councils we are live good evening ladies
and gentlemen that might be joining us
on ladies and gentlemen that are in the
gallery councilors would you please
stand for our opening
declaration we the councilors of the
City of Ballarat declare that we will carry
out our duties in the best interest of
the community and through collective
leadership will maintain the highest
standards of good governance we would
like to acknowledge the traditional
custodians of the land on which we meet
the Wada Wurrong people and recognize their
continuing connection to the land and
waterways we pay our respects to their
Elders past present and emerging and
extend this to all Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander people thank you
councilors please be
seated ladies and gentlemen the gallery
this meeting is being broadcast on the
internet and the recording of the
meeting will be published on council's
website councilors I'll declare the
meeting open at
6:32 p.m. we have all councilors in
attendance with councelor Eddie uh
online so all councilors are present so
there are no apologies for absence
councils are there any disclosure of
interest if there are none move on any
matters arising from the previous
minutes if there are none council's
going to have a motion to move the
minutes moved councelor Harris seconded
councelor Johnson any discussion
councilors
not I'll put the motion all those in
favour the motion is
carried we'll move into public question
time which will come through you Mr
Mayor sorry sorry Council McIntosh um
can I just clarify on the run sheet just
to be sure um it does have me down as an
apology I know you did just clarify that
all counselors were present but I just
thought I'd note that absolutely
councilor McIntosh yep for sure okay
we'll move into public question time at
6:33 p.m.
um and we do have a number of questions
that have been submitted first one is
from Mr Bruce Crawford who is not
attending on representing Ballarat residents
and rate payers so I'll ask our
governance officer to please read the
question thank you and through you uh Mr
Mayor the question is as follow I'm
aware the council sent you an email
about governance and public questions I
agree with their stance on these matters
I ask that you ensure councilors and
staff do not use briefings for defacto
decision making and discussion forums
ensure on block motions are no longer
accepted and keep Council meetings open
in person and enable the community to
always speak always ask unscripted
questions or make presentations on
matters to councils and officers thank
you Mr Montgomery and thank you um Mr
Crawford for the question we as the city
of Ballarat advised that Council has
established and implemented our
governance rules in accordance with
section 60 of the Local Government Act
of 2020 which guide Council meetings
about public participation and
decision-making processes I'm really
pleased to say that this Council
especially does not use our forums for
any pre-decision making we actually use
it for its intended purpose of listening
to advice from Council officers or other
people that present and to ask questions
to better inform ourselves we certainly
don't move motions that are on Blanc uh
in terms of multiple resolutions at one
time um and part of our question Forum
that we have uh whilst we do encourage
people to um submit their questions
prior to to be able to get an informed
officer response at the time uh we do
acknowledge that some people might
actually come to council first time
they've ever engaged and we are open to
still allowing those questions to take
place so we're probably one of the few
councils that still does actually allow
for unscripted Unwritten submitted
questions and we're happy for that to
continue so thank you Mr Crawford for
your question the next question is from
Mr Glenn Jones who I believe is
attending Mr Jones if you could please
come
forward if you could just tell us the
name the suburb where you reside then
certainly ask your question thank
you uh hello uh my name's uh Glenn Jones
uh I live in Warra in the ?
electric thank
you uh a new ? wind farm with 58
turbines almost 300 M tall the height of
the Eiffel Tower will be built at top
mount Bolton and mount Beckworth across
WRA and Clunes in the Ballarat electorate
Ballarat residents like myself will
likely have our homes unceremoniously
acquired by aiona because we are in the
way what is Council doing to ensure
people like myself are not forced from
their homes when renewable
infrastructure like this is built across
board thank you Mr Jones and I'll ask
director Robertson to respond
through you Mr Mayor and thank you for
the question Mr Jones the Department of
Transport and planning dtp on behalf of
the minister for planning is the
responsible Authority for this type of
proposal city of Ballarat will receive formal
referral of the application by DP dtp
sorry in course it is officers
understanding that Axona has not yet
lodged any application with dtp and this
will follow their current Community
consultation process residents are
encouraged to discuss matters of concern
with ax owner via the consultation
process and again upon receipt of a
formal referral from dtp outlining the
final form of the proposed Wind Farm
officers will assess the application and
it is likely then PR present
recommendations to our Council to then
form a final position the position will
then be forwarded back to dtp to assist
that authority to determine the
application application residents are
free to make their own representations
to dtp outside of the council process
also thank you Mr Jones you got a second
question yes I
do um this sort of goes to some of the
points you made there um as we have seen
with the Western Renewables link
Community consultation with local
communities
uh was and is fle this is happening
again with axi owner who do not consult
they simply inform Council has been
silent throughout the entire Western
Renewables link consultation process
what will Council be doing to inform the
EES process to ensure foreign owned
multinational corporations like Axona
don't simply get a rubber stamp for this
new Wind Farm without proper Community
benefit and consideration thank you Mr
Jones and again director Robertson will
respond and again thank you Mr Mayor and
thank you for the question Mr Jones I
will note that um council's not been s
silent on the uh Western Renewables link
um and at the 26th May 2021 um council
meeting uh council's determined that
they one fully support renewable energy
and the need for its transmission into
the electricity network two advocate for
the at the time Western Victoria
transmission Network project
environmental effect statement process
to properly consider underground methods
of power transmission and use
underground options where possible and
three advocate for the transmission line
route to use existing Road Rail and
electricity easements wherever possible
and as for council's role in axion's
proposal as it will become for us once
Council has received a formal referral
we will be better placed to review the
associated documentation and develop a
position thank you thank you director
Robertson thank you Mr Jones your
questions any other questions councilors
if not thank you Mr jonesk you the next
uh question is from Mr Isles who is
attending this evening come forward Mr
Isles no stranger to the chamber please
tell us your name and your submit we
reside and then over question Mr Mayor
counselors my name is James ises a
planning consultant uh I live in
soldiers Hill uh I have got a couple of
questions uh which I'll uh read to
councilors if I may um I act on behalf
of the manhan family who own land uh
designated in the western growth area I
uh sent a written submission to Council
in December 2020 supporting council's
decision to include their land within
the proposed Western growth area a
report to Council on the 23rd of
February 2022 supported the Western
growth area to proceed to be rezoned to
Urban growth Zone with two other growth
areas are and Council resolved to
prepare an amendment that would rone
three growth areas to Urban growth Zone
my first question to council is why has
Council not pursued the resigning of the
proposed Western and Northwestern growth
areas as resolved by council's February
meeting 23rd of February
2022 thank you Mr orles and director
Robertson to respond through you Mr
Mayor and thank you for the question Mr
is um Council resolved to apply to the
minister too three growth areas and they
are the Northern West and Northwestern
to ugz in its resolution of 23 February
2022 and the then Minister for planning
honorable Lizzy blad Thorne wrote back
to Council on the 31st of August 2022
informing Council of her decision which
was appointment of the vpa as the
planning authority to prepare a PSP and
DS DCP or Precinct structure plan sorry
and developer contribution plan um and
associated planning scheme amendments
for the northern growth area they uh she
authorized uh Delp who they were at the
time to prepare adopt an approv an
amendment to rezone the core area of the
northern growth area and approved the
vpa to undertake a highlevel strategic
review of bat's proposed Green Field and
urban renewal areas to inform the
staging and sequencing of residential
growth and appropriate residential land
Supply known as the I or infrastructure
growth alignment
framework recent updates from the B vpa
provided to council key stakeholders
including land owners and govern
government agencies informed us that the
vpa are working towards presenting a
complete draft of the IGA to the
minister for Planning by September of
this year council's own growth area
framework will be prepared to establish
the most appropriate sequencing to
Precinct structure plan preparation for
the west and Northwestern growth areas
in addition to establishing the
sequencing of the PSPs the framework
plan will be the mechanism for the
resoning of the land to the urban growth
Zone in the future thank you and a
second question Mr thank you Mr Mayor uh
tonight I think we're talking about the
housing strategy was which has been in
the making for for many years and has
taken all of the two two years to get to
where we are at the moment within this
time frame we have seen the northern
growth area rezone to Urban growth Zone
and it's my understanding that the
structure planning process is about to
commence but again there has been
nothing done for the Western and
Northwestern growth areas in reading the
draft strategy document there has been a
change in council's thinking on how
future res residential development is to
occur for bellat my second question to
council is why has there been a
significant policy change by Council in
in the housing strategy that now intends
to meet residential growth demand
through the use of infield development
at the expense of the West and Northwest
growth
areas director
Robertson through you Mr may I think
this is a it might answer a lot of
questions to submissions tonight and
thank you for the question Mr is I refer
to the draft housing strategy in
particularly but not only Pages 12 19
and 26 the strategy recognizes the
council's adopted policy of 50/50 split
is not being met with the split being
growth areas of 65% and infill at 35%
today so the draft looks at a means to
imple implement better planning controls
to facilitate infill to return to
council's Commitment of 5050 the draft
housing strategy is reflective of
existing Council policy in seeking to
accommodate future housing growth and
the policy context should be reviewed on
page eight and also at the appendix on
draft one um on the draft
thank you Mr ALS for your
questions is there any other questions
from the gallery this
evening than would if you please tell us
your name and the suburb where you
reside I live in Sebastapol my name is
Penelope barington and I'd like you to
address me as just Penelope thank you
Penelope the question has no Preamble
the meaning should be very clear within
the question the first
one when are the 12 broken and some very
dangerous bump strips for the visually
impaired located in Yolanda Street down
to Edmund Drive in bonshaw sebasti pole
I don't know which suburb it is that
have been damaged for at least 3 years
when are they going to be
fixed thank you Penelope um not that any
director
Mr May and uh thank you for the question
um I will take that on notice and have
to uh investigate what um the condition
is and come back to you with a
resolution so how will you get back to
me if I may ask our governance will get
your contact detail and we'll make
personal contact back to you right
second
question outside of the treasury
Corporation
Victoria has Council borrowed monies
from other corporations banking
interests or United Nations groups
signing documents that place Ballarat
rate payers and their properties as
guarantors for any unpayable loans by
increasing rates for treacherous levels
thereby causing the confiscation of rate
payers Properties by the lenders all
without the consent of the rate payers
and if so as is Council aware that it is
a breach of the law thank you Penelope
for the question director
HOSA uh through the mayor and thank you
Penelope for the question um a long um
complex question that I'd have to take
on notice Council does have borrowings
with a number of different financial
institutions and more than happy to
provide that information to you uh
through a written response so there is
no yes or no there into that question
which was question we'll take the
question on notice in terms of the
financial institutions that we have
borrowings with and provide you with
that information thank you very much
would you like a copy of that question
that would be fantastic thank you very
much our governance team will get that
from you other questions from people in
the
gallery if not thank you very much for
those questions we'll move on to the
agenda the first item is agenda item
seven the chief executive officer
report councils I'm in your
hands so Council coats moved councelor
coats seconded now coun councelor Harris
councelor coats you have the floor um
I'm happy to take it as R and thank the
CEO for all of his ongoing work thank
you thank you councelor coat councel
Harris none any other Council wishing to
speak for the motion councelor
Johnson thank you Mr Mayor just like to
raise the works in relation to bridge
moall spoken to a few of the Traders
from the precinct to indicate that uh
while there are Works being undertaken
in the mall that there have been no
major disruptions to business and that
was something that councelors were very
clear about as a priority uh in regard
to that project so congratulations to
the echod dev team and the staff that
have been working with them to ensure
that uh there are customers still able
to access uh that Precinct um and also
uh congratulations to you and the staff
in regard to the work being undertaken
to improve our customer service
processes which we'll be talking about
again in a moment thank you councelor
Johnson now the council wishing to speak
for the motion against the motion I'll
put the motion all those in favour the
item is
carried council's item 8.1 is the
customer Charter development and
consultation any councelor wishing to
move councelor coats to move councelor
to second the motion councel Johnson
councelor coats you have the
floor um sure thank you well first
firstly I'll say that I do greatly
appreciate all of this the staff who
work on the front line and do take an
incredibly broad array of questions and
and consult um with the community on a
on a range of different issues so
because the organization covers
almost 100 Services I can only imagine
the diversity of the the questions and
queries and issues that come up on a
daily basis so it's much much more than
roads rates and rubbish
obviously every person in the city from
birth to senior years will come in
contact with Council services at some
point and sometimes in a continuous way
too so whether that's whether that's
receiving rubbish collection using the
roads or foot paths as really really
sort of day-to-day examples um and most
people access maternal and child health
use parks and Gardens or sporting
facilities libraries and it goes on so
um 880,000 phone calls last year that's
pretty
incredible 35,000 digital requests and
15,000 face-to-face
interactions um so the summary in in the
report really really talks about what
people would like to see in terms of
customer service so it is pretty it is
pretty simple um people want to know can
the issue be addressed yes or no um
that's that's pretty simple how long
might it take and can you look let me
know when or if it gets done I mean
that's a that's a really rudimentary
summary of of what people would would
like and have told us so um the draft
going out for some further consultation
we'll we'll really just check that with
with the community but also the two
pager in the charter sets some some
principles around Community expectations
so around respect inclusion all of those
those kind of fundamental things that
are about continuous Improvement really
raising the bar and and continuing to to
really engage and listen to the
community and really respond to what
people people want so um some great
recent initiatives with the snaps and
solve that's been going extremely well
in that people have really been engaging
with it that it's a really really nice
simple way for people to put in their
requests and a lot of people do do lean
towards um using a digital way of
putting in in their question or or their
request and the snap sends s a really
nice way of being able to take a photo
send in the question and um hopefully
over time get real time response on
whether that issue can be fixed and when
it when it's fixed so um really look
forward to seeing whether whether people
have some further feedback on it but I
think the draft is a is a really good
start so I endorse it in this form and
um once again thank the the staff for
their ongoing work in this area thank
you councel Coates councel
Johnson thank you Mr May I'd like to
Echo what councilor coat said in regard
to thank the staff who um work in the
area of customer service and as we know
there are many staff who also work in
customer service where that actually
isn't in the title of their role where
they interact with residents day-to-day
and I think one of the things um that
will come out of the implementation of
this Charter um once it's been adopted
is that all staff know how to
appropriately Lodge uh feedback received
from res
where those staff aren't customer
service uh Representatives because a lot
of our staff across the city have
contact with residents who may pass on
inquiries or feedback and we've been
told over many years that often that
feedback um is lost and not properly
followed up on um one of the things that
I really liked uh in the charter is that
we will make it clear to people that
they should expect a response for the
more simple requests uh within a period
of three days and for the more complex
requests um up to 10 days and I think
that's great because if we look at the
people that did respond um to the
engagement around this there were 44%
that indicated that they had to contact
the organization more than twice to get
an issue followed up or that their issue
was
unresolved which is tricky uh in regard
to the unresolved um section of that
because it depends obviously how long
ago they uh lodged the
request however I think it's indicative
that to date um there are some rather
large gaps as to how we interact with
residents and follow up on their
concerns but um I'm quite positive about
the way that we can move forward
um and encourage uh residents to have a
look at that draft C customer service
Charter one point I did want to make is
that uh we had 61 responses as to how
people PR referred to contact
Council um on that question and the
preferences were email number one phone
two website 3 face to face then web chat
then the smartphone app and I'd be
interested in the demographics of those
61 responses because
uh I'm aware
that particularly younger Generations um
would probably prefer the option of a
