything
that's been said as it's all um
i agree with everything that's been said
except for the fact that i actually was
surprised i thought that the results
would come back saying that there was a
preference for at least a hybrid if not
to double booked service so but that's
what i thought and i've been proven
wrong uh 13 people shy of two and a half
thousand people have
told us what they think and that's an
extraordinary amount of people to hear
back from and so actually just what i
wanted to say was thank you to everyone
who took the time to provide the
feedback thank you to the officers as
well for continuing to go out and and i
know that there were lots of lots of
pushes from various councils including
councillor griffin to try new ways to
try and get that community voice heard
and we really did hear it loud and clear
here if it ain't broke
thank you
we'll go back to you counselor chris to
summer yeah so look i think the really
good points made i guess it's a case of
you know the current system is serving
the community well it's a much loved
system um it's working i think in terms
of the um the consultations probably
best practice for us in terms of the
consultation around this and it's made
the decision making really really easy
and it's really pleasing too that you
know both the online and the phone
survey results were quite similar
i don't think we'll need to um to use
that cause in the contract for an actual
service because i think you know we're
going to be really well served with what
we've got
and um
also you know
in terms of recycling and that yes we
need to we need to do things as smart as
we can to avoid things going to landfill
i think one of the things about this
system is if someone sees something that
they can reuse in someone else's trash
it often gets reused and a lot of it
actually disappears before before it's
picked up by council as well so i'm
really pleased at the result and um
nothing further thank you we'll proceed
to devote all those in favor please
raise your hands that's carrie
unanimously thank you so much
councillors
we'll move to planning so eight point
four is one three zero one dandenong
road north east i do know there is an
alternative recommendation before us but
first i'll ask if there's a mover of the
officer recommendation
so that lapses so it's the remover of
the alternative councilor lou and the
secondary councillor morgan thank you
councillor wu
um thank you madam mayor um look i'll be
brief because it's it's planning and
this is is pretty simple um
there's uh
at this stage is to apply the law um but
to apply it with taking into account the
views of the local community
and the local community has spoken very
strongly in respect of this particular
application
this is a this will be a tricky one at
bcat because it is on dandelion road
but most of the
the proposed developments have a
frontage of mill around
so
for that reason
i'm prepared to
move this notice of refusal
the
for the
alternative recommendation states the
grounds
i would expect that the
applicant may wish to appeal this map
this refusal to vcat and it may be that
throughout that process there's some
form of negotiation where something
better than what we've got before us is
eventually put forward but at the moment
there's been too much to squeeze into a
small block
and
it has
not been done to the satisfaction of the
local residents and more discussion
really needs to take place between the
local residents and the developer to
find the right solution we haven't got
to it at this point so i'm moving this
notice of refusal
i would say to the residents watching
do stay engaged in the process do go
along to vcap do put your
case forward because if you disengage
from the process
you may not get the outcome that you
want
thank you council alu and councilman
morgan as a secretary would you like to
see yes for you man i wanted to um
totally endorse what council has said
and and that i very much agree with what
he said on this matter and also to add
that
uh one of the issues is is that
although this property is on daniel road
and facing danielle road in reality all
the townhouses actually interface to
milwaukee avenue
milwaukee avenue is a very narrow street
it's very much a suburban street
and
if this was one property along it would
not meet the criteria
the setbacks
that you know they're judged as side
setbacks even though that is where the
pedestrian access and car park access to
each townhouse is based and it's about
three metres i do note that the
application
applicant
um
has made some adjustments particularly
to townhouse number four however the
visual bulk of having three-story
townhouses only three metres set back
from the residential street and although
technically
standing on roads actually onto
milwaukee avenue
is really significant and it is a huge
cause of concern for residents and i
think residents have a great ride to be
concerned by that because there is
nothing else like this on the lower
avenue
if the properties were facing and
interfacing onto daniel road it would be
a different matter i think would be
really clear part ben
but because of the visual bulk
and the um transition into the rest of
milwaukee avenue i personally feel that
the current version of the plans is just
not something i could support
thank you
would anyone else like to speak to the
refusal counselors
i know it's not my board but um 24
objections is a lot of objections and i
drove down miller today it's not a
street that i knew previously but i
drove down it today and i had to pull
over twice to let cars come in the other
direction so so it is a very narrow
street that was really really obvious
and and i can really understand the
reasoning behind the refusal thank you
and um
thank you mayor yes i i've passed this
streak twice in the last week by a set
of circumstances and also i was very
interested to see the street uh it's
actually doesn't face on to daniel road
it faces onto a strip that faces onto
daniel road and what i noticed about
that
that on today on that strip was that it
was a very residential route of houses
you know very low rise and i thought
even on the dandenong side of things
this would look really out of place out
of character so apart from the street
itself i felt i felt that uh you know i
totally support the refusal for yours
thank you
for the comments
counselor would you like to sum up
um i don't think there's anything more
that needs to be said
we'll put it to the vote all those in
favor of the refusal please raise your
hands that's carried beyond sleep
thank you councillors we'll move to item
8.5 which is 11 howard street south
yarra
um is there a mover for this
recommendation council healey and the
secondary councillor griffin thank you
councillor healey thank you so this
proposal seeks to construct a ground
first floor edition at the very existing
dwelling along with addition um
above the existing garage and these
additions are cited designed to reduce
any adverse amenity impacts to joining
properties
the officers consider the design
appropriately responds to the preferred
neighborhood character in the
surrounding context
the contentious part of the design is
the construction of a studio above the
existing garage and the officers support
the creation of the studio however they
don't support the terrorists around the
studio and the key reason for this is
that in order to create screening for
the neighborhood labor's privacy it
would result in a fence that's up to
4.35 metres high and this is an absurd
height although a couple of the
neighbours have noted that they're okay
with the fence and it's tight as
counters we need to take a long term
view and i agree with the officers that
it's not an optimal outcome for future
neighbours even if the current
neighbours think that it's okay
the neighbors can decide among
themselves down the line if they still
want to put up higher fences between the
properties but it's a civil matter and
it doesn't need to be part of this
permit
if it was part of this permit it would
lock them into if forever more to having
these unnecessarily crazy high fences
the area that the applicant was
proposing to be as a terrorist could
still be attractively landscaped to
provide a nice outlook without creating
an opportunity to overlook the navy's
properties therefore i fully support the
office's recommendation thank you and
councillor griffin as the second one ah
thank you mayor look this was a really
interesting one because it was a very
heated consult meeting but i'm pleased
to to learn that some of those
objectives have now come along come on
board uh because a number of concessions
have been made and as council media said
this is one of those situations where
you have a very narrow single fronted
victorian house with a long block and
the concern about having a second story
on a garage being able to look into all
these backyards so i totally understood
where these objectives were coming from
but it's really gratifying to know that
there is now agreement by i think
virtually all the objectives which is
great
and the other thing that i think is
really important is that when people can
develop these small townhouses it means
they're going to live in them for a
period of time hopefully and we should
be encouraging
know that some of these places were
built a hundred plus years ago and are
not all that suited to today's lifestyle
so i always feel really encouraged when
people are renovating these properties
and in this case uh you know it is a
beautiful area mainly single fronted
victorian terraces i think this is a
really good outcome and i think you know
everyone has come along with these uh
variations and amendments and well done
to the planning department as usual for
