Hulls Pours Cold Water On Coastal Plans

The Age 7 August 2005

“The days of hillbilly councillors acting outside a proper planning framework… are well and truly over in Victoria”

Large-scale housing and resort-style developments proposed for the Bass Coast near Inverloch may be blocked because of concerns over a lack of public consultation and their environmental effects.

Planning Minister Rob Hulls is disappointed about last-minute amendments to planning guidelines made by the Bass Coast Shire in February that would allow the new developments.

“The days of hillbilly councillors acting outside a proper planning framework may have existed years ago in Queensland but are well and truly over in Victoria,” Mr Hulls said.

Mr Hulls must approve the planning changes and said he “may find it difficult to entertain these rezonings”.

Proposed developments for the Bass Coast region include a 27-hole resort-style golf course at Tarwin Cove, 5 kilometres east of Inverloch and whose southern boundary borders Anderson Inlet. Other large-scale proposals are the Cape Paterson ecovillage, with up to 200 dwellings on a 40-hectare site, and a golf course and residential development west of Inverloch next to a new RACV resort.

The amendments to the Bass Coast Strategic Coastal Planning Framework were passed at a Bass Coast Shire Council meeting on February 16 by four votes to three in front of a packed public gallery of about 80 people.

Many in the gallery had reportedly taken part in a lengthy consultation process for the planning framework and were shocked by the surprise amendments. The amendments extended three town boundaries and exempted planning proposals submitted on or before February 16.

“These changes appear to have been made at the last minute without a transparent consultative process and council is in la-la land if they think I would be approving a proposal that has no strategic justification and is at odds with the Victorian Coastal Strategy,”  Mr Hulls said.

The amendments were not presented for public comment before the council meeting, a point Mr Hulls made in a letter sent to the council in June.

“I am concerned at the changes your council made in adopting the Coastal Framework, in that, following an open and transparent process with strong community support, significant modifications were made to the Coastal Framework that were apparently not based on any strategic investigation, public consultation or endorsement through the process that had just been completed,” the letter said.

“I am particularly concerned that council appears to have endorsed potential rezonings that are not strategically justified in terms of the appropriateness of these areas to sustainably support any additional development.”

The chief executive of the Bass Coast Shire, Allan Bawden, said the amendments “probably allow for a greater supply of land (for development) than what the consultants recommended”.

Bass Coast Shire councillor Loretta Leslie, who voted against the amendments, said the late amendments had come as a shock to the community.  “The community invests time into a process in the belief that council will act with some form of integrity,” she said.