smart phone app or web chat and it'll be
interesting to see how many
Communications we receive via social
media where we have queries coming from
residents and whether we can better
service our social
media um Pages profiles channels to
ensure that messages that come through
there are responded through and
considered as legitimate as other forms
of communication with the organization
but I think it's it's exciting I think
there's um some some work to do but
great to see that we've got this draft
Charter out for consultation thank you
councelor Johnson now the council
wishing to speak for the motion councel
Taylor thanks Mr Mayor um uh councilor
Johnson's right customer service isn't
just the Frontline stuff that stand at
Phoenix hall or sit at Fenix Hall it's
all coun um Council staff that are out
engaging with community and I think this
is a great Charter that does Set uh an
opportunity that we are then have an
ability to respond in a certain time
frame which is really important if we
don't have those type of um mechanisms
in place then there's no impetus to
actually do anything um which is NOT
saying they don't but if you don't have
those clear guidelines then then what
are we actually striving for and what
are we trying to achieve so I think this
is a really good start having a charter
in place it's simple it's
straightforward to read but also the
benefit is it's actually adaptive to
what's changing and councilor Johnson
mentioned around how people communicate
now um snap s solve is a big one that's
going to be taking over and already uh
adjustments are being made with Staffing
to actually accommodate that and the big
thing in there is the feedback loop
people want to know what's happened and
how the response has been made and
that's been worked on with snaps Sol uh
which is awesome so that people can get
that feedback I don't know about anyone
else but sometimes I don't like talking
to people I just want to get on do what
needs to be done and then move on to the
next thing and have to say that app is
has been really beneficial uh and it'll
be great if we could actually apply some
of these um Charters or or
accountabilities or other services uh
that are out there that use the same
system such as one snap sense I'll ever
have on a road that's not our road
that's still outstanding for a very long
time so maybe we can uh encourage other
users maybe government organizations to
do the same but I think this is a great
start uh and it really sets the
guidelines for Community but also the
staff on what we can achieve and what we
will achieve thank you councelor Taylor
the council speaking before the motion
speaking against the
motion councilors I I'll just speak
briefly and dare i s that over used
phras of just briefly Mr may but I'd
even take the aspect even one step
further that customer service is all of
our responsibility Council laws included
we are one entity We Are One
organization and without our community
we have no purpose to exist so therefore
this is something that we recognized as
a group as well that how we better close
the loop with our residents that we want
to have a very engaged Community to be
able to talk to us about what their
concerns were what their issues are and
how we can promptly fix them and the
biggest issue that we often heard was
about closing the loop and giving that
feedback and we've just uh recently put
on
a um an engagement officer that is
closing the loop and doing some
remarkable work I followed up on one of
her inquiries from last week that was
challenging but was able to point out
and work across the organization and the
link she went to was absolutely
fantastic but I think that demonstrates
what our customer Charter is about and
that ability to how important it is for
residents that want the information and
their interaction with Council to be um
positive to get a result and so they're
informed of that in a timely manner at
the end and as I say where it's all of
about responsibility it was great last
night that both the CEO and I both spoke
to one resident after hours um both on
on a similar issue but reached out and
at both times the phone was answered so
it does start from the top down um and
therefore if we demonstrate that
hopefully the rest of the team are doing
exactly the same so very happy for the
work that's been done and I know that
Michael Risley who is our Biz manager
who was able to interpret some of that
data will give us um certainly some
monitoring and how that data set looks
like so very happy to support
it council is any other speaking for the
motion against the motion put the motion
all those in favour the item is
carried okay council's item 8.2 is our
draft housing strategy and draft
neighbor neighborhood character study um
I might get director Robertson to
introduce the item and then we'll move
through the submissions both in written
form and then those that are in
attendance with us so director
Robertson thank you Mr Mayor and thank
you councilors for the opportunity to
introduce the draft housing strategy and
the neighborhood character study
together with the related technical
documents which are before council
tonight to endorse for Community
consultation um tonight is about
embarking on the first steps and seeking
support to engage with the community on
the draft before returning to council
with the community's outcomes and um
sorry with the community's input and
outcomes in its simplest terms the
housing strategy is intended to identify
how many dwellings are required to
accommodate a growing population over at
least a 15-year period and where we know
that if we adopt the high growth rat ARA
of 2.1% by 2041 bellat will have grown
by 55,000 people and we will need to
provide approximately 29,000 more
dwellings across the municipality in
both our infill and our growth areas our
current policy seeks to achieve 50% of
new dwellings to be directed into infill
and urban renewal locations and 50% to
be directed to growth areas and the
draft housing strategy supports
this um um the draft
strategy um recognizes that Council
adopted a policy of 50/50 split and this
is not being met with the split
realistically 65% in growth areas and
35% in infill so our draft looks at a
means to implement better planning
controls to facilitate infill and to
return Council to its commitment of
5050 the draft strategy seeks to achieve
a balanced approach for managing resid
presential growth while also maintaining
a value our valued character and natural
features of our city and townships the
draft also um is intended to provide
Clarity to the Community Development
industry and other stakeholders about
the kind of Housing Development they can
expect to see in our
municipality um it also recognizes the
needs of our growing and changing
population um are met in a sustainable
Equitable equitable and in line with
Community Values um it is important to
note that this strategy is one of many
uh and in and the strategies it aligns
with also are our growth areas framework
and Precinct structure planning our CBD
structure planning and our environmental
lands review just to name a few should
Council adopt the draft housing strategy
for public consultation tonight
engagement will commence on the 4th of
September and I urge all members of the
community to view our document on our
website and to attend at least one of
the um Community sessions across the
municipal municipality we look forward
to working on this important piece of
work with Council and Community thank
you Mr Mayor thank you director
Robertson we'll now move through our
public representations the first one is
from Mr Jamie Lockett who is not
attending so Mr Montgomery if you could
read the submission please thank you and
through you Mr Mayor the submission is
as follows I refer to the draft housing
strategy in particularly the areas noted
is incremental change to where it is
proposed to allow high density
multi-level apartments and units we live
in burnbank street we are horrified by
the proposal to allow high density
housing in the Gregory Street burnbank
Street and Lake Area this would kill the
Open Garden living atmosphere atmosphere
of that area furthermore road
infrastructure on the corner of burnbank
and MacArthur streets Drummond and
MacArthur streets is already at Peak
often clogged right through burnbank
Street this would only
worsen thank you Mr Lockett for your
submission next submission is from Mr
Evan Dow who is representing JG King
holes not attending sorry oh sorry
councelor Taylor Sorry Mr Mayor just to
follow up from that um presentation I
just want to clarify when looking at the
report the substantial growth is Howard
Street not Gregory Street so I just want
to confirm that with the director um in
relation to that substantial growth when
they were talking about burnbank Street
and how can you just clarify thata
director
Robertson you're three Mr mayor council
Taylor that's correct but remember
that's why we need to do community
consultation y thank you um next
representation is Mr Evan da
representing JJ King Mr Montgomery if
you could read that submission please
thank you through Mr Mayor the
presentation is as follows on the
executive manager General executive
general manager JG King holes Southwest
which includes Ballarat JG King homes
constructed approximately all 900 homes
per year and have for the last 38 years
with bat being our head office with an
average of 120 homes per year built
locally in the Ballarat area we directly
and indirectly employ 650 people
approximately we are a wellestablished
family-owned and orientated business JG
King also manufacture windows and steel
frames in ballerette with a $6 million
upgrade investment to the window company
in the the last 12 months we have viewed
the draft housing strategy and have
serious concerns regarding its
implications for both Ballarat and our
business the housing strategy as we
understand it looking to replace
Greenfield development with Inner City
development JJ King homes throughout
Victoria in New South Wales undertake
the vast majority of their construction
on Greenfield sites if the plan is to
limit Greenfield development around
balarat this will have a drastic
negative effect on our business and the
people we employ why is Council allowing
the Western growth front and the Lucas
growth front to stop and theoretically
be replaced by the northern growth front
adjacent to the bat seage treatment
plant JJ King have recently expanded
their business to assist with inner city
developments this is a business we wish
to grow however it is problematic due to
many factors including topography
flooding vegetation Heritage and
cultural heritage in summary Council
should be working towards releasing some
Lots in in all three growth fronts to
encourage competition dwelling Supply
and affordability and I thank you for
your time Evan da thank you Mr da for
the
representation the next submission is
from Mr Darren Crick who is not
attending which will also be read out by
Mr Montgomery thank you Mr Mayor the
representation is and follows I recently
purchased a property on how Street with
the intention of developing a showroom I
intend to Lodge a planning application
shortly I object to the housing strategy
if it will stop uh my showroom
development the site is targeted for
high density development for level in
the housing
strategy thank you m um councelor Taylor
thank you Mr may I just wanted to
clarify this one as well it is this is
the area that's listed in the housing
strategy around that um substantial
change uh to the director is there a
change in the planning zoning in that
location or is it will stay as what it
is which is commercial mixed use Etc in
that area thank you Council Tyler
director Robertson three Mr Mayor and
thank you for the question councilor
Taylor to be able to clarify so as it
currently sits it is zoned mixed juice
which is recognized as that combination
of residential or retail commercial
operations there is no intention that
this area should change Zone um and
therefore it wouldn't pre prevent um um
Mr criek from developing his showroom
all it is saying that this is an area
that is ideal for a combination of
residential commercial and Retail thank
you thank you director Robertson the
next presentation is from Mr Darren
Fraser who is not attending Mr Gomery
Montgomery if you would thank you and
through you Mr Mayor the presentation is
as follows I'm the managing director of
Hudson Ridge Builders a registered local
residential Builder Hudson Ridge started
in 2018 and building the Ballarat and
jalong markets building aox 75 homes per
Market per year in the bat Market alone
through our business and Partnerships we
employ approximately 45 people and over
300
subcontractors most of these homes have
been built have been in Greenfield
Estates across the Ballarat market and
the majority in Greenfield Estates in
the jalong market we've also engaged in
developing our own site at 200 Victoria
Street B at East which is providing
approximately 50 medium density houses
our long-term commitment strategy to the
market is based around housing
affordability and building in the growth
zones particularly in the west where
substantial infrastructure is already
servicing these growth areas this uh is
accounts for over 90% of our business
regarding the draft Ballarat housing
strategy proposal we have serious
concerns regarding implications and
effects it will have on the greater bat
market and particularly our business as
our business strategy focus on
Greenfield sites and the supply of
Greenfield land does not appear to be a
focus of council we've been involved in
several infield projects and have
experienced all the challenges
associated with these projects
particularly around Heritage protection
cultural heritage storm water retention
and Underside services and
infrastructure which quite often add to
substantial hidden cost to the project
in most cases make these sites unviable
and ultimately too risky bat's mining
Legacy adds more uncertainty to infield
site again it's no secret that Builders
are facing many challenges right now
with spiling materials on labor costs
and Rising inflation putting
unprecedented pressure on the
construction sector in my opinion the
proposed change in housing policy and
the push for infield over Greenfield
will add significant risk to my business
and to our industry and will ultimately
lead to an exodus of investment and
economic benefit for the city thank you
Mr fra for your submission the next
submission is from Mr Jackson Z who
represents beverage Williams who is not
attending and that will be read out
thank you Mr Montgomery thank you and
through you Mr Mayor the presentation is
as follows beverage Williams would like
to take this opportunity to commend
Council officers on this preparation of
this draft housing strategy and
neighborhood character study we believe
this is an important driver to ensure
Supply plan for the needs of ballot
residents and improved social and
affordable housing availability beverage
Williams is happy to support the
development of this draft uh document
during the consultation process we
believe the provisions of information
such as the likely time frame of lots
available to to the market based on
developer and landowner Readiness and
preferences will assist Council shape
the strategy and future growth areas
framework to ensure most appropriate use
of Greenfield and infield uh
opportunities we would like to further
consider with Council the research
undertaken by the Department of
Transport and planning which estimated
the potential for
1,211 residential infill lots to be
provided to the market whilst in
comparison there was the potential for
35,6 45 Greenfield residential lots
available if the population of Ballarat
is projected to grow by 55,000 people by
2041 it seems logical that the
Greenfield Market is required to play a
significant role in ensuring adequate
housing Supply as the this provides far
greater certainty when these Lots will
be available compared with waiting for
peac me infield development to occur we
look forward to working with Council to
finalize the the significant report
supporting uh the exciting growth for
Ballarat thank you Mr zal for your
presentation the next presentation is
from Mr Anthony dong who is not
attending and will also be read out by
Mr Montgomery thank you and three Mr
Mayor the presentation is as follows the
housing strategy having read the draft
housing strategy it would seem that the
focus will be on infill rather than a
combination of both infill and new
subdivisions or Greenfield Estates while
the proposed location of development
areas for increased density seems
logical we still need new Greenfield
Estates in addition to infield
development this is based on 25 years
experience as a drafting practitioner
working with various clients who either
build to live in or are
developers as such I would offer the
following points bat people generally
prefer living in Stand align dwellings
or units and and think of Apartments as
rental properties the financial
viability of constructing four-story
apartment buildings would would be
questionable is the proposed increased
development in soldiers Hill and Gregory
Street going to mean a relaxation of
existing Heritage
restrictions thank you Mr dong for the
representation the next representation
is from Mr Michael pton representing the
committee for bat who is not attending
and will be read out by Mr Montgomery
thank you three Mr Mayor the
presentation is as follows committee for
bat has long advocated for a thriving
and vibrant City and region recognized
for its livability sustainability and
inclusiveness housing and specifically
housing is critical to achieve this out
we support growth as with it comes
opportunity to enhance our social
economic environment Prosperity that
said sustainable develop must be Central
to all decisions and we make in relation
to our growing population committee's
view is the house draft housing strategy
needs to be more balanced and provide
greater detail in relation to the type
of development in the growth zones and
IND
inner city INF field development the
housing strategy references diversity
design affordability crucial in relation
to inclusiveness and environmental
sustainability we do believe the
strategy should be more directive in
relation to exemplars that promote these
and the other kind identified key
matters that underpin the strategy in
relation to the development of the
proposed North Western and Northwestern
growth zones the strategy needs more
detail in both timing and Direction
despite the reference to the development
of growth areas framework in the future
the strategy should identify Exemplar
Green Field development to clearly
articulate what is required the
development of Lucas is such an Exemplar
and demonstrates how communities can be
developed in Greenfield areas with a
provision for activity centers including
schools Parkland active and integrated
transport retail business and health
facilities it is the it is this
provision that should be articulated in
the strategy to ensure we create great
amen
connect the community and build
neighborhood character in our growth
zones in relation to infill We believe
it is too heavily focused on exiting
residential use sorry existing uh
residential use at the expense of urban
renewal projects that may require to
rezone significant available land and
unlock potential again we believe the
strategy should highlight Exemplar
infield developments such as lion's
place which has demonstrated that
exceptional design can deliver diversity
and density together with environmental
sustainability in the inner city this
has been achieved whilst balancing
Heritage considerations and challenging
previous height
conventions the strategies focus on
infill does not fully capture the
opportunity for greater densification in
the inner city the delivery of the
bakery Hill master plan is work that
should be accelerated uh with this
strategy and yet focuses heavily on
current residential lots away from the
CBD a more walkable one less reliant on
cars should be an underpinning feature
of the housing strategy Inner City