ensuring that on on the whole i think uh
these objectives will be very happy with
the outcome
thank you
i'll open it up uh council
just to to add further to the previous
discussion i guess the key
points are on page 62 and 63 of the
officers report which are the conditions
so
condition 1a is that the upper level
terrorists above the garage to be
deleted consistent with what council
helia said
also there's got to be confirmation of
both sides of the bifold screening to
the north facing balcony access from
bedroom one will manually open and close
together which is another condition
added after the consultative meeting
and there's also a 0.6 which
is prior to occupation of the building
fixed privacy screens in brackets not
adhesive film because we know they can
come off
uh it is designed to limit overlooking
as required by standard a15 cores 54.04
in the accordance with the endorsed plan
must be installed on the satisfaction
responsible authority to maintain to the
satisfaction responsible authority
thereafter for the life of the building
so that um that addresses the issue of
overlooking as well so look we got some
really good feedback during the
consultation process it was good to have
a consultative meeting um that
feedback's gone in an informal final
report and it's locked in there in
conditions it will stay with this
planning application forever so a really
good outcome the best outcome we could
get under the circumstances
thank you would anyone like to comment
on this application
we're back in the online no need to sum
up or i will proceed to the vote all
those in favor
carry the receipt thank you councillors
we move to our final planning item eight
point six which is four ten two hour
tourer by doing that there are two
alternative recommendations before us so
um first i'll put the officer
recommendation if that lap says um then
we can go with the first shelf hands for
the alternate that is put first so first
of all is the remover
for the officer
recommendation
that lapses um did anybody like to move
an alternative counselor and is there a
second one for that council griffin so
council press can you please state what
your alternative is i can
give it a read though um the council
authorised officers of the notice
to issue a notice of refusal
just provide a summary but this is to
refuse the planning application which is
right up there on the screen for
everyone here to see it also online as
well and feel free to speak to it thank
you so we will be um what i'm asking
like
fellow councillors to support is a
refusal of this application i just feel
it's an over development on the side
it's quite a small site and particularly
the interface into tin turn
is not um is not consistent is my view
and that's reflected under the
conditions so um the reasons for refusal
are set out in four points proposal
fails to respect and is it odds with the
existing naval character of the area and
does not comply with enabled character
objectives course 55021 and the detail
and the design detail objectives course
5561
to the height scale design sitting
and the build form the proposal is
inconsistent with enabled character of
the area in particular with tinton
avenue and it's very unsympathetic to
tintern
uh the proposal will have unreasonable
visual bulk impacts to neighbouring
properties the development crowds are
cited street boundaries and results in
an excessive degree of israel bulk
presenting to tintin avenue and
adjoining properties the development
fails to comply with force 5331 street
setbacks and course
5541 side and rear setbacks so look it's
a it's a four-story apartment building
it's got a rooftop terrace as well
there's not much open space on the site
so there's stuck it on the roof and we
all know what happens with noise on
these rooftop terraces they carry
everywhere
there's one level of basement car
parking comprising two um and it
comprises two three bedroom apartments
and two four bedroom apartments with a
total of five bike spaces and provided
across the ground basement level a total
of nine car parking spaces are provided
in a basement with access crossover on
tinton avenue so gain access is on
tinten avenue so look it it presents as
just a massive brick wall um when you're
driving down tworack road towards the
city
it's a huge brick wall right up hard
against the pavement and then you've got
a little bit of a setback with some tree
plantings and then another big brick
wall going up to the to the rooftop
terrace it's not well articulated it's
not consistent with the other buildings
in the area where there are large
buildings on two rack road you'll notice
that the brick walls are often set back
a little bit or there's some greenery
planted and then it steps up to a higher
wall and then you've got tree plantings
and so forth this is right up hard
against the wall in a street that's a
very residential street in two rock
which is tin turn avenue so look i just
don't think it um it fits with with our
planning on with our planning grounds
and it should be refused hopefully the
applicant will go back to the drawing
board and come back with something much
better in future
thank you councillor and
thank you mayor look i'm totally in
agreement with this refusal this this is
a massive bulky looking building
and uh the neighbor the immediate
neighbours to this building this
four-story massive bulky building on the
east side we have two-story commercial
building across the road that's the
start of direct village to the south
side three-story unit building
and to the north side sorry to the
let me get it right to the west side a
two-story building so here we've got a
four-story building with a rooftop
terrace and not just a rooftop terrace
but a swimming pool on top now i believe
that this you know really impacts on
neighbours amenities when they are so
buildings are so close to each other
and if you look at the design guidelines
for garden river to ensure new buildings
and extensions do not dominate the
streetscape to encourage a high quality
of building detailing that references
without mimicking the details of
buildings in the area this building does
none of that
to maintain and reinforce the rhythm of
spacing around between and around
buildings to maintain and strengthen the
garden setting of buildings and tree
canopy of the neighborhood to prevent
the loss of front garden space this
building does not conform with any of
these requirements in this garden river
precinct so i also support the refusal
thank you casa healey thank you
um i have similar but different concerns
as my fellow norfolk councillors um i
agree with officers that the height is
appropriate there's good in car parking
it's a strong landscaping design i also
found applicant has done an excellent
job with appropriately managing the
north and south sides of the building um
overall i think it's an appropriate
development for the side it's a four
four full floor apartments and a terrace
seem reasonable in the area and the
quality of the apartments and their
design seems to be at a high standard
from a strong architectural practice
however like my fellow ward councillors
i'm concerned about the interface on tim
turn avenue we currently see a vertical
face of four floors with a setback of
only two meters from the boundary line
with the lift shaft on the boundary
itself i see this is too confronting on
the tin turn street frontage
i do acknowledge however there's going
to be four trees along the boundary
which will reach a height of 10 meters
and two trees which will reach a height
of 8 meters and the lift core itself has
a climber going up it so landscaping
will use to help soften the interface
although it is described as being
adjacent to the activity centre it is
adjacent and it's not actually part of
that zone
therefore i was going for shallow an
alternate recommendation to require
setback at the fourth floor by one metre
because given the proposed landscaping i
believe that this would overcome the
concerns that i have and would be an
acceptable outcome
thank you would any other councillors
like to speak to the alternative motion
council coach you need to sum up no
fantastic we'll proceed straight to the
vote all those in favor of the refusal
please raise your hands and all those
against
that's carried thank you councillors
so we moved to item 8.7
um amendment
c319 and
is there a movement for c3200 record
another question of course
thank you um look i just wanted to ask
this castle
that difficult name uh sorry um what was
the cost of this study because look this
is just to show the gallery and remind
all of us
this is a huge study
amazing study and i think it denotes the
importance that we hold heritage
uh in stonington and i'm very interested
to hear what it's cost us and how that
cost compares with doing all these
studies individually do we have a figure
i can
actually have information
our two-day council has spent 485
thousand dollars um he's anticipated
that council will spend approximately 1
million 180 000 in total for the reviews
and that includes the suburbs of moulton
tourette's kuya
um the suburbs of south yarra glen iris
and morgan peace have not been costed as
yet but if council was to look at
applying their heritage overlays to
properties on an individual basis so if
we didn't go through any suburbs other
process that would cost us approximately
twenty thousand to forty thousand per
property
thank you thanks
so is there a mover for the
recommendation
counselor healing and second dead by
councillor bada gold thank you
councillor
when we reflect on aspirations of our
community as defined in the community
vision
maintaining and celebrating our heritage
features really predominantly and this
program is part of delivering on that it