development helps enable this brings
vibrancy and maximizes current amenity
including access to public and active
transport reducing the congestion on our
roads must be part of our planning for
growth and in City development this can
be achieved through the repurposing of
some current Assets in the city that are
not zoned as residential the committee
looks forward to working with the city B
to further refine this
draft thank you Mr pton for that
submission
the next submission is oh sorry Council
coats oh yes please um can I just ask a
question that was that was weaved in
that there there's some good points in
there and some good feedback but there
there probably was a question in there
around the um directiveness of the the
growth zones whether whether the
director um could respond to to that
whether that would be expected as part
of this work or or other other work
thank you Council coach director
Robertson through you Mr Mayor thank you
for the question Council coats this
document is not the document to be
directive to time frames or um or how
things should be rolled out through so
in a growth area that's the precinct
structure planning after the with the
ugz and um ultimately our framework um
structure plan sorry our framework plan
for the PSPs is the guiding document for
that recognizing that the housing
strategy does take into account growth
but it cannot be specific because we
don't even have the time frames we have
to apply to a minister for them so
yeah thank you director Robertson the
next representation of from Mr Ross
proud who is not attending and will be
read out by Mr Montgomery thank you and
through Mr Mayor the presentation is as
follows the ballot housing strategy
observations and opinions on the
strategy document published on the
council's website along with the CBD
Urban Design framework the draft
Ballarat neighborhood character
assessment firstly how's
housing is one of the three fundamental
requirements for life on this planet
food water and shelter this makes
housing a human right not a privilege
over the last 40 years the time over
which I've been involved in all aspects
of the building construction the
planning controls have progressively
contributed to the current status of
housing being a privilege the cost of
housing has now become unaffordable to a
large cohort of the population the cost
of land currently stands at
approximately 50% of the total cost back
in the s and 880s the land cost
represented between 20 to 25% of the
total cost of
housing the significant blowout in
relative cost is due largely to the
planning restrictions on land available
availability combined with land banking
as a consequence the artificial
construct of supply and demand soon
inflates the cost in my view the term
planning refers to what the future
brings with a view on History to give
the future of some some perspective we
don't make the so we don't make the same
mistakes also believe planners should
have a big piter view of the um of the
issues facing the global community and
apply Solutions at the local level
taking into account the current and
potential changes to social economic and
political norms and Customs as well as
Trends in technology the current mindset
and practices in my view are at best
tinkering around the edges and not
addressing the real and Urgent
challenges housing requirements need to
reflect the demographic requirements two
or 300 square meter homes may be a
requirement for large families and
perhaps the wealthy but in order to
reduce the costs we need to have a range
of smaller homes on smaller land plots
available in the appropriate locations
close to public transport singles and
couples time is of the essence this is a
very simple concept that seems to have
been forgotten but is one of the major
reasons for increasing costs it should
not take years to achieve what could be
completed in months the CBD and Heritage
for the last 20 years the CBD and the
Industrial Development of this Fair city
has been neglected to the extent that b
is been reduced to the status of a
housing estate for Melbourne along with
Melton beus Marsh and ban bad's history
architecture and Street Scapes is
without doubt probably the most
significant historical City in this
country being the location for the birth
of democracy but we must use this to
attract development history and Heritage
should not become a restriction but a
means of inspiration historical cities
around the world successfully mix new
and old the CBD need people living in
the CBD so it's not just Windswept
streets after 6 p.m Ross PR thank you Mr
proud for your submission the next
submission is from Mr Marshall s
Sullivan who's not attending will be
read out thank you and three Mr Mayor
the presentation is as
follows this strategy holds significant
importance and stands as a pivotal
decision tool to guide ballarat's
development over the next five decades
in essence it advocates for higher
density developments throughout the
existing neighborhoods of Ballarat in
terms of growth areas planning the
housing strategy does not provide
particular guidance on the roll out of
the growth areas the strategy confirms
that it will be part of the ga framework
which will be the document to ultimately
guide the development of future growth
areas this is a sign this is significant
because clearly the growth areas are fun
fundamental in facilitating growth not
only for housing but also for services
and infrastructure required to support
communities the strategy highlights the
promotion of high density housing in
existing urbanized locations which
essentially relies on infill and or
deinition demolition of existing house
stock in order to make way for smaller
and potential lower amenity housing
options of course challenges arise with
pressures on roads and infrastructure
including drainage and flooding Heritage
character vegetation and design and
development controls topography buffers
access to Social Services sporting pH
facilities and the list goes
on the strategy states that areas with
the most capacity for change which
includes B Central that new neighborhood
characters will result this is a
fundamentally significant policy
direction for Council to adopt so
caution is needed it is not fair on the
community to Simply adopt a policy which
means that their character will
change change should be Progressive and
needs to be sympathetic to its context
while also balances other growth
opportunities such as the growth areas
our City's Heritage is a Cornerstone and
at the face of it the approach
encouraged by the strategy poses a risk
to its preservation furthermore several
of these proposed INF areas are quite
distinct from the CBD raising concerns
about their ability to significantly
contribute to the CBD activation it is
not fair to compare Melbourne or other
City infield strategies in a ballat
situation we don't have the same special
distribution of infrastructure active
activity centers public transport that
other cities have so therefore we should
not seek to apply philosophical
strategies to a very unique place like
Ballarat this is again why the role the
growth areas have of delivering house
stock needed to be given a higher
priority in any housing strategy the
strategy projects the potential for
about 34,000 new dwell to be added
through infield Development Across
Ballarat this is a significant number of
dwellings which can easily be reduced by
recognizing the role of growth areas the
city's existing infrastructure is
already strained and it's unclear how
social services and Facilities will cope
such as schools sporting facilities um
medial employment Etc and inner city
land is not available for this
purpose the strategy albe it indirectly
appears to endorse infill as a
replacement for green fuel growth around
Ballarat with the yet to be approved
Northern growth areas as the sole driver
for Green Field development in the
forceable future this stance leans on
the theoretical availability of 34,000
Lots suggesting there's no pressing need
for additional grainfield land we don't
think this is a wise policy direction to
take we think that more work is needed
to identify the actual reality of
achieving the infield targets along with
acknowledging the greater role growth
areas have prior to the public
exhibition the recommendation in the
council report calls for Council to
endorse the strategy albe it for
Community consultation purposes we
suggest that the purpose of this
endorsement is clearly understood in
that it's not an endorsement rather it's
the approval to commence a consultation
we think this is a subtle but very
important
distinction thank you Mr Sullivan for
your submission the next representation
is from Mr Darren Evans representing
Preston Row Patterson I believe Mr Evans
is with us this evening thank you Mr
Evans please come forward even thank
you Darren Evans Preston Ray Patterson
um and I live in Lake W all right um I
haven't uh sent anything out initially
so I did take the liberty of printing
some uh copies of our submission if you
wanted
that thanks m
r one for myself to raise Sam
there yes so thanks for the opportunity
to uh to talk to the um to the agenda
item and the housing
strategy so Prest Patterson are Property
Consultants and valuers with a national
network of officers uh across the
country uh more particularly strong
presence in Regional Victoria including
bat Bendigo jalong warnable horam and
Sheeran at bat office is well placed to
contribute to the housing strategy
discussion with key Personnel boasting
up to 30 years experience in the local
property Market thank you the
development and growth across bat in
recent years has been extraordinary as a
prop property professional and residents
it's exciting to be part resident sorry
it's exciting to be part of the gross
story we are encouraged by the draft
housing strategy and applaud the need to
urgently address projected population
growth housing needs diversity
affordability and
sustainability on review of the strategy
documentation we have serious
obervations with aspects of the data
presented our concern is not with a
projected population growth to 170,000
by 2041 and the need for 29,000 new
dwellings but in the Quantum of land
Supply suitable for development as
suggested particularly in relation to
infill the aspirational objective of
council to accommodate the 29,000 new
dwellings on a 50/50 split between
infill and growth areas notionally
supports diversity but we would
challenge the reality of that objective
it has not been the case in recent years
and the strategy documents do not hide
from
that well we believe the significant
development constraints that have always
been present in Bat will severely impede
the potential infilled land suitable for
housing as identified by the housing
capacity assessment the assessment in
its own words States among other things
that it does not assess the likelihood
of the land being developed I think it's
a key key
recognition the total supply of infield
dwelling sites has been identified at
34,000 we believe this is misleading and
needs to be carefully reviewed for
context of the scope in which the
numbers were
derived constraints including broader
Heritage interests fragmented ownership
historic mining activity and
contamination aging infrastructure and
services capacity along with higher
underlying land values in central areas
are all factors that can be expected to
substantially erode the potential number
of 34,000 adversely impacting the
objective of a 50/50 infield of growth
area
[Applause]
split a significant concern to us is the
reference to the inclusion of some
industrial areas for residential lead
mixed use development industrial land
has been the standout performer of the
Ballarat property Market in recent years
we've seen industrial land VES increase
from around $100 a square meter up to
$500 a square meter today in Parts
limited supply has been the key driver
of price growth along with changing
occupancy patterns with a significant
take up of Warehouse units and self
storage facilities by households who no
longer have a shed in their rear
yard any reduction in available
industrial land is a major concern from
our perspective we recommend an
industrial land strategy to fully inform
this housing
strategy we understand that the growth
areas framework plan will guide the
sequency and roll out of Greenfield
development however we note the plan
will be formed by the housing stry to
this end we believe it's critical to
expedite the West and Northwest future
growth areas to readily supplement
housing demand across bellat at a more
realistic split of 30% infill and 70%
grainfield growth
areas thank you Mr Evans for your
submission questions
counselors there are none thank you Mr
Evans um councelor
Johnson thank you for your submission um
interested to know what you see is the
key challenges in regard to developing
the
identified uh infill opportunities
across the city um and if you have any
experience with um you may or may not uh
with within field
developments how long it usually takes
to uh have all the planning approved and
get to the stage where a property can
actually be built thank you councelor
Johnson fairly um broad ranging answers
so that I think the yes have had some
experience and yes we observe it readily
um we deal with a number of clients who
who put forward submissions for
development in central infill areas um
the complications can range from from U
Heritage related issues to soil related
issues um Restraint of just capacity of
size uh car parking there's a whole
range of things that are going to feed
into that which invariably relate to
higher costs and these these projects
are no longer viable
um a number of those over the years have
have failed to materialize for those
very
reasons thank you Mr Evans councelor
Eddie you've got a
question um
thanks sorry thanks Mr Evans for your
presentation your
audio can you just try
again hello testing yep loud and clear
okay um thanks Mr Evans for the
presentation and I know another
difficult question following on from
councelor Johnson but you've talked
about the difficulty at achieving that
Target of
34,000 and and simply based on the
experience you have and what's perhaps
gone before in the past what what do you
think a realistic number is of that
34,000 that might come to
Market thank you counc ready Mr
Evans uh I look I'd hate to speculate at
what that number looks like certainly
haven't done any specific study on what
that might be um I just think in a
Quantum of number uh
to if we've got um growth area estimates
of how many houses can go there and
we're thinking there'll be a 50/50 split
then the numbers just don't add up to me
that if we put 34,000 forward as an
infill potential and I think um I just
think broadly about the limitations
around that and what will realistically
be achieved um I can't see that um that
would be anything like that number and
it it it may well be a third of that um
so therefore we need to be looking to
the growth areas to
supplement the the housing lots to
achieve that 29,000 Target
thank you m Mr Evans i' further followup
cancel
ready thank you Mr Evans for your
presentation the next presentation is
from Mr Nick gtz who is attending this
evening thanks Mr
gtz thank you Mr Mayor is that on yes
yeah um Nick rvage director of land
development at Integra um I'd like to
thank you for the opportunity to present
tonight on behalf of the Integra
group we've been developing master plan
communities and quality housing options
in bat for over 25 years and we've been
awarded multiple industry awards for our
works at the Bak Golf Club Redevelopment
known as Insignia Canadian Lakes estate
MacArthur Park at miners rest and Lucas
and we're really proud of the
communities we have helped create we
have a real Affinity in balarat and
commend the Council on drafting housing
strategy to assist with setting the
vision for this great
City we also acknowledge that creating
crafting a housing strategy to plan for
the future bad is not a simple task and
we thank you for the six weeks of
community
consultation but we must ensure we
protect everything we love about our
town seeking Community feedback on the
draft housing strategy is important from
first review we know that the data
quoted on Supply at Lucas is out by
approximately
35% will include the correct figures in
our submission but it does raise the
questions on the abity of other other
figures we also query the timing of this
report when it preempts the release of
the iiga one month away the growth areas
framework plan and the Statewide housing
plan this strategy will set the future
of bat for the next 20 years and while
not everyone will agree the data and
forecast those decisions are made on
should be Beyond
dispute data we do know to be true is
that Landy prices have increased by 30%
over the last 2
years this is directly related to a lack
of land Supply in our Green
Fields make no mistake we are in a
housing
crisis alterate and diversified ongoing
stock is critical to accommodate an
increasing population base while
ensuring affordability is achievable and
that people have M multiple options to
match their
budgets affordable housing doesn't just
need to be multi-level apartments on
subdivided blocks in the CBD it can be
delivered in our green fields and we
have demonstrated this throughout our
communities This Is Why We Believe
multiple development fronts and choice
is so important for
balarat the aspirational infield targets
reflect a city Centric planning academic
but those aspirations can't be at the
expense of constraining Supply which
directly correlates to affordability in
balarat this city has fostered and
encouraged investment in balarat West
and in alfin and West for over a decade
now and the area has fulfilled about 70%
of demand during that time the schools
there are established with more coming
significant parks and playgrounds have
been installed walking and cycling
infrastructure is connecting and they're
accessible and Health Community and
shopping choices are growing and the
development of Beware is continuing the
heavy lifting here has been
done while the northern growth area and
infl opportunities assist in the onr
supply required to ensure affordability
and diversity they should not be the
sole solution and we know they will come
at significant cost to City of bat rate
payers as new and upgraded amenities are
demanded by the
community this draft strategy is a good
start but it needs work and the input of
locals as well as out of town
Consultants it is a massive
responsibility to direct housing options
for bat for the next 20 years and this
requires a clear understanding of how
the city is to be perceived by
prospective residents and our current
constituents
alike counselors should take a
precautionary approach to planning for
growth and make sure that good and
proper planning occurs in both the
greenfields and in field areas so that
so that there are fundamental changes to
your
assumptions excuse me so that if there
are fundamental changes to your
assumptions investment in Bat is not
halted as I've noted councilors there
are concerns around the accuracy of the
data in this draft strategy and I ask as
you consider your response to this
evening statements and questions from
the public I ask that in
addition to considering whether the
statement should be put out for consider
consultation of at all you also ask if
the data should be checked and qualified
with local stakeholders first thank you
thank you Mr gitz any questions
councilors councelor Tyler thanks Mr
Mayor thanks Mr grovich um just a
question you made a comment around the
the Lucas data um I also note that in
the report there's the data around 9
half thousand in the existing growth
areas already and most of that is down
south um which has actually struggled to
actually see development there and drive
down there pretty well every second day
and not much is happening why is that on
a go slow when in other areas such as
the Lucas or Winterfield and winter
Valley is just booming why is it so slow
in those areas uh do you know why that's
the case yeah I I believe um those GRE
areas haven't proceeded because of of a