identifies and looks to protect the
places and areas that give our city a
sense of place a place to be proud of
places that make stonington stonington
and i note that our community vision
also asks us to celebrate to celebrate
the built in natural heritage cultural
heritage to reactivate and celebrate
private and public buildings
and this program helps to identify and
protect but we also need to think about
ways to keep celebrating and
reactivating our heritage buildings
i really applaud this body of work and
the future studies of other areas that
will come to us for endorsement
but also as a challenge thing we need to
look at to the next stage of
reactivation and celebration of our
heritage to deliver on the aspirations
our communities set for us i believe if
we're going to begin to increase the
desired literacy of our communities we
can work together to ensure that we
preserve and create more spaces that we
can love
thank you
thank you matt
our heritage is why many must choose to
live here it's beautiful it's a it's a
gorgeous area to live in
and i hadn't actually seen the
volume of papers printed but now i have
read them when you see that you can
understand the amount of work that's
been involved
this goes back to 2019 so this is
predates me um a lot of the returning
councillors
where a detailed study was
recommended and approved and an
independent expert or a group of
independent experts has gone out and put
that together which is really quite
extraordinary it's the second review
that's happened we've seen melvin come
to council already this is now three
other suburbs and i believe that paran
windsor will be the two final ones that
will come to us
just for anyone who's watching it's a
review in two parts which is why it's so
detailed
the first is to look at the existing
heritage and updates that might be
needed citations
changes mapping anonymous anomalies etc
and then the second part is that gap
study which i suspect is where a lot of
the work is involved and that's where
the new individual places come the new
precincts are recommended
and any superseding of neighborhood
character with a heritage overlay as we
have in the recommendation for bailey
avenue and valentine
i understand that notice will be given
to the property owners with any changes
that have been proposed and exhibition
will then commence
after following authorisation from the
minister for planning and then
submissions will be invited so we have a
strong history of investigating and
protecting our places and this study
really adds to the excellent work that's
been done today it's not over now some
of the things that perhaps haven't some
of the buildings perhaps haven't made it
this time round will need to be looked
at in the future but hopefully this will
this will keep us going given the
expenses involved quite some time
thank you i'll open it up is there any
further discussion on the site
council advice
you know
heritage is really unique in the city of
stonington um it's really is what set us
apart and you can't get it back once you
lose it we've lost so many beautiful
heritage buildings over the years um
because we haven't been able to get them
protected before the developers have got
at it
a lot of the city is is heritage
protected now and that reflects the work
of many generations of council councils
and um and officers and so forth working
to achieve that
and part of the reason why these
processes are quite expensive is because
there's a lot of consultation that takes
part in that you know there's got to be
an independent sort of panel set up has
to be a lot of work from officers
consultants and then we go out to the
people impacted in the community
and ask for their feedback on about
three or four different occasions before
it finally goes to the minister for
approval so it's a really extensive
process that recognises the importance
of property rights as well as protecting
something as important as our heritage
as well
just a few more words i think now we
have about 25
of our residences covered by heritage
so that's fantastic really i'm sure that
there are some more possibilities for
future studies but i think that's a
great outcome and i know not everyone
feels the same way and some people want
to tear these wonderful buildings down
but if you travel to european cities or
anywhere else in the world what makes
them fabulous
is the uh the heritage
and i think you know we all get very
upset when we see beautiful houses being
torn down we have to do whatever we can
as a council
to discontinue that so i think this is a
great outcome and i totally support this
study
thank you
any other comments counselors
council here do you need to sign up
great we'll proceed to the vote so all
those in favor that's carried
unanimously thank you councillors let's
move to eight point eight uh coded 19
response and recovery progress and
future directions report so we're
looking to endorse those this evening is
[Music]
but maybe just a few more words which is
really that this is um i've just been
trying to write a gender item because i
wasn't ready to take this um
that the future directions report will
be used to establish our priorities and
our future actions and it'll guide
planning and funding and initiatives as
we move forward and we continue
as i keep hearing to live with covent
and what that looks like and what that
means
and there'll be some indicators and some
updates that i understand will be coming
through on the ceo report so that we can
track progress which which is essential
it's it's it's great to come up with
actions it's even more important to
track against them
and then the second part of this is a
progress report this really shows us
what we've done it's not an impact
report at this point in time it really
just summarises responsive recovery
initiatives but there will be some
evaluation to follow at which we will
actually be able to see the impact of of
the actions that have been taken today
here which i think is fair enough
council's response to the pandemic has
been significant and deliberate the
formation of multi-disciplinary response
teams a dedicated 1.89 million funding
reserve and a community recovery
committee of local agencies etc i think
everyone has seen the impact of the
outdoor dining for example that's
probably the single most impacting
thing that the council has done for this
community it was done really quickly and
i really admired the way council
officers uh
worked really quickly when this pandemic
hit us so
i commend them on that and i have
nothing further to say there
would anyone else like to comment on
these reports
right uh no need to sum up i'm assuming
just to say briefly about it
if people have something to say on the
report
please move them by all means
we're probably just all sick of hearing
about it right then proceed to the vote
uh almost in favor of endorsing those
that's carried animals thank you
councillors so 8.9
is the covered recovery fund of
recommended expenditure which is for the
remainder of that 1.89 million um is
there a movement for this report
cancelled healing and the second up
i'll second for the purposes of debate
thank you
so this is really looking at the balance
of that coverage response fund
um because council's already previously
approved drawdowns for the crown market
traders for 14
days
uh for a concession for residential um
uh for pension
concession holders
um and then a range of other initiatives
as well including volunteer support
programs and arts and culture programs
so this report now recommends the
following drawback downs on the funds
which will um take it to century zero
and that's going to include mental
health education well for welfare
support for sporting clubs and there was
even an article recently about how kids
during covert have got how to catch a
ball or something so you know this sort
of thing is really important um library
programs including digital skills
building for
culturally linguistically diverse
communities and getting job ready family
programs including skills for stronger
families
anxiety and children
and bullying and social interaction
issues a threat together residency in
parang square which builds upon a trial
is done at the hub i believe
funding to support precincts and place
making activations and also the funding
of roadside dining safety barriers that
were used for the summer roadside dining
program
so the impacts of covert will continue
to have an impact in our community and
the fy 22 co-recovery fund was of great
importance to help our community deal
with social pressure points as they
arose and areas such as family violence
youth mental health
and social engagement drops and
volunteering drops in sports
participation increased isolation
vulnerability and of course the impacts
of covert on the local business economy
have all been supported through this
one-year fund so i fully endorse the
final drawdown
thank you councillor healey i don't
often second but i'll very briefly just
say that um you know this isn't it's not
that starting to only spend 1.89 million
on covert assistance in recovery um
we've actually spent well over 10
million over the last couple of years to
support our community but what this 1.89
was was the great rise of last year that
we put aside and said we were going to
use this for any kind of covert related
challenges that our community faced and
we didn't want to just use it to
continue waiving fees or things like
that we wanted to really use it on
practical programs um and that's what
we're doing particularly with this final
bit so although we did spend some on on
a rent waiver at the front market we had
a concession and we had all of these
outdoor dining initiatives we are now
looking at those volunteer programs arts
and cultural programs and you know
there's a great there's a great list in
there um which is just hopefully going
to encourage our community to come out
um continue to explore their local
community and you know support our
businesses of course so we do need to
spend this in the financial year that is
what we're committed to doing and so
what we're looking at tonight is that is
that final proportion
um so i'll open it up are there any
other comments counselor
i just have a question um
from the ceo for you man there was there
ever an officer recommendation discussed
a briefing about an additional
covert recovery drawdown fund around
market traders and was it clear from the
discussion between councillors that this
was this officer recommendation was not
supported and subsequently
officers withdrew that recommendation
and it never made its way to a council
meeting
yes
certainly
draft reports are provided to council
briefings that officers develop and they
are draft in nature so
any of the reports that come up for
discussion at a council of voting are
only for discussion purposes and at that
report there was a suggestion about an
opportunity and following the
conversation officers um chose not to
not to put a recommendation forward that
they had discussed as adult
would you like to speak to the item
counselor
all those in favor
thank you councillors let's move to
eight point ten
the regenerating counon crew which is
our gardener's creek contract awards um
can i please ask for remover of the
recommendation
thank you council
can i seek a secondary first council
yeah
is there a second eye
thank you council griffin uh
um very briefly mayor
because we've talked about our garden
creek master plan a number of times this
is a contract um
to help us progress our gardeners creek
master plan much of what we cannot
discuss in an open council meeting
because much of the dot many of the
documents are confidential
um
that's all i need to say
okay very succinct thank you and
councillor griffith did you want to stay
uh just that gardner's creeping is
approximately 45 of all open space in
the city therefore it's really important
and we need to have this looking
fantastic so i totally support this
thank you or open it up is there any
further discussion on the item
i will just highlight because it was in
the news last week that um our member
for higgins dr katie allen has committed
1.8 million dollars towards our country
master plan um it's not of this
particular section however i did want to
highlight that it is part of
what sorry it is one of the other
sections that we will be completing
shortly um and you know it's more than
just making governance creek look good
it will function significantly better
and it could be a lot more to our
community than it currently is with the
inclusion of picnic areas barbecue areas
proper trails separation of bike and
pedestrian improving the waterways and
you know a whole list of
amazing initiatives so i think i think
it is important to acknowledge that
contribution that we've seen received
from our local member and there has been
a commitment as well from the labor
candidate um dr michelle for about a
million dollars i believe as well for a
different section of the creek
kilometers long so there are lots of
different sections and we're very
grateful to receive any funding to
helping council improve that which means
we should be able to get it done in a
lot less than 10 years which is what
we're currently projecting
um
no further comments i'll ask councillor
if you'd like to sum up
um you've said it all
thanks all right we proceed to the vote
so all those in favor of adopting the
contract that's carried unanimously
thank you councillors let's move to item
811 um which is also a contract award uh
is there a river for this item
councillor healy and the secondary
council of articles thank you councillor
hilly thank you
i'm sure when councillors from
particularly north and southwards who
are campaigning in 2020 chapel street
came up with a key area of frustration
and hope for residents they're
frustrated because they we know how
important the strip is the identity and
pride of our city and we're frustrated
because we see that its current state
does not meet our aspirations for the
potential of it
we have seen for a long time the decline
of strip shopping and the growth of the
wall we've witnessed our other beloved
shop strip shopping strips and other
council areas become ghost towns and
we've seen through cover the increasing
growth of online retail
these are the two competitors chapel
street strips like it malls can decide
where the tenants go what standard
presentations required they provide easy
access to bathrooms they provide a sense
of safety and cleanliness but they still
miss the magic of chapel street they
miss that sense of community they miss
the sense of festivity discovery
discovery and authenticity that strip
shopping really creates
and while we need to address some of the
current barriers to visitation chapel
street we also need to lean into the
authentic magic of chapel street to
ensure that it's not just an icon of
stonington but of melbourne and of the
world the team that's been selected to
help us on this journey presented during
their pitch process precinct
transformations that they're also part
of
in criden south high street in london
the melbourne arts precinct
transformation and streetscape
transformations in city north and sydney
i'm excited also that they look not just
at the aesthetic and experience of the
transformations they make but also the
social and economic impact of their
projects the london case study discussed
shock vacancies being reduced from 25 to
5 percent through the projects and i
also really like their approach um the
approach their practice discusses about
how it's good to have an idea of what
the big future is through master plans
etc but we still need to have little
futures too with short-term activations
and experimentation so that we start
moving sooner rather than later on
lifting our neighborhoods
chapel street should be one of the great
streets in the world and as locals we
know its potential to be that and this
project starts to work towards making
that reality
thank you that's about a goal as a
second year would you like to speak
thank you it's a heartache to follow
i won't add too much there obviously the
passion and what's to come out of this
piece of work is very evident
it's just exciting chapter street's an
important important area it's iconic
this is a new approach it's place based
the 2013 work well it was wonderful it's
nine years old now and this is time to
refresh we can see how much has changed
over this time particularly in the past
two years
uh and this really provides us with an
opportunity to rethink chapel street and
new innovative exciting ways
and have a new master plan that we can
work from and and have
more projects that we can hand over to
future generations as well
thank you i'll open it up for discussion
is there better
so the recommendation suggests that the
contractor developed the master plan
design and documentation of the primary
initiatives
[Music]
over the period of two years does that
mean they'll come back to this council
with that master plan
oh yes
sorry how excited is that
that's all thank
would anyone you like to speak to the
item counselors
yes council said um thank you may
chapel street is something that's pretty
much setting the two-heart basket with
this council for as long as i can
remember
simply because we're trying to do too
much in a narrow strip
of retail
we've got a
we've got
pedestrians we've got bicyclists we've
got car parking we've got two rows of
trams we've got outdoor dining it just
doesn't work
so i'm going to be really interested to
see what comes out of this master
planning process because something's got
to give
we have talked previously about the
potential to remove parking in sections
of chapel street and build larger curb
out stands to encourage
retailers out onto the footpaths diners
that creates for a more of a safer
environment because there's passive
surveillance and people feel safe for an
environment where people are around
we do know that no trader wants a seat a
tree or a bin out the front of their
premise so we always run into challenges
as to who's going to get that there's
significant amounts of infrastructure
under the ground
um which we have to deal with not to
mention the veranda's up above not to
mention the tram lines and the overhead
power lines so these guys have got their
work cut out from the madame air so
they're a fantastic firm they've come up
with some great um responses i've seen
you know coming for this council
previously and and other um
infrastructure projects that they've
done so really excited to see what comes
but it's it's not going to be easy
that's for sure thank you council fair
would anyone else speak yes thank you
mia our councillor just touched on
something i thought i had to address
because i think the city of melbourne
has some big regrets now about some of
the bike lanes and the reduction in car
parking
and the city is empty and people are
really fed up so i agree with you this
this organization has a huge job ahead
of it uh balancing the needs of traders
and pedestrians or shoppers uh but look
all these things can be done
uh and let's hope some of the lessons
here's why
okay okay
some of the lessons from the city of
melbourne can be passed on to us because
i think you know there's some real
problems there and just on a more
optimistic note i'm starting to feel
that the big online move is not
subsiding it will always be there it's
part of our lives but there is there is
a move back to bricks and mortar and if
you look at the stock market and the