range of reasons that have always been
there um not all these areas can come to
the market there's fragmentation there's
people who just do do not want to
develop their land um there is a lack of
infrastructure sometimes there's no
sewer and other services available um
and often the sites are unviable you
have to run Services a long way and and
it it just does not make sense for them
to be developed so in our opinion that's
why they haven't proceeded I suspect
your the numbers you're talking about um
you know saying the um amount of land
still available in the growth areas is
is I suspect the council officers have
just used the desktop studies done from
the consultants in Melbourne and they
don't understand what's happening truly
on the
ground
um so um yeah it's theoretical Supply I
suspect it's half that Ben oh
councelor councelor Tyler followup just
before just to follow the train of
thought Council
McIntosh or you you're right um probably
to the director first and then maybe to
Mr gillich in relation to the north we
started to get discrepancies in relation
to um numbers of lots so 1 minut 7,000
now at
7,800 um what data are we using to
quantify the amount and my understanding
it's more likely around 20 20 Lots per
hectare is that is that the
case cheor
Robertson
sorry three Mr May councelor Tyler the
DAT is used by it is a habitable Lots
per habitable hectare and if you're
looking at the new growth areas which
are different to the existing growth
areas we've considered the option of a
20 dwellings per habit habitable hectare
in the general residential component and
then potential for increases in that in
the more medium density areas
recognizing the need for or that um the
world has changed and and you could
accommodate smaller lots and and more
Med density so 20 to per habitable
hectare and even greater development
such as tow houses or apartment style
around activity
centers that changes a lot yield councel
Tyler and then probably the followup
question for Mr gillich I think you've
even mentioned this in the chamber
before what roughly around the Lucas
which has been used as a bit of an
example um around a good development in
that area what's roughly your lot um
Lots per hectare that you're getting in
maybe for future um stages have you been
increasing that and to what to what size
sure um you know when we commen Lucas
you know um the adjoining suburb of
alfen roughly had 800 squ meter blocks
that were 20 M frontages by 40 m depth
um quite large um the precinct structure
plan for alfin and West um aspired to
get to 15 dwellings um initially the
market didn't like us going from 800 to
400 squ met or 500 Square met so we've
been delivering about 12 a half
dwellings per hectare um more recent
permits with throughout Lucas are edging
closer to
15 but I I I would warn the council
going from 15 to 20 dwellings you're now
saying that you want 25% smaller blocks
in our Green Fields I'm not sure that's
the future of ballat that we
want thank you Mr gorilla it's councelor
McIntosh uh my question question is to
the director but follows on from
councelor Taylor just to get a tiny bit
more detail Mr G gurovich um talked
about the data
discrepancies um could you please just
uh elaborate on that thank you Council
mag director Robertson to you Mr May and
thank you for the question Council
McIntosh so um despite Mr Gilla saying
officers are ill informed we do um do a
lot of work in the technical documents
to understand the data um we don't make
that up ourselves we actually go to
experts to give us that data and we also
run that across state who actually then
um can verify that um through their own
data so we're just drawing on the the
mechanisms that are available to us and
also the the things that are available
to us to understand the lot
Supply whilst we understand land is
constrained in some areas in growth
areas that might rule out development we
still have to recognize them as
available
Lots Council Macintosh follow up
uh through you Mr Mayor just to follow
up to Mr gilovich through you um is
there any further information you said
speaking to the developers to get more
information about that um correct data
is there any further detail that you'd
like to provide us before we make our
decision here in the chamber this
evening I guess where the development
Community is somewhat confused right now
counselor is um two years ago we had
uh the head of Delp um the planning
Authority come up to balarat and and she
said that balarat was one of the most uh
had the lowest land Supply in the
regions and um um 18 months ago we're in
this chamber debating the rezonings and
and the council officers report set up
and said due to the land Supply crisis
we need to reone these three areas this
strategy says that we have enough land
Supply in some in some places to 2041 in
the Greenfield so it's chopping and
changing that's the confusion anxiety
that's providing to the development
Community thank you Mr gtz for your
presentation thank you very much Mr
cman thank you Mr C um uh thank you uh
Mike cof and Lake wender bat Consulting
planner um as I've mentioned before this
is a big decision for bat um people are
saying this is the next 20 years um I
believe if you look at 50,000 Lots it's
probably the next next 50
years this is a complex
document 250 plus pages on the agenda
we've had since last Friday night to
have a look at it so the comments I'm
providing tonight
U with my old um body and my old brain
is the best that I can come up with in
relation to the
document in simplistic form the housing
strategy in front of you tonight is
saying that we're proposing high density
development right across all the urban
areas of
balarat one way or
another the only real question is the
level of increase in density
these high density areas are being
promoted in Gregory Street Howard Street
near the lake soldiers Hill Bakery Hill
sasta pole wer and
ran most of these areas are currently
predominantly built out with houses so
if they're built out with houses and we
want increased
development and quite a few of these are
covered by Heritage
controls saying that we want to put more
houses in backyard
Ys as has been
mentioned quite a bit tonight before me
and that's one of the problems with
going
last Heritage is a huge component of our
city in front of you tonight you have
the proposal to put 33,000 houses units
somewhere in in a balat in
backyards there's currently roughly
50,000
houses in balat
and we're saying there scope to put
another
33,000 in Bor so for every three houses
you drive past in the city we're saying
there can be two
more to me it doesn't make
sense I'm not here
tonight to say the housing strategy is
completely wrong I'm not here tonight to
say we don't need
infill we do we need it for
environmental reasons
we need it for social reasons and we
need it to activate the
CBD as has already been raised in one of
the other presentations a lot of these
areas that are proposed for medium and
highdensity development are well remote
from the
CBD so in terms of
activation I query whether we're
actually going to achieve the goal that
we want with uh what we're doing
the question for the average person in
balarat is do I want to see houses and
units in the backyards and the
properties are joining
me that is the simple
question that comes out of this 250 plus
page
document there is a place for it it's
been raised as how much of it do we want
to
see
bat's infrastructure within the city is
currently near
capacity so if you think of what had to
be provided to provide for 50 the 50,000
houses that are needed here in terms of
schools and hospitals and community
centers virtually every school in Bat is
full and at
capacity yet it's put in front of us
tonight 33,000 potential additional
lots I'm worried
that if the document gets the
endorsement of council it will then be
used to guide the framework plan and the
framework plan will then say we don't
need more growth
areas we've heard from businesses
tonight big Builders saying their
businesses are significantly tied into
the growth
areas I
myself currently got eight inner city
um unit projects on the
go I started them roughly five years ago
they're not all 5 years old some are
only the last 12 months I haven't
managed to turn a sod on any of those
eight for various reasons and I won't go
through the the
reasons I think it's a good thing to be
building units in the center of Ballarat
in the right way that's
respectful but it is very very difficult
and I think putting in front of us
tonight that it's potentially the answer
and would
underpin basically the winding back of
the growth areas I believe is dangerous
for our
economy Australia has a housing
shortage bat has a housing
shortage the construction industry has
been hit by interest rates it's been hit
by the cost of materials and it's been
hit by the cost of
land in an economic downturn it's the
Housing Industry we normally turn to to
try and dig us out of the problems we're
in I'm worried that the document that's
in front of you tonight will finish
up actually not helping with delivering
more
housing to the best of my memory the new
housing strategy started before
2016 these reports that are dated 2016
that assess the three growth areas back
then and then there was another lot done
in
2018 so it's fair to say that this has
been going for8
years 8 years so if that's the case what
I say to the counselors
tonight is that if you were to spend
another two or three months to put this
document in what I would call a more
balanced
form considering where you've come from
and where you're at I think it's easier
to do that process now than trying to
pick it up
down the the track which would be my
suggestion the issue of Cambrian
Hill is an issue for the city of balarat
it's in the report tonight that there's
thousands of houses proposed at Cambrian
Hill which has no infrastructure no
facilities no
schools no Parks no nothing they will be
specifically needing to use the
infrastructure in the city of
Ballarat and in particular in Sebastapol
so I I also say that that's another
issue that should be looked at by
Council this evening as to what your
response to that needs to be in the
interest of your rate
pays overall tonight I'm saying there
needs to be a combination it's not
infill it's not
Greenfield it needs to be both and I'm
worried that this document is setting
baller up ballat for down the track to
be basically infi based thank you thank
you Mr C Council
Maloney thanks Mr Mayor and through you
um Mr cofin thanks for the presentation
tonight and I take your point you've
only had a few days look at it and
that's WIS is going out to consultation
for a few weeks to to get people a
chance to digest it properly but the
report of the strategy or draft strategy
doesn't talk about an open slather in
fill every where in central bat it's
quite clear in terms of specific
corridors and specific areas so if you
can't heavily develop those specific
corridors can you develop any part of
inabel out then so I mean I guess it's
not saying open sther it's being very
specific in terms of slyther of bat
there's certain streets on on on traffic
corridors there's certain um high
density um you know commercial areas
that are recommended if not there then
where can you do infill
minutes Mr
cman good
question so the planning scheme at the
moment currently provides I think for
five designated urban renewal
sites which are large sites which have
been in the planning scheme for the last
five or six years targeted for
significant
development and even though those sites
have been in the
scheme none of them have been developed
even though the planning has been there
to do it so because they haven't been
developed because industrial sites are
hard to resign and they come with issues
as been suggested
before it leaves us to a certain extent
with the backyards and and the existing
blocks if it was
myself I would look at a scope of tools
to activate the center of
Ballarat planning is one preco it seemed
to me like there was an event on in
central Balor
at 45 weeks out of the year I would look
at a policy to activate St street with
events
markets
displays Heritage to us the whole bit
just the planning of of of saying that
this is where we want to push
development history tells us it hasn't
happened and the example I've just given
you shows that
follow
up thank you Mr thanks thanks Mr May
uh um yeah yeah so I guess again really
sort of the key challenge I think I've
found as seven years as a counselor is
that no one wants to specifically be
clear on where in central bat you
develop it's almost a Cas so it's it's a
NIMBY thing completely it's never in my
backyard not not in my back it's just
never anywhere near me And yet we'll
have to keep on going out forever and
not learn the mistakes of every other
city that so we'll have to keep going
out and create traffic sers ultimately
seems to be the strategy so um I guess
you it would be good to sort of
understand um during the consultation
process where the developer Community
thinks we can develop but I I wanted to
touch though onve got to ask a question
at
least in terms of some of the key themes
that are holding up
proper development in the Central Area
um you what are some of the the hurdles
you're encountering that's that's that's
costing time and money um and you know
delays to to decent development in the
Central Area look I'd like to preface
it my response to this with there's an
genuine intent from the staff to try and
help that's that's the first thing the
second thing
is the council is obliged to abide by a
set of rules that are law uh many of
many of which aren't in the jurisdiction
of the council cultural heritage is is
is one flooding is becoming a bigger
issue now what's what's happening in the
past historically if your site flooded
or didn't flood you're
okay now what's happening is if the road
for example floods for half an hour in
100 years out the front of your
property that's in biding development
probably something worth considering for
the bridge melon and the opening up
there the um issue was of
servicing a lot of the servicing in Bat
was done 100 years ago and a lot of the
properties sewers don't actually provide
to sewer an entire allotment and that
that generates problems uh vegetation is
an issue and we want to save
trees uh drainage is an issue a lot of
um properties fall to the rear yet the
drainage is at the front that Bri uh
creates problems a lot of these issues
then result in the need for the consent
of AD joining
owners uh which can become difficult too
as
well whether you're building one unit or
50 um a lot of the same issues quite
often apply um which can make it um
problematic I could probably r on for
quite a while but that's some of the
M thank you Mr calman coun any other
questions of Mr calman if not thank you
Mr cman council's any questions this s
Council Taylor happy to move happy to
move and talk to it if I get a second
thank you seconded counselor McIntosh
was quick with oh sorry I didn't turn to
ride but councelor
Tyler thank you Mr Mayor and um tonight
we've heard some pretty pretty pretty
good explanations around what's
happening and concerns In the City by um
very different people with experience um
and qualifications and um I agree with
what they're
saying but we have to actually do
something as well so we've got a a draft
document that we need to get out there
uh councilors if we keep sitting on this
we can keep talking about it going
around in circle but we actually need
the feedback from the community from all
aspects of the community to provide the
feedback back against this document um
do I agree with it 100% no way no way do
I agree with it 100% I mean I question
the the ability to get to 5050 in
relation to 50% infield and 50%
Greenfield um I question that because
history shows it just isn't it just
doesn't happen um Council adopted that
position I think in 2015 was the the
position that Council made to say it
should be 50% but that's showed now what
are we talking 8 years later that that
just hasn't happen and the latest data
what is it 65 um 6535 we haven't reached
that what we've seen though is when you
do uh put changes in place going back
eight nine years ago it takes a long
time for them to be implemented within
the infill of this city and I'll use one
example um which is Eddie Avenue we all
know Eddie Avenue we had this chamber
here it was 10 units uh two and three
story in Mount Helen um we voted against
it went to vcat and it was
successful the only thing that's changed
on that side is the house has been
removed one house has been removed to
then with the future opportunity for 10
but that hasn't eventuated I think I
understand that application's been
extended they're permit but still
nothing's happened it that's you know
we're talking eight years to see a small
change which still cannot get out of the
ground uh someone mentioned lioner I
think it was a part of the submission by
someone Lin Street fantastic we have
approved that development to happen in
the CB but still we sit and wait it
doesn't get out of the ground now
hopefully it happens soon we'd love to
see it happen but it doesn't happen
because the viability for those
developments don't make it stack up and
that's the concern that we have when we
start looking at creating opportunities
for people to move here we look at
opportunities around affordable housing
uh those type of things we actually need
the houses there to be built at a price
that people can afford to do it if it's
not viable then it just doesn't happen
and that's why we start to see more
green field development happening
because it's might seem on one hand
bigger broader more expensive it
actually isn't because of the scale the
multiplication means it's actually cheap
at BIR block when we start with looking
infield you got those issues that come
up and number one issue that we have and
it's not an issue it's a positive it's
actually Heritage when we start
overlaying things like incremental
change to across soldiers Hill the first
thing that's going to come up is how do
we then balance that with the Heritage
that's within that areas it's going to
be a big challenge so we've got a big
blob on a map question is what's the
percentage of that can actually be
developed I do agree that the amount of
infill blocks of 35,000 sorry 34,000 is
ambitious more than ambitious even to
the point probably
unrealistic and the line was stolen I
had it written down Mr KFAN but this is
not a 15-year plan it's a 15 50-year
plan for the infielder Ballarat and
that's because we can't get a house on
every you know two out of three blocks
we can't get a house in the backyard
it's just not feasible and even if we
went up we're still not going to reach
that that amount in 15 years it's going
to be more likely 50 years as the city
matures so we need to find a balance and
I think we've got to challenge ourselves
with councils with the community is is
that 50 50% realistic if it isn't do we
need to make that policy change but if
it is realistic how do we support both
to make sure we have housing on the
market we have affordability and we can
keep up with the infrastructure that's
there I think the officers done the best
they can with what they've got they had
to use a methodology to come up with and
they had to look across the city um but
that doesn't mean it's right it means
there's every opportunity for for people
to provide feedback and to give uh
opinions and Views and recommendations
on what should happen um I look at prime
example would be that that uh
substantial growth in Howard Street that
is not going to happen overnight how can
you change what businesses are already
there in place to actually turn that
over and say we're going to have
five-story development there it's just
it's going to take a long long time to
do it so trying to reach these targets
are going to be pretty ambitious and
damn near impossible so we've got to
make sure we've got that balance but the
only way to to start to move on
something is to actually put it out to
consultation we have to get the feedback
and I'm sorry for the people that have
read it quickly probably with glazed
eyes in the middle of the night and
probably made them go to sleep and
actually read it um it actually needs to
have it needs to be dissected it needs
to be pulled apart it needs to be looked
at layer by layer and we keep forgetting
that we've also got part of this is the
neighborhood character study and when I
looked at that I thought put a
neighborhood character study over the
top of what we want to do it actually
doesn't encourage growth in those areas
because it changes the character of
those areas what does that mean to the
community I know the people in Park
Street weren't happy when they start to
see well they were starting to see
development happening in that area
changes of character overnight but
tonight we're looking at not endorsing
the strategy that is implemented in the
planning Scheme tonight it's about
actually Community engagement and
feedback this is the first part we've
heard submissions from people here is an
opportunity now to have more detailed
submission and hopefully even open the
doors get people in draw on the maps
work out what works what doesn't work
and then what we need to do to try and
find the best for the growth for this
city so I'm happy to move tonight um
because I think we need to take a step
forward not a step back step back is not
going to go anywhere we need to take a
step forward we need to review it but
need to do it as a a total Community
with everyone involved thank you
councelor Taylor councelor McIntosh is
the second uh Mr Mayor just to confuse
the proceedings um I support the uh
recommendation that's there to some
degree but I would actually prefer it
have more time for Community to consider
it I understand that Council Maloney was
going to second the
recommendation um I really do believe
that a couple of days for many of the
experts in our community to decide for
such a significant report requires some
further time so I will can I clarify are
you
speaking you've moved will the second or
you prefer one of the other councils I
prefer one of the other counselors to
Second counselor um coat also had her
light on as well Council money if you're
happy I know it's probably outside of
our standing orders but I think the
intent is clear and I'll allow some
leeway for that to council Coates if
you're happy to
Second sorry oh you've already seconded
so sorry just before we do to
clarify so we've had a
mover and a perceived
seconder was there you can C you can
certainly reserve your right or I'm more
than happy to I'm more than happy to
reserve my right to speak if that's the
way that you um accept it in terms of
governance and you can certainly speak
against the motion even though your
second is quite okay councelor McIntosh
thank you okay all right so councelor
McIntosh is going to reserve before you
speak councelor CS I'll ask if there's a
council speaking against the motion
councelor Harris is indicating so
Council Harris over to
you
um just a question if I may first when's
the I report likely to hit
um
Robson oh through you Mr Mayor
um counselor um I just had a mental
blank sorry Council um it it it's
proposed to be provided to the minister
in September but there is no commitment
as to what time we will see this so
we've committed to forge ahead without
the understanding of the igf report
because um if we do we do not know when
we will have certainty on that so we
need to take charge of our what we can
um through the housing
strategy thank you Council Harris thank
you Mr um no I um you can take a view
that you know we get this out for um to
community to have a look at um my view
is as councilors know as this has gone
through that there's still some
fundamental flaws I think think within
the whole Paradigm particularly that
accessibility overlay and some of the
skewing that that does and some of the
actual real potential risk that it puts
our community of creating some
concentrations particularly that um area
down south in sebass that um by virtue
of the fact that it might have a you
know a bus route and um some other um
positives uh in reality where it is you
know is we know in our bones it's the
wrong Dynamic for around down there it
wouldn't be where we'd choose I wouldn't
have thought um uh if we had Godlike
powers to have that sort of
concentration so I'm wary of it um Mr
Mayor um wary enough that I would prefer
it to go back with some more thought um
I I don't with the Ia stuff I mean in
the end um government's going to come to
us um what they will want no doubt is um
more Central Development because they
don't want to pay for infrastructure
that goes out um they'll make us make
the hard decisions there's no two ways
about that but both for officers and
both and for counselors as well so we'll
have a um a flurry of um uh objections
that come forward as we go forward with
this uh but basically we'll have some
construct I'm sure in the IG or for
other central government Dynamics where
um we would just you know it'll it
doesn't matter how many times you take
it to vcat it'll just be approved so um
you know we're on a a a hideing to
nothing our best um way that we can
tackle it I feel is to get it done right
in this maybe this very small amount of
time we've got to get it right and I I
agree with um the director and that uh I
I think we do have to forge ahead and
get it done but I think this is a false
start this one I think it's it's flawed
um and I worry about some of the
outcomes that might uh Prevail um I do
trust it going out to community as well
I guess but I think the community
deserve just a a better um package than
this one that's currently offered thank
you councilor Harris councilor speaking
for the motion councelor
coats yes SE thank you um yeah obviously
a housing strategy brings out a diverse
range of views and it's local government
101 isn't it where you've got on one
hand more Green Field people wanting
more green field and then on the other
hand people wanting more infill and um
uh um better better sort of connectivity
and diversity so um we've got to start
with the conversation and put put the
work out and and as counselors we have
to be confident that we have qualified
advice not opinions um that we're
looking at it with with clear eyes
without fear or favour so um putting that
out to the community which will be a
broad Community developers are are one
section of that and people in the
building industry but what's at the core
of what we should be looking at is the
the common good and that means social
environmental and economic it it also
means
livability and um that has to be front
of mind for
the the the numbers are pretty
concerning so you know contrary to
councilor Taylor Who's saying we need to
you know do everything we can to
facilitate growth it's happening anyway
so it's more about we have to actually
prepare for the inevitable and looking
at those numbers of you know going back
to the the directors um Clarity on the
the role of local government in and this
housing strategy how many and where so
the how many around 30,000 and you know
if we look in detail at the the
discussion paper around social
affordable housing onethird of those
need to be affordable so we really need
to change the balance of of how um using
the tools that we have that we have
available so um as has been mentioned by
some of the submitters we are in the
midst of a housing crisis um and that
that's that's um that's the result of
several decades of public policy um and
particularly at the federal and state
government I would I would put my
opinion in there um but look it has been
a long process and you know it's not
really going to serve anyone by delaying
putting putting out for for further
consultation the report spells out
really clearly the four areas that we're
we're looking looking at
um that we're looking at the spatial
distribution so um contrary to to one of
the submitters it's not it's not a broad
brush to the whole city being um high
density it is very specific around where
where medium or or higher density could
be could be suitable um and it's very
much based on on evidence and best
practice around livability which
accessibility and transport is actually
so fundamental to the well-being of of a
city and um obviously the other the
other three areas are environmental
sustainability that's never been more
important than it is now um housing
design which takes into account
neighborhood character and Heritage and
that will be an area that attracts a lot
of community interest we know that our
community loves Heritage and values it
um but we we also need to balance that
with the common good of of um being a
livable a livable City with good
accessibility to to services and things
that people need to use like shops and
schools and um
employment
um housing diversity of course so so the
supply of housing that we have and we've
known for 10 or 15 years that it is very
skewed towards s um single stand
Standalone dwellings that are generally
three-bedroom where we have a very high
proportion of single member households
we have an aging population um we have
the wrong type of housing we have we do
actually have some empty houses as well
so there are a whole range of factors
that feed into that so I do appreciate
people taking the time to to make their
submissions at this St stage I don't
take on board the the fear that's um
that's that's being um sort of put
forward at this early stage we are still
in the consultation stage and look to be
honest where you stand depends on where
you sit doesn't it if you're a developer
you you may um tend to have some vested
interests around which which direction
this goes if you're a person who um is
struggling
to afford rent let alone never dream of
of um affording a home you're in a very
different position so for us as
counselors we we need to take into
account all of that and and look at the
evidence with really clear eyes based on
um qualified advice and without fear or
favour so I think it will still generate
a lot more Community interest and really
look forward to um lots of different
sectors in the community putting forward
their their thoughts and Views and
opinions and our job will be to balance
that with evidence and and um moving
towards what's best for the for the
common good and livability for the
long-term benefit of the city thank you
councelor coats counselor after Council
speaking against the motion councilor
Johnson thank you Mr
Mayor councilor coats mentioned a person
struggling to afford rent or dreaming of
being able to afford a home may have a
different opinion in regard to the draft
housing strategy than some of the people
present in the gallery this evening
however at the moment uh lack of uh land
supply has meant that we have less than
1% rental availability in bat and
increasing costs associated with
rentals sorry just fixing a technical
error Council Johnson please
continue means that we have uh 1% or
less rental availability in bellat and
we also have uh rapidly increasing costs
associated with renting those properties
as well as fairly rapidly
increasing costs associated with
purchasing um a property which has only
just started to uh Peter off in the last
few
months we are facing a land Supply
crisis in
Bat I think we probably are already in
one and the reason that I'm speaking
against uh the motion tonight and we'll
foreshadow an alternate motion which is
to um not put the put put the strategy
out uh on exhibition but rather or for
consultation rather but to bring it back
in and make a range of changes in
consultation with the group um if the
motion
fails I believe the 50/50 ratio that the
strategy intends to pursue is not only
unachievable but simply wrong there have
been various ratios uh discussed this
evening but I think 3070 with 30% infill
and 70% Greenfield is more akin to what
we should be pursuing as a council the
summary document relating to the
strategy says we must ensure sufficient
land to enable 20 29,000 new dwellings
by 2041 50% of that is
14,500 in field
developments uh and we're told that
there are 34,000 dwellings identified as
potential infill sites but if we know
anything about infi development we know
that infill is often challenging and
unappealing there are a whole range of
uh issues uh associated with infi
development that might make sites
unsuitable including issues relating to
Heritage
protection uh cultural heritage storm
water retention undersized Services
vegetation and trees uh consent of
joining land owners
um meaning these sites are unviable uh
and I would estimate that a much much
smaller number than
34,000 are actually suitable for uh
infield development and then whether
there is the will of the land owner to
actually redevelop that land is another
thing
altogether and on that note uh we should
consider that tow houses are the most
likely infill housing type as per the
report uh attached by act um entitled
Municipal housing capacity and
assessment tow houses are the most
likely infill housing type as stated in
the report sale prices for nearly
constructed tow houses are between
300,000 to 550,000 most commonly selling
for
around uh so excuse me for one
moment sale prices for newly constructed
tow houses between 300,000 and 550,000
most commonly selling for around
400,000 if you then consider the cost of
construction which is on average between
300,000 to
350,000 there isn't a lot of profit left
over meaning that uh it's less appealing
to actually undertake this
process and uh especially once you
consider hidden projects costs in
relation to all the other matters I
mentioned
earlier we already we already have city
of bat according to the state government
around a th000 appropriately zoned infu
opportunities in Bat so why haven't they
been why haven't they come to fruition
why haven't those properties been
[Music]
um uh why why hasn't infield been
undertaken at those properties
and I understand that the idea is if
that we restrict the amount of available
grain Field Land for development that
that will somehow incentivize people to
um
uh put other you know I don't know what
the the way to say it is to uh go ahead
with infield development that's what I'm
trying to say however um at the moment I
would say it's a fairly appealing time
for those um properties to be
redeveloped in bado already the cost of
housing is incredibly High and um I
don't know
that restricting and limiting the amount
of grainfield land grainfield land that
we're going to um reone to residential
is actually going to increase the appeal
of
um
infill we simply don't have the luxury
of time required to force the outcome
and to artificially prop up the value of
these uh properties property prices have
already increased drastically in B
at and I think we really need to take
this one back uh to council and look at
the fact that in 2016 we released about
18,000 lots for a 10year
period we apparently have around 9,500
Lots in Bat West and 1300 Lots in Lucas
which will get us through the next five
years more likely six until the next lot
of properties become available and at
that point we're only releasing
6,000 um to encourage infill I think
that that balance is
incorrect uh as you can probably tell
from my my ramblings this isn't my area
of expertise but uh even I with limited
knowledge in this area can easily see
that where there isn't
enough Supply um particularly in those
Greenfield areas it can relate in some
really negative outcomes for our
community as far as affordability and
accessibility of housing
thank you councelor Johnson and I
apologize if I we had a technical issue
we've lost councelor Eddie at the start
if I threw you off your game
um do we still have is councelor Eddie
with us working through but we still
continue to okay councilors I'm happy to
if we consider a short adjournment to
give governance an opportunity for
councelor Eddie to join us I know he
wants to speak to the issue so we have a
motion to uh adjourn for a period of
time toilet break move Council Harris
second to council Maloney all those in
favour against that's carried thank you
councilors we'll have a
break okay so thank you ladies and
gentlemen we're back online and
council's on l a motion to move back
into standing orders move Council
McIntosh second to councelor Taylor all
those in favour against that's carried
councilors for um record at the moment I
have councilors Taylor and councelor cod
that have spoken to the motion I've got
Council counc Harris and councelor
Johnson who have spoken against the
motion I'm now looking for a counselor
who wishes to speak for the motion and
councelor Eddie you had your hand up
would you like to
speak uh thank you Mr Mayor um yeah look
I'm torn on this um I I see both sides
of the argument tonight I think we've
got to move forward in some way um I'm
worried about uh the affordability of
land uh in terms of uh the The Limited
Supply if it takes a long time to bring
infill on uh that the affordability for
people to move or stay in bado is going
to get harder and harder um I understand
the need to be involved in neighborhood
change and for people
to see that as uh something of the
future but I'm not sure we should be
driving change in neighborhood structure
and what they look like and I do have a
lot of sympathy for those areas where
we're suggesting that there's going to
be a significant change in the density
of those areas um and I do have concerns
about the building industry uh as to uh
you know the viability ongoing
opportunities within our area if um if
we don't have a a plan and a structure
that allows us to uh both uh focus on
INF field where appropriate but also to
allow growth in development in New
Growth areas so I suppose I'm still
sitting on the fence but um I'm really
torn on this it's probably I'm not yet
convinced that we've got it right and I
support somewhat what councelor Harris
has uh outlined earlier thank you thank
you councelor Eddie is there Council
speaking for the motion Council Maloney
uh yep and questions a couple questions
for the officers first Mr that's okay uh
through you PS to director Robinson uh
there's been some different figures
thrown around with regard to the infield
targets can you remind us of how many uh
dwellings we're seeking to achieve on an
infill basis is over I think it's 15
years the time frame is that right y
director Robertson three Mr Mayor thank
you for the question Council Maloney if
you if the strategy itself is a
long-term strategy and it does identify
that there are potentially 34,000
residential lots but we talk about in
the next 15 years achieving
29,000 dwellings for 55,000 people and
that is split between growth and infill
as much as we can drive that so
ultimately if we were being um split
down the middle it's
14,500 Lots in residential and then our
community will give us an understanding
of whether that's achievable in infill
or not and when we determine if there
are emerging areas so our community will
ultimately determine our split but we're
acting on the strategy that tells us
50/50 thank you and followup question as
well so I'm aware you know Council as
have had four maybe five different brief
things on this so far so lots of
opportunity to give feedback but um have
has tonight's conversations or debate
revealed any known inaccuracies in data
in the
report director Robertson through you Mr
mayor council M no known inaccuracies
the the team don't do these figures off
the top of their head as I said they're
informed by technical work and they're
informed by discussion with State as
well um so no inaccuracies as to figures
it can certainly be challenged through
Community consultation and also um no
inaccuracies in terms of the 50/50
strategy in that case I'm happy to speak
in favour of the report um if okay Mr M
so I want to start by thanking officers
uh for all the detailed work that's gone
into this I know we have a couple of
officers present tonight so thank you
for that we we don't appreciate enough
sometimes the huge amount of work that
goes into these reports so thank you we
we I definitely appreciate at least
anyway I'm sure my colleagues do even if
they don't agree with the content they I
think that everyone does appreciate a
lot of time that goes into this um
counselors tonight we're just being