online shopping companies there's a bit
of a decline going on so i think that
we're going to see the revival of we all
love shopping we all love walking out in
the streets we love chapel street it's
amazing so i think we should feel a bit
optimistic and with this master plan
being undertaken i hope that retailers
in chapel street see the bright future
because after all those small businesses
those people are really the soul of our
community thank you mayor thank you
councillor griffin
yeah i've got to say something to you
now
um i agree chapel street's so unique and
so special and but it constantly needs
attention and investment just like a
shopping mall they're constantly
rebuilding it you know look at chadstone
and so forth it's the same with chapel
street you've got to keep up with the
times and people are looking for
experiential
experiences um when they go shopping and
chapel street's got it you know it's a
place you want to be seen it's a place
you want to experience it's different to
everything else it's not just you know
during the day it's also at night as
well it's a nightlife economy there too
and if you look at windsor and some of
the unique dining destinations there you
won't find anything like mr miyagi or
hawker hall or some of the other places
there anywhere else that they've
germinated in that area because you know
they've been able to get cheaper rents
and there's various other people in the
area as well that have bought it there
and i think with the city of stonington
we've actually done a really good job if
you look at um gravel street you know
the the public realm there has just been
transformed since since we did those
major works there um and also pran
square is wonderful the car parks
constantly you know full from what i
hear there's always people in the square
using it it's been a fantastic success
story
and it shows what we can achieve but
they're not without its challenges as we
touched on there are always challenges
when you bring about change
there were some people that were
terrified of the changes in gravel
street and were very very concerned but
now they can see the benefits of that
that's what's likely to happen with any
master plan for chapel street no matter
how good it is probably the better it is
the more controversy it will generate
thank you councillor
would anyone else like to speak to this
motion
council healing would you like to sum up
what i'm hearing is a lot of passion
um and acknowledging that it is a tough
project for this
this group but it's also potentially i
would think it would be a dream project
for them as well
because there's so much potential for
the area
and we have huge again passion and
aspiration for what it can be so they're
going to be able to pull from
international best practice
from other developments and
conditions that we had around australia
as well so i think we can just be really
excited to see what happens
fantastic
to the vote all those in favour
that's probably unanimously thank you
councillors so we moved to item 812
internal arbitration determination so
we've got an officer recommendation
before us council morgan is up to move
not a question okay
that's us so councilman has moved that
recommendation can i please take a
second after that
thank you council bogo uh councillor
morgan
thank you for you met i'm going to take
the officer's recommendation and the
arbiters findings and reasons as read
all councillors agree to uphold the
prescribed standards of conduct when we
are schooling as counsellors
this does mean that local councillors
are held to higher standards of
behaviour than ordering members of the
public
this is the system we are under and what
we all agreed to follow when we were
spawning as councillors
in this case
an independent arbiter has found that
councilor lew's behaviour did constitute
misconduct due to remarks he made on a
public facebook post on july 25
2021 which breached the prescribed
standards of conduct 1c which says that
a counselor does not engage in abusive
obscene or threatening behaviour in
their dealings with members of the
public counsellor staff and counsellors
councilor lewis comments referred to
local community member's home morbidly
brutal body while referencing the
community members residential street
name
i would like to put on the record that
if council lou had just sworn in
frustration at the community member who
was critical of him i would not have
raised his complaint but avada did note
in his findings that council lou had
apologized to storington councillors for
his behaviour and that was to his credit
i agree with this
however if councillor had also
apologised to the community member he
made the abusive comments about i would
not approach his complaint
i raised this complaint because i
thought it was a genuine breach of
prescribed standards of conduct and
because councillor lou is an elected
councillor which means he holds a
significant leadership role in our
community
council lou is held in high regard by
some members of our community in
stonington he is an elected councillor
and a local community leader and a role
model to some
i believe it would have been a terrible
precedent giving councilwood leadership
role in our community if he was not i
had not been held to account for what an
independent arbiter has found to be
abusive and inexcusable behavior
thank you council morgan is uh i have to
go to the second to first council has
reserved her right did you want to speak
councillor luke yes please um thank you
as is clear from the archers report
councillor morgan has made a barrage of
complaints against me
while the focus will be on the one
bullet that successfully hit its target
it's worth mentioning that two out of
the three allegations that formed the
substance of councilor morgan's
complaint were dismissed
the arbitration also refers to another
complaint that councillor morgan made
that she withdrew indicating that she
may resubmit it
i can say nothing about this complaint
except this
if the complaint was submitted and if it
was dismissed for being frivolous
vexatious and lacking in substance the
local government act would prevent me
from ever discussing it publicly
i'm interested in hearing an explanation
from councillor morgan as to why she
embarked on the task of defending mr
core's honor at ratepayer's expense
the arbiter viewed mr core's facebook
activity and described his conduct as
obscene abusive and racist
the arbiter says brandon core should be
ashamed of himself
why has counselor morgan associated
herself with this man and prioritized
his grievances for political point
scoring
this man who a magistrate made an
interim intervention order against for
my protection on the application of
malvern police
and then the court extended this order
for six months through various hearings
and mine
this man counsel one moment please can i
please ask the gallery to stop
interjecting the debate thank you thanks
castle this man whose activities
frighten my neighbours who are who are
councillor morgan's constituents and my
wife this man whose activity resulted in
the council installing cctv cameras in
my home
how will i ever be able to work with or
trust councillor morgan ever again after
her actions
why did councillor morgan do nothing
when faced with a complaint from some of
mr clau's victims
when he laughed publicly at a video that
contained anti-semitic imagery and
bullied three women
tagging this video which described the
women being subjected to non-consensual
sex acts
where was councillor morgan's commitment
to high standards then
wheel councilor logan also pursued
councillor scott with the same figure
only recently councillor scott used his
council of facebook page to post the f
word to describe liberals i can't even
say that in the council chamber what's
the point of order council
53 1 1 this is uh sorry i'm getting the
wrong numbers it's irrelevant to the
business on the agenda i do agree
council moves don't name other
councillors just stick to the uh the
arbitration and the report before us
thank you or
or a councillor who happened to describe
the liberal party as corrupt climate
records
is there one rule for greens councillors
and another rule for the rest of us
i intend to do the training set out in
this report as quickly as possible so
that i can be back on social media again
communicating with my constituents
i'm also considering
my options with respect to lodging a
supreme court challenge as i'm of the
view that the arbiter made several
errors of law which if allowed to go
unchallenged could result in other
greens councillors across victoria
weaponising the code of conduct and
proceeding
weaponising code of conduct for
political reasons i'm mad at me i raise
a point of order councillor scott
smirking at me
what's the point of order exactly though
um the point of order is that he's not
acting with he's not acting respectfully
let's have a look uh
a councillor is not um
a council is not is being offensive and
is engaging in an act of disorder
point one point eight 53.1.7
ask you to ask councillor scott not to
speak well i certainly don't think
there's been an active disorder i
haven't seen the act of offence however
i asked all counsellors to remain
respectful during the debate and you
know i do know noah has interrupted you
but um councillor i will also ask um you
do need an extension of time would you
like to see that uh a very brief
extension of course you'll get a full
minute thank you councillor scott is
there a seconder for that additional
minute council about a goal uh anyone
opposed to that additional minute no
thank you council luke
um there remains an
issue as to what this council ought to
do now about mr corp
his name remains on the prominently