asked to ultimately put this out to
consultation for the months of September
and October if there was something
fundamentally inaccurate in data by all
means pause this and
reflect however if you don't agree with
the policy put it out to consultation
hear genuinely the feedback from the
community then make an informed decision
about whether we go forward or not so
tonight I would only halt
consultation if there's an inaccurate
data set or something in there that's
going to really throw the consultation
out policy direction is something that
we can hear about during this eight or
so week consultation period throughout
September and October uh and it's it's
the right thing to do for counselors to
not take it back in try to change
outcomes themselves but to let the
community do that we are here as
Community representatives and we should
be allowing the community the chance to
give that feedback so I'd be concerned
if there was something wrong but um you
know that doesn't seem to be the case
according to the officers um if anything
we we need to now talk about the policy
Direction and whether the policy fits
right and that can happen over the
coming weeks by all means um I think we
keep on constantly sort of hearing that
you know bat's a unique place and yes it
is you know and I love it from many of
its unique aspects but every city on the
planet's unique um but we do need to
learn from other places as well we do
need to actually reflect upon the
experience of others bat is the 17th
largest city in Australia and if we
don't learn from some of the other 16
before us then we're doomed to make the
same mistakes they make as well yeah
okay we might not want to pay any
attention to what happens in Sydney
Melbourne Brisbane Adelaide they're too
different to us but what about other
places like Wen gong um Newcastle cans
Toba they're they're bigger than us but
also regionals what about jalong up the
road you know again they were once our
size and now they become this big
massive sprawling mess that just goes on
forever so we have an opportunity to
learn from our peers to learn from you
know the other cities that are a bit
bigger than us and make sure that we
actually learn you know continue to uh
get that good diverse mix of housing uh
I think Council coat spent a bit of time
talking about diversity um you know we
we are a city that that that faces a big
problem because we don't have enough
diverse stock um if you are a single
person or a a student or retiree uh
you're forced to basically get a three
or four bedroom house a house that's too
big for you that costs a fortune to run
um as a single dad myself with one one
or two kids in the house I had to get a
four-bedroom house because that's all I
could afford um I wish I had the
opportunity for a smaller place in
Central bat but that just doesn't exist
you're priced out of the market so
there's all these different things going
on all these different conversations
that need to be had I I'm glad that
we're having these conversations I'm
glad as a nation we're starting to have
those conversations around housing
because they've been missing for too
long we've got entire Generations locked
out of the housing market because we
haven't been having considered
conversations so councilors let's not
put the brakes on these conversations
let's have them over the next several
weeks let's let's put this out to
consultation hear the debate and then
make a decision that's all I ask all
right thanks very much wrapping up thank
you councilor Maloney uh Council
speaking against the motion councelor
Hargraves thank you Mr Mayor and look
there's been so much um robust de debate
and um opinions information angles
coming out of the conversations tonight
and I can see why going out to
consultation would just um bring us even
more of that and would be a very useful
exercise at some point but I just don't
feel that we're there yet um even you
know people speaking in favour of um
going forward as the document is have
spent a lot of time pointing out the
flaws themselves um I'm
hearing a lot about the 50/50 split and
I agree with I think it was Council
Johnson that said changing that number
to something like 7030 might be um you
know a more realistic way to go about it
I don't really feel comfortable with
going out when there's been a lot of
talk already about whether it's
realistic as it is um yeah we know that
um we need to have diverse options for
people um and that includes people of
all um Family sizes and incomes and all
that sort of thing but I think um trying
to kind of force development inward is
just not um yeah it's not realistic and
I don't think it takes into
consideration what people's needs are a
lot of people do want to still have that
backyard even if it's a small one for
their kids to play in um yeah not
everyone wants to live um they're in
town it's there's also the constraints
around expense so you know so many
people won't even touch a property once
it's uh if it's in a Heritage situation
because it just increases your costs it
increases time lines which increases
cost again we've heard about projects
that haven't um come to fruition just
because of the the red tape and the
complexities around doing that so um
yeah I just don't think that we've got
it right yet and I think it was Council
Harris as well that said about the um
areas
uh in sebass I have major concerns about
that also uh in wender I think um that
is going to be confusing for for
community and we've even heard
submissions from people you know around
confusion as to whether they can do
things with their businesses that are
there currently um so look I just feel
like there are too many things that we
could possibly tighten up before we go
out to our community with it and I do
agree perhaps um
you know many times already in this
chamber I've said on different occasions
I'm just a fan of getting on getting on
with it and doing things and not wasting
more time but um for something that's
taken so many years to get to where it
is now I don't
see the problem in just taking a little
bit more time and cleaning up some of
the issues that have been brought up
again and again tonight so for those
reasons um I don't support the
recommendation to go out thank you
counselor har
Graves question councelor Maloney with a
question thanks Mr Mayor I'm just maybe
my questions to governance um given I
was just reflecting on a public question
at the start of the meeting tonight
about making decisions um during
briefings will councilors potentially
put ourselves in a legal or governance
dilemma if we were to take this document
back and make changes against officers
recommendations before pointing it back
out to consultation
I asked a question of govern I'll take
the response from governance we may will
have a view on that but I'll take a
response from
governance so um thank you uh for the
question Council M uh in in essence
you've been provided with a document
which is the officer's um professional
opinion uh which is counselors
ultimately it's just that is it's an
officer opinion councilors may have a
I'll hold a different View and may
request that's the reason why the
resolution is only um before it becomes
a resolution it's only office a
recommendation uh once the resolution is
put which you've already got a a
recommendation has moved into a
resolution right now before you the
current resolution is what's on the
table that's for consideration if there
is a consideration to change that you
will need an alternate motion to change
that if it doesn't get up you've already
got a foreshadowed motion uh which may
provide that
mechanism thank
you Council McIntosh did you wish to
speak before you as a right uh to
reserve you can speak now if you wish or
I intend to speak um but happy for you
to speak you got your light
on I will use my Reserve right to speak
Mr Mayor and I am not surprised that you
will speak as well um probably if I was
really playing this game well I'd wait
but anyway um like counselor haris uh
spoke in the very beginning I do think
this is a bit of a false start and the
reason that I hesitated when I seconded
the recommendation I was hoping to
Second it with a slight Amendment and I
just wasn't sure if the Mover would have
accepted the slight Amendment and that
was to uh ensure that there was a period
of time before this does go out I do
believe it needs further
consideration and I fully support um
councelor Johnson's foreshadowed
recommendation if this is to not be um
accepted in the chamber as it's written
um I do think that there's a number of
items that have been brought up this
evening that we really do need to take
note of some people might know I've been
away for the last month I came back
yesterday L late last night and I've
spoken with a number of people today
that didn't know that this was coming to
the chamber tonight and this is such a
significant thing I understand there's
been seven years work in fact probably
heaps more than that on this particular
project but um some people in their
minds thought that it might have been
out there for two days it's 300 Pages
it's a lot of information and there's
some really big challenges in amongst it
we've also heard tonight a lot of
conversation about the aiga uh response
and and we know that that's coming back
to us in a few weeks maybe four or six
weeks so it it would make a lot of sense
for us to include to consider that as
part of moving forward with this
particular project we know that over the
years there's been a great deal of
conversation and in fact significant
support from this Council for projects
like the making bellat Central the um
Skyline and Vista studies and we've also
had significant conversation about the
gaps review and and I know that that's
sitting there in limbo for a long period
of time what we've heard tonight as well
is a lot about ballarat's authenticity
we've heard a lot tonight about how
important our Heritage is we've heard a
lot of conversation about infield
development and what's that actually
mean um it's my understanding that
infield development is about uh those
opportunities to use vacant sites or
maybe unused sites and it's not
necessarily about whacking a property in
the back of everyone's home and I'm sure
if our community was asked you know
35,000 people are you going to be happy
with a little thing popped in your
backyard that might change the reason
that people move to Ballarat I think
people love Regional cities because of
the space they love to know that there
can be trees and yard and and all sorts
of opportunities for their kids to climb
be healthy and and learn and I and I
think that's what we have but there is
something very unique about Ballarat and
and so I don't necessarily agree with uh
councelor Maloney's conversations in
terms of Newcastle jalong wulong gong
and other places like that because we're
so different we are so different to all
all of them I understand their Regional
cities I understand that there's you
know probably similar numbers in some of
those Regional cities but I think that
our growth is quite different and I
think our community want our growth to
be quite different I agree with
councelor coats when she talked about
diversity um equally I agree with many
of the comments that came from committee
for Ballarat and um um the executive
officer Michael Pon when he was talking
about sustainability and diversity and
and the availability of housing stock
and so on I agree with um councelor
harres when she talked about that split
should it be a
5050 many people have heard me talk in
the chamber over the years about the
need for infill develop development and
I have not changed my view um I believe
we absolutely need to consider infield
development but what does that mean and
are we focusing on the right infield
development when I talk about info
development I talk about it as the
definition says if you Google it I talk
about those unus used spaces but I also
look at the upper levels of our CBD I
look at the upper levels across our city
and I look at the um lack of good
direction that we have we've got
building codes that prevent us from
using our upper levels we've got
building code that has stopped someone
for 5 Years From retaining a staircase
that's got a Heritage Park on the
outside of the building just down the
bottom of stt street we have
challenges that we need to fix before we
uh launch ourselves into this new space
I too like many in this chamber want to
see things move forward this has been
going on for a long time we've seen many
decisions in this chamber made however
we've seen drafts go out and they don't
change a lot and that worries me that's
part of the reason that I hesitated at
the start of this debate what I want to
know Mr Mayor is that we put out a
housing strategy and a neighborhood
character study that our community will
look at and respond to but that gives us
plenty of time as well to make sure that
we actually adopt those um the feedback
that comes from our community and that
we have the the opportunity to make the
appropriate changes that we need to I
don't believe by putting this out
tonight that that is going to give us
the full opportunity the community will
see this as our chamber having supported
it if we hold it if we consider the
feedback that we've had tonight if we
are able to consider even some of the
data discrepancies that have been put to
us um then I think we would be able to
go back to the community with something
that's absolutely confident and uh a
great reflection of how we do need to
look in 50 years time I know the world
heritage serial listing of the
goldfields is going to bring us
something like $68 million a year of
economic return we're talking about a
downturn at the moment we're talking
about the need to activate as Mr calman
said our
CBD I agree with all of those
opportunities I can see the benefit if
we do this right if we get it right and
that's what it's about we're not talking
about infield development that's just
about jam and cram and stack and pack
and popping things in 35,000 properties
across our community that's not what
we're talking about let's get it right
let's take the time we've taken seven
years we've put it out there for a
couple of days some people don't even
know it's been out there it's 300 Pages
it's a lot for for our community to read
I understand that this allows two months
for our community to to respond but from
what I've seen over the years when we
put a draft strategy out it doesn't
change as much as this probably needs to
so for all of those reasons I don't
support the recommendation as it is
however I do supporting the support the
foreshadowed recommendation if this
fails thank you Council
M um thank you um council's
and the magnitude of this document I'm
not surprised at the level of debate and
care that everyone has brought to the
chamber tonight from submitters who have
taken the time to come in and present to
those that who have written uh
submissions as well to be taken into
consideration and also the workshops
counselors that you've been involved in
with our planning department to get to
this stage I guess in terms of that what
it is we are asking or what this
document is asking is it is a draft it
is a collection of some ideas and some
thoughts about how bat will grow into
the future we are growing we cannot stop
that the last couple of years at about
1.8 to
2.1% has said that we are growing and we
have a demand for houses to be built to
House people that are choosing to come
and live in this city and we need to
make sure there is a sufficient Supply
not only just of land but of houses
being built to House
people that housing crisis that is on
our doorstep that is on Australia's
doorstep we have a role to play in part
of that in being able to offer a housing
Supply and choice to people hopefully
that they can afford that they can get
access to that meets their individual
circumstances part of this document is
about Consulting with those who are
subject matter experts that are the
people that are here presenting to us
tonight I'm getting a sense that this do
that this motion may actually fail that
concerns me and the fact that it's
likely to then put it back until not
coming back into the chamber until next
year which is then certainly not going
to be able to activate it any quicker in
terms of the relative crisis that is on
our
doorstep met the last week with
the minister for housing that was really
Keen to see what our um draft housing
strategy was going to be about when we
talked about infield when we're talking
about Green Fields the fact that we've
got the belat North Precinct that has
been gazetted but we've also got two
other growth um growth fronts that are
currently sitting on The Minister's desk
and we've lobbied and we've written to
the minister for
Activation there's a lot of this that
lies in the hands of the state
government in terms of where they want
to possession even some of the language
that we have been talking about from a
70 to 30 is what some of the meetings
I've been in hearing from state
government and clearly their ability to
pay for infrastructure in some of those
areas we talk about um the Lucas Area
not having access to bus routes that are
going far enough into the community at
the moment so we need to be careful in
terms of if we are pushing for more and
more growth fronts and I'm not saying
that they're not a bad thing to do we've
seen some really great developments but
infill has its challenges as
well lots of parcels are land that are
sitting there but it also needs the
motivation of someone who is the land
owner that's willing to either sell that
land for someone who is willing to
develop or for people to develop them
themselves and we know that presents
challenges when yellow signs go up
around our community and local
neighborhoods tend to not want the
development in their backyard if we're
talking about a change to the
neighborhood
character but our city must grow we
cannot turn it back it must grow and it
will continue to grow we're not talking
about wholesale changes about scrapping
particular areas of neighborhood
character but over time and so long as
there is Choice some of the developments
that are being put forward in some of
the visuals that we've seen is two and
three lot subdivisions where maybe some
Terrace houses there are people that
want to live in those that don't have a
large backyard that have downsized or to
something smaller
but at the moment we are just not seeing
that mix and diversity of housing stock
across our
community even though our growth fronts
are very welld developed and
award-winning to the the wonderful
people at integr doing some of their but
when I drive around I'm still seeing
generally four bedroomroom homes on
every lot that is not for everyone I
think of my daughter who is 20 years and
at some stage will either be in the
housing market or even moving up rent
that will be totally unaffordable for
young people even that would have
normally gone into a one or two-bedroom
apartment or a flat for some reason it
looks like we have stall doing some of
those types of developments and I don't
know why we need to make sure that we
have diversity of housing stock to meet
the growing demands of our community our
aging Community people who are living on
their own those cost of living pressures
that people are struggling with I do not
see any harm in what has being proposed
by the officers of putting this document
out for public consultation to continue
that conversation for a policy and a
vision that will come back in
conjunction with those who are probably
a bit more
expertise than nine of us that non have
a planning background or a development
background some of those subject matter
experts that are sitting in the chamber
or others from around the community that
can then engage
and help shape the direction of where
our housing policy needs to
go if we put a hold on this tonight my
sense is that we take it back
inside we're in August going into
September this will not come back to us
until either December at the earliest or
early to next year and we've just missed
that opportunity for this Council to
stamp its Legacy in terms of what how we