displayed on the honourable right here
at malden town hall
each and every day it's there given the
artist's finding besmirches the good
name of stonington council
i can't do any more more about this
i would be conflicted but other
councillors can
other councillors could move a notice of
motion and remove his name from the
honor board like that
and as councillors do not do this
counsellors stand with mr core
and with his sexism and with his racism
and with his anti-semitism
just like councilman morgan stood with
him in the arbitration application
so this sort of behavior is what makes
council toxic
and i thank the many many people who've
reached out to me
over the weekend to offer me their
support
and i i do genuinely hope councillor
morgan has taken note of the questions
that i've raised and answers them in
this debate
thank you mayor uh look this is i find
this stuff very disturbing because i
think social media is a tool for good or
a tool for evil and and you know i i
really am concerned about this i'm
pleased councillor lou
quickly retracted a strong post from his
facebook and twitter
and deleted it before anything directed
directed towards mr core and apologise
to councillors for that but this report
has left me with more questions than
answers and i'm very sorry that council
lou has been a victim of such intense
attacks both inside and outside council
i do not understand why certain
councillors are associating with mr core
against another councillor and in this
case defending someone who has been
described by the arbiter i'll say it
again because it's really shameful as
someone who should be ashamed of himself
and whose facebook posts range from
abusive to the obscene and racist
what does that say about any counsellor
or anyone who supports or colludes with
him i cannot understand why this council
which has been aware of his behaviour
for some time on facebook and his
threats against two female residents
still has his name on the board in the
lobby of the council chambers
being acknowledged among the stonington
citizens of the year awards i just asked
the question how genuine is this council
about mutual respect
while we as councillors may expect
strong debate and arguments from the
community
mr core's persistent vitriol seems to
have another purpose
his ongoing attacks on those councillors
who dared to question percy juveniles
aside and i was one of them and i
believe he's still attacking me on his
facebook pages which i don't read what
is behind his interest in the stadium
and other council matters
in the meantime while we wait for
answers to these questions
rate payers are being slugged again
this time for arbitration costs which i
gather
given there seems to be more
arbitrations pending will amount to
thousands of dollars and to what benefit
for rate payers and residents
these costs need to be transparent to
the community
and i believe the dysfunction in this
council has now reached a point where it
requires external monitoring
thank you griffin would any other
councillors like to speak to the motion
if you'd like to exercise your right
second i think his health regarding
command
the local government act has established
this council of code of conduct it's to
address council of conduct and
behavioral issues not people who are not
counsellors it's an opportunity to raise
complaints
for timely intervention
and as the matter before us shows the
answer only makes a determination when
there is sufficient efforts and it is in
breach of the prescribed standards this
motion is to consider councillor blue's
behaviour not missed of course so i
think it's important we focus on the
right behavior here
we have an obligation as councillors to
abide by the prescribed standards
and in all the work that we do this
includes our interactions with staff
with the community and with fellow
councillors
and as the arbiter says in paragraph 14
councillors do not stop being
counsellors when they leave a council
meeting
i'm pretty sure i'm not alone around
this table when i say that i receive
plenty of emails i observe posts on
social media comments that are about me
direct messages which i personally would
consider at best in appropriate and at
worst possibly offensive and threatening
in my opinion i'd love to respond to
these particularly when i disagree and i
feel an emotional response but i don't
because i understand that we as
counselors have prescribed standards we
have to abide by i also know that people
often say things in an online
environment that they can say face to
face and i think this is a trap that you
don't want to fall into
social media is an important tool for
freedom of expression but it doesn't
mean freedom from consequence the
findings from the alberta make this very
very apparent
from personal experience i know that
making a submission for internal
arbitration is a very difficult one and
a challenging process for all parties
you don't go into it lightly
particularly for those of us without
legal experience
it's important though that we focus on
the findings and we don't deflect to the
applicant or the reasons behind it
as i said in february
no's account and i understand that the
audio was bad when i was in covert world
but
no counsellor staff member or member of
the public should ever question their
decision to call out behaviours that
make them feel uncomfortable
no counsellor should ever hesitate
holding unacceptable counsellor
behaviour to account
the cost to council when interventions
are needed are measurable but in my
opinion the cost to council with the
breakdown of good governance due to poor
behaviour that is accepted and
normalised is far far worse
that's a question
yes
so can the ceo please advise if brendan
core has contacted the council
seeking to convince the council to use a
flooring product he has a commercial
interest in at percy trevor memorial
park and if the ceo is not able to
answer that question can the ceo please
advise why it is that she's not able to
answer that question counselor can you
please hold that over to questions to
council officers because that has
nothing to do with the matter before us
thank you
but any other counsellors like to speak
to the motion counselor healing thank
you
councillor has previously expressed that
he feels that free speech trumps
everything
this ruling demonstrates that what we
say is councils and leaders in our
community still needs to reflect the
expectations of the code of conduct
including that we do not engage in
abusive obscene or threatening behaviour
in our dealings with the public council
staff and councillors
i believe that our federal mp dr katie
allen recently described this principle
very eloquently when she said that free
speech was a fundamental aspect of
australia's democracy and should be
expressed respectfully those who descend
to aggressive personal attacks belittle
themselves
i also note that social media is in two
of the 12 key questions in the recent
pwc investigation to council culture in
victoria the report asked how can
awareness be raised on the best ways to
harness social media to ensure
consistent management approach covering
monitoring appropriate usage and the
consequences of negative usage
how should social media harassment be
defined and what mechanisms should be
introduced into the act
so we also know that this is a broader
sector issue which needs to be addressed
in the lead up to anzac day my family
and i listened to the amazing audiobook
the happiest man in the world by eddie
jaku
a holocaust survivor and eddie talked
about choosing kindness rather than hate
in order to ensure your happiness and i
have been concerned about an ongoing
dialogue of hate and division and
counsel those communications for some
time and i hope that he chooses a path
of kindness going forward for the sake
of his own health and for the community
that he serves
thank you councillor healy um are there
any other speakers to promotion
i'll just ask a question um i've seen at
other councils in this webinar the cost
of the arbitration published with
findings um is it correct that we don't
have those costs at this stage yeah
through me we're still trying to secure
those costs and i hope to have them this
week for councils
any other speakers to the question or
questions counsellors
council morgan we're back with you if
you'd like to sum up
for you mayor
i answered and gave an account of why i
took out this complaint when i swept
counselor asked me to explain why i took
out the complaint that i already had in
my opening speech council blue has
expressed many opinions here and he has
the right to express his views
however i feel that for me to go through
and answer some of the questions he's
asked me i could potentially be
revealing information provided to an
arbiter or produced by a liberal arbiter
for the purpose of an internal
articulation process other than the
finding and reasons
in the report and so i'm not going to
comment on that because out of an
abundance of portion i don't want to
inadvertently reveal anything that is
confidential information that may have
been put into
this process as evidence
finally what i wanted to say is is that
this is a very serious matter and
counsellor behaviour and conduct is a
very serious
matter
i don't support abusive racist sexist or
anti-semitic behavior by anybody
however
yes you do counsel lou please don't
interrupt
no one interrupted you when you speak
however i do have to say that this
process is about councillors and it's
about council of conduct and an
independent arbiter who is very
respected in the community who was a
municipal monitor at city of little city
who recommended the going to
administration has found that council
alu did commit misconduct
it's just more appropriate for any
councillor to ever refer to a residence
hall morbidly brittle body packing it in
and being wheeled out of their home
and that's what it comes down to
and nothing else to say thank you
council morgan so we'll put it to the
vote to note just to remind councillors
we are noting the determination and
acknowledging um steps council we need
to take can i please um take a vote all
those in favor of adopting your
recommendation and the division has been
called so all those in favor
that's carried anonymously will cast it
again for the division all those in
favor
councillors healey battagol lou griffin
coast
sorry said scott morgan and osiris
that's carried thank you councillors
we move to iron mine uh correspondence
is there any to table this evening
councils
just have one piece of correspondence
related to agenda thank you council
coast and i will table a letter from
samuel's
about council donations uh sorry i can't
take donations for 20 20 local
government elections and i've circulated
an email copy to all councillors if that
hasn't already taken place
if there's no other correspondence to
table uh we'll move to item 10
tabling your petitions and joint letters
are there any this evening none that i'm
aware of
item 11 is notices of motion and we do
have one this evening um which is a
decision is there a mover for that
and a secondary
council of hosts thank you council said
can you just explain what we're doing
here
thank you thank you
um
at the last council meeting uh council
voted uh four five
to the refusal of an
application uh for one four one one four
five two one five one high street param
um
that made that
decision really bothered me
uh we did have a huge agenda that
evening i think we're all
exhausted
and i wanted to bring this matter back
before council so that we could reassess
the decision
because
just to remind councillors
planning is a very complex
part of our role
there's a lot involved
there are aspects of it that are
mandatory
which makes our life a bit easier
because there are rules that we
must abide by irrespective whether in
stonington or whether it's across the
state
and then there's other aspects of it
which is subjective and that's when we
all come together and we make a decision
on different values to us
now quite rightly there was a concern
about going over the preferred height
in high street by two and a half metres
however many mayor as i go through the
report again in the context of how the
development that's been approved in the
evolution of high street
that two and a half meters as a
preferred height
uh going over a preferred height is not
not an amber claim on behalf of the
developer i'd certainly have significant
concerns if they were going three two
three four five stories above what the
preferred height was
but in this context madame
we're talking about an application
that's been worked through with our
urban designer top heritage consultants
top architects for nearly 12 months
it's a revision of a proposal that had
previously been refused by this council
and what we're seeing is the restoration
of the heritage building that has really
been left um to become quite dilapidated
and unused and certainly not to the
calibre that the building offers into
the streetscape um so in my view two and
a half metres of preferred of height
above the preferred way we have to be
reminded that is a recommendation it's
not mandatory and just to give council
some context
this is at 145 but 87 high street is
eight stories
26.17 meters 99 and 108 high street is
10 stories
32.58 metres now these were ones that
neither i was not comfortable with and b
these both went to vk and unfortunately
um council's decision got overturned and
they were approved 105 high street nine
meters 28.9 meters so this metamer
coming in at 23.5
metres in the context of what is the
evolution of that part of the
streetscape from charles street up to
chapel street is not unusual two and a
half meters in the grand scheme is not a
lot we have two objections to this
none of those objectives have contacted
southward councils to my knowledge
um and what we're really doing is
sending this if
the council is not too of the view to
approve the proposal is put before us we
will be sending this to v cash i am
really concerned we may lose a lot of
the concessions that
our planners have have put um have put
through in the
recommendations and the conditions you
know we've got and a building that's now
the old and the newest delineated is
required under the viral charter for
heritage we've got a glass atrium in the
center
um and madame air i really do think this
is an optimal outcome for the site and
you know again two and a half meters
it's not that much in the context of the
environment the evolving environment
that i've mentioned so i hope that those
councils that weren't supported at the
last meeting would reconsider their view
on this matter thank you thank you
councillor
um yeah just um briefly i agree with
everything councilor says said and she
knows planning inside out she's one of
the best counsellors ever on on planning
matters and knows that area particularly
well also in the context of the site and
he's really in touch with the community
expectations so if she's supportive of
this on the grounds that she's outlined
i think it stacks up i think it stacks
up on planning grounds and
there's been a lot of concessions made
in this application the applicant has
worked really hard with officers to get
a really good outcome there's no heat in
the local community over the application
and if we refuse it it sends all the
wrong signals it sends to developers the
message there's no point discussing
seriously with offices making
compromises because council's just going
to block it anyway and you'll be off the
vca sometimes we'll just go straight to
vcat we've got one of the best respected
planning departments in victoria we need
to keep it that way our offices have
recommended in favor
i've got a local councillor who's
strongly in favor i thoroughly support
the rescission motion and um and backing
this project
thank you councillor um i'll open it up
for discussion councillor griffin um
thank you mia it's always embarrassing
to have to change your mind publicly
but sometimes it's it's an important
thing to do
and i've listened very carefully to what
you've had to say councillor there um
and i visited the site
which i hadn't had time to do before i
mean this is a very embarrassing mission
in a public meeting we had a huge agenda
and i've had time to really reconsider
this and i support um i support your
recession notice thank you thank you any
further comments
counselor thank you man uh the i
actually i'm not embarrassed by having a
change of mind i think it actually shows
great strength and brave and courage of
character to actually admit that you
were wrong so so i have no problem doing
that whatsoever as you mentioned it was
a packed agenda i think also there's
some information that's come to hand
since the recipient that was not evident
in the offices report so it mentions
that the previous
proposal was rejected which included a
full demolition i've since found out
that was actually a different applicant
so you jumped to a conclusion thinking
it was the same applicant but it's a
different applicant so this is actually
a new applicant bringing a new proposal
which they've worked very diligently
through
as you mentioned they've gone to great
lengths
the two objections i have to say was
something that was sitting a bit
uncomfortably with me with bringing the
amendment past council meeting but i
also have a i have it's a something that
i feel deeply with is the emerging
character and the preferred height limit
so it's how do you balance those two
things out
it's also i talked about the
the different views on community benefit
and i've received some advice from
council officers on how you define
community benefit what that means and
really it is up to interpretation and i
think on this one i'm just gonna have to
go to the officer's recommendation which
is that they believe this is community
benefit it might not be what i think is
community benefit but um but i'm happy
to go with the experts and and say that
i was wrong thank you counsellor any
other speakers to the motion
i'll just say that given it is a very
unique situation and people watching may
be wondering what on earth we're doing
it is just essentially you know we have
the ability as councillors to lodge a
decision motion after a decision has
been made we've got a limited amount of
time after a council meeting to do so
and it is creating nine and a half years
on council this may only be the second
one the third one i've ever experienced
so we don't we don't you know use these
mechanisms as political weapons or
anything like that it is because
councillor genuinely thought that we had
made um the wrong the wrong decision and
i signed onto the motion with the same
belief um we are absolutely allowed to
change our minds and good leaders do
that when they acknowledge that that's
something they feel that they need to do
it doesn't necessarily mean a mistake
was made previously it can just say that
different information has come to light
or we have a different perspective on
what's before us today and that's
completely okay it would be much more i
think a problem if we were the types to
really dig our heels in and stick with
what we did previously if we didn't
actually um believe that view anymore
and wanted to change our minds but
didn't feel comfortable to do so so i
absolutely applaud um any counsellor
that has chosen to do that this evening
um on the balance of the information
that is before us um and now i will be
supporting the application as i also
believe it will be just brilliant for