want bat to grow for the next 20 30 40
years
our decision tonight is not going to put
a firm print saying that's the way it
must be it is about having further
conversations Gathering all of that
feedback bringing it back to for
officers to have further workshops with
us and then bringing another
recommendation to the council chamber
that will be that guiding policy as to
where we go further from there so
counselors I know people have spoken in
for and against but I would ask ask that
councilors consider the benefit of
putting this out for public
consultation with the community as being
an absolute part of that consultation
rather than drawing a Line in the Sand
we take it back in and when we get to
the next phase we've still got to go out
for another couple of months of
consultation why don't we do that now we
can amend some of the data if people
think we haven't quite got it right but
we can actually build it together that
we can all be proud of councils I would
say that if the motion is defeated
councelor Johnson has
foreshadowed um an alternate
recommendation that would be to
councelor Johnson if I'm right to bring
the document back in for further work by
officers back through the council
briefing cycle is that the intent of
your Al turn it off foreshadowed
motion uh thank you Mr Mayor to
reiterate the um trying to think of the
right word to defer it sorry it's
getting late uh to defer the matter for
further consideration by counselors and
uh one of the points in the alternate
would be to review the split the 50/50
split which is informed by the bat
strategy which is a document from 2015
and determine whether that's still
correct but uh if this motion fails I'm
happy to work through the details of
that alternate with The governance
officer
thank you councelor Johnson if we if we
do we can suspend standing orders to get
the wording so that that is appropriate
councelor Taylor as the Mover can I just
ask a question Mr
Mayor thank you Mr Mayor I'm just
curious as to where the time frame that
the strategy
um and study wouldn't be returned to the
council for consideration until next
year where that time frame came from and
whether it's actually possible that it
come back uh within the next cycle if
the intent is to review the the ratio as
to infield versus um Greenfield site
development
uh yeah I think that's probably the
major bone of contention among the
groups yeah I'm happy to get that
clarification on time frame director
Robertson through you Mr Mayor well
thank you for the question about
clarification of time frame first ofly
if you landed on that you wanted to
change your position on the 50/50 that
is embedded in your bellat strategy so
we would have to put all of this work on
hold and go and look at your bellat
strategy which is the today tomorrow um
together strategy and revise and
Community consult on that to determine
so we'd actually have to use this work
and go out to community consult to
determine if 7030 was a good idea if
that makes sense so um the challenge is
is probably trying to get you to
understand that Community consult is
probably your best mechanism to trigger
all those changes um and if you were to
defer it um to come back I'm not quite
clear yet what those changes are that
you want I would expect that my opposing
counselors would spend a big commitment
of their time in the draft and showing
us where it needed to be changed and
also telling me where we've failed in
policy data and all those things so um
um I'm as I'm saying that's probably not
a a a next cycle process that's
definitely looking at next year just to
get it out to community consultation
again thank you for that opportunity to
clarify it councelor Taylor as the Mover
and your right to to close thank you
thank you Mr Mayor how long do I
have
minutes councelors we all know infield
is not the Silver Bullet it's just not
and counselors we know tonight that what
we've already adopted in this chamber is
not going to change and number one what
we have adopted in this chamber on
February 22nd was to go to the minister
to rezone the land what's happening now
though is that's on a go slow and it
shouldn't be this housing strategy
should make no changed to what we've
already what we've already said within
this CH chamber and we need to hold
everyone accountable to that internally
to the officers to the state government
to the bureaucrats to everyone that is
the path that we have set to go down
which is to making land available to
continue the growth of this city that is
the north which has been resigned it is
the west and it is the Northwest that is
what we have said the eye gap's been
thrown in there and I'm going to be
honest I'm seriously concerned around
what that means and also serious
concerned on whether it actually even
sees the light of day because if the
minister gets it and thinks it's not a
great idea they might just sit on it and
what does that mean for this Council
we're sitting here doing nothing so we
need to progress that and keep moving
against that this strategy is not the
silver silver bullet to totally change
and bring in 50/50 in relation to this
city I agree that figure is not right
it's clearly shown from The Today
together tomorrow whatever it was called
back in
2015 it didn't work and it didn't happen
maybe we came close on one year but
we've seen when the opportunity is there
on a site that might have the ability to
do some larger type of development it
just doesn't stack up or the community
just doesn't support it either and
that's the problem when we start looking
at this but we have to find the balance
and whether that balance is 70 30 60 40
whatever it is the market is going to
determine that my biggest fear is when
we look at infill all the good spots
have been taken
and what's left is not great got a story
of a someone who rang me the other day
and they've been nearly waiting 12
months to do a very simple battle ax
block 12 months with all the other
things and costs associated with it that
they need to do so yes it's not easy to
do it that's why Greenfield is a great
opportunity because it brings housing to
Market and it brings it at affordable
cost because of um the the scale of what
happens in that space so councilors
tonight this is not about making the
decision to adopt what it is but it's
about putting it out to community
consultation we've clearly heard tonight
the feedback from community and people
that are experts in their industry that
there's things that might be well
debated and this is the opportunity to
do it to take it back within a briefing
doesn't provide that opportunity to hear
more we're only hearing one side which
is great this is really important what
we're hearing tonight but it's not the
whole Community that's giving that
feedback we have every opportunity once
we put it out receive the feedback and
then make the changes that are needed
from that consultation so tonight again
the infill is not the Silver Bullet to
solve the problems of 50/50 or to solve
the problems of Ballarat but at least
this is a start to debate to have the
conversations and to get to a position
where with the community support to
start working
forward and I have to go back we have
already made decisions in this chamber
around growth already and we need to
stick to them this this document does
not change that at all and it shouldn't
uh so really happy to get on and move on
to vote for this position thank you
Council Taylor councils I'll put the
motion all those in favour of the
motion five and councils those councils
against the motion is for the motion is
one five Mo votes to four Council
McIntosh a
division thank you Council as all those
in favour of the motion councelor Taylor
councelor Maloney councelor coats
councelor Eddie councelor Hudson those
councilors against the motion is
councelor Johnson councel McIntosh
councel Hargraves and councelor Harris
the motion is passed five votes to four
thank you councils and great debate from
everyone on that particular issue tough
issue but thank you to the submits who
came out as
well councils we'll move on to the next
item which is the item 8.3 the growth
areas quarterly report councilor Taylor
thank you Mr
this is the growth areas report we're
just talking about what we actually made
those decisions within the council the
concerning thing is the ey GA which
we're still waiting on but also we've
got uh an a concern at the moment it was
raised tonight actually camber in Hill
which is on our border um what this
report hasn't included is what
consequences happen as part of what the
IG may decide or may not decide so
councilors even though it is a note the
contents of this update report I'd like
to add a second one you don't have a
second I don't have a second well I
haven't actually put what I wanted to
add is that all right I do that
absolutely yes add the second one which
is to uh have a report back to Council
in relation to the cambering hill
development in Golden Plains and then uh
a position in relation to Priority on
where we see it uh I don't know if we
need to do that or just a report back to
council and I can talk to it y thank you
councelor Tyler is there second for
councilor Tyler's motion second to
councelor Harris councelor Tyler you've
got the floor
I did a pretty good intro didn't I um as
was mentioned and it's been we've
discussed this in in multiple times
we've even had uh conversations with BPA
that that the camber and Hill
development in Golden Plains there
approximately 3,000 dwellings 10,000
people on our boundary literally across
the road um the biggest concern is
what's that mean as we've walking
working through our growth another
Council has then come up with their
growth strategies that are at
contradiction to what we have we've had
a plan around growth for many many many
years and the north is a prime example
of of even discussions back in uh 2008
um when that first came about uh and
then it's only been adopted or actually
only been um rezoned in recent times we
need to look at um what this means as a
as a city the growth we've just looked
at the housing strategy around infield
but on the side we have something that
has we have no control of in relation to
3,000 lots that affects our housing
strategy that affects our growth
strategies so we need to understand that
more so we can actually look at where it
sits from a priority point of view and
where it sits in relation to our current
growth so having a report back to this
Council I think is really important and
that's why I've added it in apart from
that yeah the update's an update I asked
for the update to be every quarter the
hard thing is you don't get much of an
update when not much happens especially
when it comes to the Ia but it's great
to see the north progressing but we've
got to be realistic even though the
reone has been done we don't see a
health started out there for another 5
years so as we looked at back in
2022 uh we did talk about a housing
crisis we did talk about housing
availability that still hasn't
changed thank you councelor Tyler cancor
Harris well thanks Mr de thank you
councelor Taylor and thanks for the um
Amendment too councelor Taylor I think
we've all thought the same thing that we
do need a report on um the Krim Hill
development we've got to reset how we
think about things and I like most
councelor here we've been here a while I
can't remember uh dealing with a matter
like this so I just don't know what the
toolbox looks like so I'd be reassured
to um actually get that and like
councelor Taylor the
agaf dynamic or what state government's
going to do uh as we go forward is
concerning um as I said um a previous
matter you know I I I can feel it you
know it'll be about Council enforcing um
and providing information for doing all
the planning work but still having a
large policy override which will be uh
difficult and unpopular and state
government will be very happy to leave
us with all of that um pain um uh and um
the overriding Dynamics which may very
well be delivered to us very soon so I I
wait you know await that as well and um
I hope uh it doesn't get stuck in the
works because it is like that other shoe
that's just hanging there to um to to
fall at some juncture so um thanks
councelor tayor for the amended motion I
strongly support it thank you councelor
Harris there a councilor speaking
against the motion speaking for the
motion thank you councilors I'll just
speak briefly on the from the point that
I was down talking to Golden Plains
earlier this week to their mayor and CEO
when we spoke about Cambrian Hill um and
its potential impact and from a Golden
Plains point of view I certainly
commented from a a strategic planning
point of view that where their budget is
not huge and other infrastructure costs
but bat would absolutely be 90% of their
activation of people coming across the
border into DTC to Sebastapol and other
areas um interesting that that two
growth fronts for Golden Plains one on
the bat border and one on the jalong
border um strategic in their in their
placement I would suggest um but
certainly it does have implications for
our growth fronts the sequencing U and
to make sure that we get development
right I would also imagine those that
live down on that border that are used
to a rural Outlook um will grow their
voice and would have a significant
opinion in relation to that when and if
the time comes if that is to develop in
that way but I thank councelor tayor for
adding that extra part to the motion I
think it is something that we need to
have a briefing on to understand the
implications but so is that we are part
of the discussion
as we go forward to fully understand
that I'll put the the motion all those
in favour against the motion is carried
thank you councilors councilor's item
8.4 is a report on international travel
to the eth asia-pacific urban Forum in
Korea in October
for um our staff member in relation to
UNESCO cities and opportunity for
professional development is there a
counselor willing to move the
recommendation sorry councelor Harris oh
sorry left on councelor Hargraves happy
to move and councilor coats okay
councelor Hargraves you have the the
floor thank you Mr Mayor I think this
one virtually speaks for itself it's the
best value for money we've ever seen of
anything we've ever done I think $412 to
send Tara pool over uh is a note brainer
so very happy to support that one thank
you Council hardres Council
coats yes kudos to to Tara pool being
invited to to attend so it really is
just Testament to the to the great work
that is being noticed that's being done
in the arts and culture culture team
here so it is it is a real um credit to
her to receive that invitation to to
attend and present present at that
conference so look forward to hearing
how that goes thank you Council Co any
Council speaking against the motion for
the motion put the motion all those in
favour against that's
carried council's item 8.5 is the B
friends of anaro Community Committee
contribution for their playground
development is there a councilor wishing
to move the
recommendation uh I think councelor
Eddie was happy if you moved it face to
face okay I'm happy to move it if that's
okay with Pete yeah Pete was quite happy
with that and I'm happy to second the
motion um Council
coats so this this is a a really big
achievement actually because it comes at
the time of the 20year anniversary of
the friends of vinaro and fun fact I was
on the very first delegation
um as part of the signing of the
Friendship agreement 20 20 years ago um
before I was a counselor so it's it does
feel really good to be in this position
where that relationship has endured and
is still really strong 20 years later um
and when that agreement was first signed
there was a really strong and heartfelt
commitment to ensure that that was an
enduring friendship and relationship and
I think the reason that a big part of
the reason that it has endured the way
that it has is the passion from the
community across such a a breadth of the
community um from so many different
sectors from the schools the Friendship
schools from the health sector from
other community groups
and and the benefit that that's brought
to the community in in them H working
together on a common course I don't
think that can be undervalued that
that's really enriched our community
here as well as contributed to our
friends in inaro and for people who
aren't familiar with the the situation
in Tim or lest um it's still very very
difficult there is a great deal of
poverty the things that we take for
granted here are are very difficult the
condition of the schools playgrounds
barely exist in the in the regions um
foot paths don't exist um there is very
little in the way of sporting
infrastructure um in in many areas they
they struggle with clean water and those
sorts of things so this this
contribution in the in the 20 years of
the friendship relationship is actually
probably the the first time that that
the Friendship group has come to City of
bat for this kind of contribution but
they do so in matching that through
fundraising and um over this 20 years of
the friendship relationship Community
groups have raised tens of thousands of
dollars towards the the betterment um of
the community in in to their credit so
to my mind it's a very small
contribution and it is being equally
matched by the community um the bar
friends of inaro committee through their
fundraising and that's an absolute
credit to them so fully endorse um this
project and full credit to council pet
Eddie for his stewardship on this
project and working so closely with the
bar friends of inaro who are really
deeply embedded in the principle of
Community Development around this
project and working in such close
collaboration really listening to the
community over over there getting their
direct input in the design and I mean
honestly it's such a tiny amount of
money towards a playground a playground
here in in Bat would cost
10 times that amount um more more than
10 times I don't know 100 times more
maybe maybe so the value for money is is
just incredible and the joy that it will
bring in that Community I I don't think
can be
understated thank you thank you Council
coats and as a seconder to the motion
it's interesting to when you talk about
the comparison of an investment in in
our city and was out with the member for
wender today that was um opening the
three um exercise pieces at Doug Dean
Reserve 72,000 from state government 36
from us 108,000 for three pieces and
we're talking about a complete play
ground developed by the community for
15,000 75,000 which is done through some
hardworking fundraising good
oldfashioned activities movie Nights
trivia night and sausage sizzles um and
a small contribution of match funding
for us which is timely in terms of our
20-year anniversary of our friendship
City having been to t- moleste and in
anara myself back in
2007 uh councelor Harris who has been
there and accompanied former M Judy
valinda at the time and it was important
for others to see just why we choose to
have a friendship agreement with inaro
and it was about walking alongside in
terms of Community Development we're not
a big NGO that can build uh roads or
Bridges and invest millions of dollars
that's not what our relationship has
been but it has been about genuine
friendship and allowing them to learn
from some of our processes in local
government as they established
governance for themselves but the
community groups that have taken
teachers over there to help teach
English the health groups our our own
Avi in Kate Owen who spent 12 months
over there doing Grassroots Community
Development this is a very small
contribution but we'll have genuine
longlasting
Legacy and fully appreciated for the
local community that they have designed
they will build themselves they'll
Source the materials themselves so they
will see the benefit of the economic
benefit of this particular project and I
applaud councelor Eddie for his work
with the committee to actually get it to
this stage Council if there a council
wishing to speak against the motion
speak for the motion
if not I'll put the motion all those in
favour against the motion is carried