the area and the low level of um
objections given in such a high density
area that typically attracts a lot of
objection i think speaks volumes so um
i i support this motion
any other speakers counselors
council said we're back with you if
you'd like to summer um thank you mayor
um and thank you to those councils for
your honesty bravery it's it is hard and
i can tell you sitting in this table or
i've gone home and thought voted the
wrong way on that one and you know and
it's sat very uncomfortably with me
um so thank you all for you know for for
listening to me taking it on board and
also acknowledging planning is really
really hard um it really does test your
values um you know i've had much longer
at it so i've admit and read many vcat
decisions around community benefit and
know when i can mount an argument when i
can't but i know this is the right
outcome and i thank everybody for their
support
well done okay councillors let's proceed
to the votes are all those in favor of
the recision which is to approve the
application that's carried anonymously
thank you councillors
so we move to item 12 reports by
councillors are there any reports this
evening
no um fantastic thank you councillors
item 13 is questions
officers um are there any counselors
thank you mayor yes through you i've got
a question i think mr mclaughlin is the
person answering this question i'm
really interested to know mr mclaughlin
how many trees will be planted this
autumn
uh will they be infill or in new areas
uh and if the latter which areas and
sorry so casually just all questions
through the chair we've got a lot of
acting staff this evening who may not
have the information but we have we have
the answers for you
so can you finish your question it was a
question we've noticed so i do know mr
mclaughlin has the answer but through
you ms weatherall
i'll start again how many trees will be
planted this autumn will they be infill
or in new areas uh if the ladder which
areas and what is the total spend on me
trees yeah three of you there
councils spending seven hundred thousand
dollars um each year in regards to
planting of young trees
um and between now and june we've got
approximately 600 trees being planted so
they're young trees that we established
right across the muse valley in all
sorts of different periods and then in
the second half of the year between july
and december there's between 600 and 900
trees being planted again across the
municipality
thank you
and also through you mayor to ms federal
um
i've had residents asking me about ward
meetings and i'm just wondering have we
set some dates for the
board meetings as yet yeah through you
mayor um you'll remember that there's a
relevant resolution from council for us
to test meet your council and listening
to posts so we'll be bringing a report
back once
opportunity to do something thank you so
much
yeah thank you
uh any other questions
um can the ceo please advise the public
of recent changes to council briefings
procedure and is it correct that free
things are no longer confidential what
steps are being made
to make sure what occurs in briefings
are publicly accessible
yesterday
um under the previous local government
distant public's benefit um the city of
stonington and all local governments got
a new local government act um the local
government act 2020. so under the
previous local government act that we've
had for a long period of time um council
ceos had the capacity to designate all
um council briefings as confidential so
there was different confidentiality
provisions under the previous
development act
the custom and practice of the previous
act local governments had continued in
including stonington into the new local
government act um
with the customer practice that they
were confidential briefings but the
question was asked of me around the new
local government act to review that um a
short while ago and so i went through
and mr thompson and i both took legal
counsel around that and investigated it
and are now well aware that the
confidential information provisions
within the local government act section
three
graphics one
are clearly listed and in future
briefing items that meet the
confidentiality requirements and i won't
go through all of them there's quite a
lot of various items it would be things
like
commercially confidence material
regarding a tender for example would
make the confidentiality provisions
those items will remain as being
confidential items but draft reports
that are coming up for a council
briefing which are not subject to one of
those confidentiality provisions
won't be designated as confidential
thank you mrs
um
can
miss weather or can you please advise if
brendan call has contacted the council
seeking to convince the council to use a
particular flooring product that he has
a commercial interest in and purchase
your global memorial park and if you're
unable to answer that question can you
please advise why
the first question i don't know what the
answer is but there's no explanation
needed if the answer can't be divided
um through you madame and i have
actually um oh mr thompson i have
responded to council louis garcia but i
just remind
the public in particular that council
every day receives many many submissions
from the public around products and
services
and
on any occasion ordinarily um if an
individual um sends a piece of
correspondence like that to a council
staff member on an operational issue
which contains personal information
about the resident and the information
privacy principle set out in the privacy
and data protection act 2014 aren't
engaged disclosure for a purpose other
than the primary purpose for which the
information is provided is
as you know generally not permitted
i gather from your earlier email
that you are seeking access on the
ground the report going to council names
the resident common law council's right
of access to documents is limited to
documents that are relevant to an issue
coming before council for a decision and
respect of which access is necessary in
order for council to discharge their
functions when participating in the
decision making curiosity or an indirect
motive are insufficient
um
and lastly
um
i've been contacted by residents this
week in finch street
concerned that bicycle sharrows are
insufficient to
to ensure the safety of cyclists within
our suburban streets what steps is
council taking to provide adequate
safety to cyclists
in suburban streets
is
are a relatively expensive treatment to
sign close to cyclists alternative
routes of the arterial road system so
it's
advantageous to be able to use the local
street
to travel
and as well as encourage motorists using
those local screws to show that slow
down and share the road
uh we're in implementing a number of
uh we intend to
of all of those unders
just to do their effectiveness and if
additional traffic treatments are
required in relation to finish through
specifically which previously consulted
on tracking treatments in pink street we
could not get community support for
traffic treatments we have been working
with the department of transport to
progress 40 kilometer per hour speed
limits in those streets at spring street
and adjacent streets as well as right
turn restrictions in the pre-power to
assist the issues
any other questions from counsellors
thank you man um i know tonight that i
heard the council of louis considering
legal options and i read in the age that
that includes possibly a supreme court
challenge
can i confirm if this goes ahead who
would be responsible for paying the
legal costs or would stormington
i think there's a variety of
variables
any other questions
councillors let's move to item 14 urgent
business is there any to raise this
evening
no
under item 15 any other general business
councillor
um thanks may i just wanted to report to
everyone and to remind residents about
the fantastic sculpture exhibition
interactive lich council healey castelo
coast and i attended a red carpet event
which was really nice after this long
overdull time to actually see red
carpet on these pavements
even though it started pouring with rain
which was a bit tricky but it was a
really lovely event it was a new venue
new food a whole new time and atmosphere
and
i also want to congratulate vickland on
offering ten thousand dollars for the
winning scope to the winning sculpture
which was fabulous
um so it was a really great event and i
want to congratulate the turret traders
and tracy cameron from putting on such a
great event that we all enjoy
thank you thank you councillor griffin
and the other speakers on a different
topic council
i mean it was it was a great um it was a
great exhibition and okay it's a great
leather exhibition in our city in our
part of northward they missed out on it
last year so we had to it was cancelled
last year dude
so first time it's come back after a
year missy we've got over 80 sculptures
in the area it was great to be able to
mix with some of the artists who have
not been able to get out and socialize
for the last couple of years and to also
meet all the traders as well and it was
a really well attended event on a very
wet night i think councillor griffin as
well
so yeah again also encourage people to
go out and see the sculptures it's all
about making our city a destination
point and making it different to other
places it's really good can you cancel
the case any other speakers under
general business
i don't need to talk to it come on
all right councillors um well we don't
have any confidential business um to
discuss this evening so i would like to
officially close the meeting at 8 57 pm
and thank everyone for the
the gallery for attending anyone at home
watching
please enjoy the rest of your evening
thank you very much