thank you
councilors council's item 8.6 is the
cury engagement action advisory
committee terms of reference and
committee membership Council coachs
happy to move and seconder councelor
Maloney councel
coats yes so it it is relatively
straightforward really we are just
refreshing the the ter terms of
reference as as happens fairly regularly
with with a lot of the advisory
committees um in this instance um we've
gone through a bit of a lengthy process
of co-design with with um some of the
career engagement action group members
which has has been really beneficial to
to Really um really strengthen our
commitment to um again walking walking
beside the community and really really
making space for
um for their voices to come through
really strongly uh from our first
Nations Community as we as we you know
try to um make progress towards
reconciliation so um the career
engagement Action Group actually also
goes back 20 years through the the
commencement of the UN unfinished
business advisory committee um I've been
co-chair for almost 10 years now of of
the career engagement Action Group and I
can say that the members are more
passionate and engaged than ever and
full credit to them for the voluntary
hours that go into into the committee
really for the betterment of the
community here to to help the broader
Community really really learn about the
importance of First Nations culture and
um and the need for for reconciliation
and to keep going moving forward so I
w't speak too long about it but I will
give a shout out to the the current um
endorsed members who are Sarah Jane Hull
the current co-chair uh Nikki Foy who's
a previous abigal liaison officer here
city of bat and it's great to have Nikki
still involved um Adena King who works
in the abortional Justice area Deb lower
Clark who's in education um Melissa
Peters um Victoria Police uh tiny Jarvis
um Wang traditional owners Corporation
representative is currently Michaela
Johnson um we are are seeking a Jara
representative um we haven't got a name
against that but that position that
position is there Shu Brown is a
proposed new member and Luke Bosworth as
well and all of those members are First
Nations community members which is
terrific that that's the purpose of
having these advisory committees that we
are seeking um really strong
representative advice to help inform our
policies um make our services better and
and Achieve our reconciliation action
plan thank you councelor coats councel
Maloney tough act to follow Mr M Council
coats is largely some it all up
beautifully um I want to thank the
members of KAG that um been on uh that
Journey for 20 years now uh I think
especially being attending some of those
meetings has actually been some of the
more fulfilling uh time I've actually
had as a counselor over several years
terms of my learning and understanding
of Aber T shade Island issues within our
community um and uh I think we've got a
great range of expertise on there so um
Council coachs has already outlined all
of all of the the uh valuable members um
there has been some see some membership
changes so uh there's some new people
coming on board so great to see them
come on uh and importantly though it has
to have obviously a strong leaning
toward people of Aboriginal t honor
background because that's what we're
seeking advice on and it's that and it's
that advice that's um been valuable in
helping us with a whole bunch of
sometimes difficult conversations and
difficult issues to navigate at a
cultural sense but um you know even
right down to understanding right now
that this is a particularly diff time
for aage onour Islander people and we
need to make sure that whatever you view
on The Voice um whether you're Pro or or
against um that we continue to have uh
aigal communities uh welfare at mind and
that our our language is always
respectful um of of of people who will
feel significant impact either way um so
yeah again thank you to that group and
uh and I hope that uh they they continue
to to give us some some fantastic advice
on these difficult issues thank you
Council Aly any other Council wishing to
speak for the motion against the motion
put the motion all those in favour
against the motion is carried council's
item 8.7 is the governance policy
reviews there a council willing to move
Council Taylor thanks Mr Mayor this is a
I know the question was answer but I'm
going to ask it again in relation to
this review it actually is a change and
adopting update policies for lease and
Licensing policy as well as Lake windery
boat ship policy and they do seem Common
Sense changes that need to be done but
somewhere around terms and and times
adding five plus a three and incremental
for leasing things like that should this
go out to community consultation first
instead of actually it just being
adopted without actually hearing back
from those users that it does actually
um affect can um Mr Montgomery for a
comment
thank you and um through you um Mr Mayor
and thank you for the question um
councilor Tor essentially those changes
um can if Council believes that they
wish to put them out for Community
consultation can put those policies out
for further consultation but they are
still in line with what it would be a
commercial term and a commercial lease
Arrangement uh which would be uh
considered in line with what we've
actually got also advice back from Deer
as well around how we manage those um
properties on that land
thank you Mr Montgomery cancer
Taylor thank you Mr Mayor I'd like to
move that council do put these policies
out for consultation uh only needs to be
a short period 30 days um maybe even
well 30 days is enough isn't it what's
part of our consultation usually 30 long
normal longer than normal well we can
put it out for consultation and then
come back I think it's worthwhile at
least seeing if there's a uh a nugget or
a fire that's in there that uh that may
not have been been looked at that's
that's specific for those areas and I
just think it's worthwhile and yes
sometimes there are controversial kind
of issues that we come up against I
remember one was was around for a long
time when it came to that uh boat shed
policy so I think it's worthwhile at
least getting feedback to say is that
right is it in line with those changes
or is there something we just need to be
aware of that it may change dramatically
so happy to move that we put it out to
consultation so that will be the
alternate recommendation that it's out
for public consultation for a period of
a month
thank you councelor Maloney second
motion Council Maloney uh yeah thank you
councelor Taylor for that that good
suggestion um I've looking back at you
know when this last came up and it says
April the 1st 2020 and uh it felt like
an April Fools Day joke back then when
we were um debating the the lake Wendy
boat shed policy and only offering
threeyear
terms to uh boat shed operators and then
expecting them in the same in breath to
make some significant financial upgrades
and maintenance to their buildings and I
know that back then the
debate um three years ago was around
having a stick to basically whack
somebody over their head if they didn't
do the upgrades to their sheds now we've
got a period of 3 years later on where
there's a chance to reflect on that
maybe it's more of a carrot approach
that's potentially needed because um the
officer report does say that the uh
Crown Land Act does allow up to 10 years
at least does have to be three that's a
bit of a subjective thing that can be
debated through
consultation uh and it you know be also
interesting sort of keep it in line and
consider how that applies with other
Crown Land issues such as um airport
hangers and the like out at the airport
which is also crownland um so yeah I
think going out to consultation for a
small period is a common sense way
forward thank
you thank you very much Council malani
any other Council wishing to speak for
the motion Council McIntosh um I will
too Mr Mayor I think it's really
important that we do everything we
possibly can to look after what we've
got whether it's owned by the city by
the community by individuals um no
matter who it is that are that's looking
after our properties we need to make
sure that we've got the right policies
in in place that encourage them to
protect what we've got and uh Council
Maloney talked about a carrot rather
than a stick and I think that's totally
what this is about if we're expecting uh
people to invest into something for 3
years that might get taken away from
them there's not a lot of incentive
there for them to do a great job um at
even simple things like painting but
what we see with the boat sheds is you
know there's certainly plenty overtime
that have been let go for far too long
and we need to have a look at why we
need to understand with any of these
types of issues what is going on and why
are people not jumping out there because
it's it's beautiful beautiful product to
have um you mentioned Council Maloney
the airport and we know we had these
similar conversations it was pretty hard
to attract anyone to put a lot of money
into a hanger when they only had it for
3 years it just doesn't make a lot of
sense it needs to go at it needs to be
discussed we need to make sure the
community have plenty of knowledge of of
this particular piece of works so that
when it comes back we can make the right
adjustments thank you councelor McIntosh
any councilor speaking for the motion
against the motion put the motion
all sorry the recommendation will be for
Community consultation for one
month end so Council endorsed the
leasing and Licensing policy in the lake
wind boat shed policy proceed to
community
consultation will be there Rec yeah
happy with that with the move and
seconder
yeah for sure okay if everyone's clear
on that I'll put the motion all those in
favour against the motion is
carried council's item 8.8 is the
outstanding Question Time items is
largely procedural move counselor Harris
second to counselor coats any discussion
counselors I'll put the motion all those
in favour
against the motion is carried councils
there are no notices of motion item 10
is reports from committees and
councilors any councilors wishing to
give an update councilor Cod see moving
for the lot oh yeah was I was waiting to
see if anyone else was I've um just got
a couple from um committees that I chair
or co-chair um the K committee so as as
well as um working on those those terms
of reference the the reconciliation
action plan working group um has been
meeting regularly and looking forward to
progressing um towards our updated
reconciliation action plan soon and a
shout out to Linka vanderboom who's the
new abigal liaison officer as well who's
doing a a great job so far um where
she's a few months in but is is doing a
a terrific job as well um the
Intercultural advisory committee with
that had on thanks to community members
and city of bat Intercultural services
staff for the work on the um Pakistan
and India Independence Day flag raisings
and morning tees they were they were
terrific an update from inter
Intercultural advisory committee um
there's real excitement from the
committee members about the
Intercultural garden plans and um
following the completion of the
community consultation and approval of
the the budget so the committee members
are really looking forward to that and
excited there's also been a positive
response to the new language switcher
tool that's um being proposed for
council's website so that means that
people can uh can access it's it's
somewhere between 10 and 14 different
languages on on council's website which
is pretty exciting and that's also
available for the community impact
grants as well so that people can access
those in um a number of preferred
languages and it was explained to me
that they they're working on building
that's the starting point but working on
on building that up to more um a small
update from the LGBT iqa plus committee
which I um chaired in in councelor
Maloney's place this week um so the
current committee coming to the end of
their 2-year tenure and um the group
provided feedback on council's current
Community
engagement and um advice on the new
expression of Interest process that's
that's underway so it has been a really
engaged committee as well and um thank
them for their amazing voluntary work to
date as well thank you councelor
coats councilors I'll rise and just give
a report back on the 35th
Anniversary um visit to inagawa in Japan
that uh the CEO myself councelor Harris
and councelor Johnson have attended and
um just how special that um experience
was from the time we arrived in inagawa
at the front of their town hall for I
think I've said this story to to many
many people that the flag pole clearly
displaying the Japanese flag the inal
flag and the Australian flag prominently
all their staff out the front that just
stood and applauded our arrival and all
the way through their Town Hall facility
to all their staff as we had a tour and
learned some of the the processes of
their local government and different
areas of responsibility similar to to
our own um and then some opportunities
to gather with their Community um to
share some of cultural exchanges of
music dance and food
um entering some other sites it was
really interesting one of the smaller
activities that was organized through
our governance unit and there was the um
postcard exchange between schools here
and schools in in agawa and when we were
taken to the shopping center to have a
look at some of those postcards that
were on display from Australia and uh
with our wonderful interpreter naoko
that certainly took us under her wing
and guided us really well throughout the
entire state
but there was a random lady that was
just walking through and happened to
notice the Anglo-Saxons that were in the
area and came up and asked a question
about who they were and where they were
from and it was pointed out that they
were from the sister city of Ballarat
and we're here for the 35th
Anniversary and when I was introduced to
to the the lady and had a conversation
she took her mind back and she
remembered a previous delegation where
former mayor Wanda Chapman Chapman
that she had dealings with and Rod sto
from dolini Winery that were in in agawa
and they she had some very fond memories
of the importance of that delegation at
the time and in 35 years there's been
some absolutely fantastic achievements
through the delegation Graham vendy who
took
75 or 78 students from Clarendon College
as a musical Ensemble would have been
the logistics around that would have
been an enormous but again a wonderful
cultural exchange the
MC uh on the night of the community
celebration was a former
English-speaking contest winner from
2005 that was then back doing the mcing
and translation on the night they are
very respectful of the 35 years of
history that we have shared as being
sister cities it was interesting being
down at Melbourne town hall for regional
cities on
Thursday Japanese flag is prominently
displayed in the Melbourne town hall
because they have assisted City with um
Osaka which is also 35 years in the
making so around the same time in 1978
when both cities commenced their
friendship agreement we signed a new
declaration of friendship for the next 5
years um and we look forward to being
able to host the Japanese delegation in
5 years time whoever is sitting around
the table but to make sure that we
continue to Value the relationship as we
retry and activate some of those
programs the English language speaking
competition and some other ideas that
come from the formal meeting that we had
with their Council officers and staff as
well but I certainly felt extremely
humbled to have been able to lead the
delegation of such a symbolic nature and
years of achievement and I hope that in
35 years time whoever is standing in
this place is able to talk about the
Friendship city after 7 years of such a
celebration thank you councilors any
other Council wishing to raise any items
of General business counselor
Johnson thank you Mr Mayor a report from
the disability advisory committee is
that
um so committee members had the pleasure
of um staff from bat Aquatic and
Lifestyle Center presenting to our
meeting and there was feedback provided
to committee members around new uh hoist
options for pool
users um and once again the value of
deck um was clearly demonstrated with a
range of um pieces of of lived
experience um and advice provided back
to that team as to uh the Hoist design
that would be most useful to um a to the
to the greatest number of people so that
was really useful
and it was great that there was
continued support for the sensory
friendly sessions at the center to
continue as well um I pointed out that
the session times uh during the week and
during school hours so young
people uh from prep to2 that may be
interested in attending those sensory
sessions uh currently unable unless it's
during school holidays so provided some
advice that there might be some session
times available on the weekends the
committee also supported the concept of
make it accessible and then make it
world class and I absolutely love and
fully support that concept as well
meaning that first we must make our
facilities and services accessible and
then focus on making them
worldclass um obviously both are
important but uh ensuring that services
are accessible to people with
disabilities they're afforded the same
opportunities to acquire information um
engage in the same interactions and so
on is really important uh Mr Merill also
touched on our trip to inagawa for the
35th Anniversary and that uh sister city
agreement was actually signed in the
year I was born which is wonderful to
think about that through my entire
lifetime that relationship has existed
and one of the things that I was
particularly impressed with and uh that
Illustrated to me just just how special
the relationship that we have is where
all the references right across the city
to Ballarat including at the library
with uh an array of books relating to
bat available uh within the inagawa
library they've got a bat Corner um with
a few display cabinets with a range of
items related to bat and uh some
australiana as well the Mosaic the koala
Mosaic that were worked on um and
swapped between students of iniga and
bolat um displays at the Town Hall uh it
was lovely to spot pictures uh all
around different facilities of places
like the Mining Exchange and other
iconic bat locations to see the the
postcard exchange within the shopping
center the memorial tree out the front
of the town hall and I also loved that
when we were out and about uh nowco um
as uh mayor Hudson has pointed out um
was the one that uh was our our trans
later and support staff member from
inagawa town who who traveled with us
and she would be out and about telling
people um these these people are from
Ballarat and the looks of excitement on
the faces uh of the people of iniga when
they heard that was really wonderful and
showed just uh how much the broader
Community is invested uh in the cister
city relationship as well as the the
community dinner the number of community
members who attended and wanted to come
up to talk to us um as representatives
from their sister city and last Mr Mar
I'll just uh mention the fact that we
also had an opportunity to discuss
future opportunities to further
strengthen our sister city Bond uh for
the mutual benefit of both of our cities
and
uh our CEO yourself uh Council Harrison
I had the opportunity to hear those
ideas and then reflect back uh our
feedback and any ideas that we had as
well and uh I was quite excited by some
of the things that were proposed during
that meeting and I'm looking forward to
another the 35 years plus of our sister
city relationship with inwa thank you
councelor Johnson any other items of
General business from around the
table if not thank you counselors there
are no items of virgent business no
items in section 66 so I'll declare the
meeting closed at 9:45 p.m. and to those
that are still with us online thank you
very much for staying the distance hope
you have a good night thank you very
much meeting
closed