Bass Coast DAL needs to draw ‘line in the sand’, says shire

THE Bass Coast Shire Council has called on the Distinctive Areas and Landscapes (DAL) panel to quite literally “draw a line in the sand” to protect the Western Port Woodlands during the final day of DAL hearings on Thursday, April 27.

The shire has urged the panel to include The Gurdies Hills within a protected zone that also includes the nationally significant woodlands, which are under threat from massive sand mining operations, with Significant Landscape Overlay (SLO) and Environmental Significance Overlay (ESO) at least until the area can be mapped and properly assessed.

Presenting the shire’s closing remarks, after 27 days of hearings, legal counsel for the shire David Vorchheimer of HWL Ebsworth Lawyers said the case had been clearly made by technical experts, the shire and the local community that the Western Port Woodlands area was a significant landscape and should be included in the DAL process, and appropriate recommendations made for its protection within the process.

“There needs to be some form of judgement made and a line in the sand drawn as to whether the extractive industries are allowed to continue to operate and expand or if there should be some acknowledgement that things have to change and that this area needs to be protected as being of nationally significant, recognising habitat and bio-linkages,” said Mr Vorchheimer.

He acknowledged that further work needed to be done, mapping and studying the area but he submitted that the DAL committee needed to recommend that mapping be undertaken to establish the boundaries of the woodland area to be protected, as distinct from the biolink corridors, and that SLO and ESO overlay conditions also be recommended.

“It’s a big call,” responded committee chair Kathy Mitchell, noting that the panel would consider the submissions made by the council and others.

“But whether or not it should be part of this process or another, we have not yet decided. We’re still listening.”

Submissions made on behalf of the Minister of Planning have urged that if there is to be a further study of the woodlands, with a view to added protection, it should be the latter.

But Mr Vorchheimer said the shire and the community would not like to see the “bulldozers roll in” in the interim to take advantage of a vacuum in protection levels while the government set up another assessment process.

“You’re talking about a vast area as needing protection,” said Ms Mitchell.

“Yes, it is a vast area but we’re just saying put the brakes on a little bit until further investigation can be done. There’s already wide recognition that those values are there.”

Ms Mitchell asked if there was a definitive map of the woodlands area but Mr Vorchheimer said no, pointing to a map that had been tabled during earlier proceedings as the most relevant to date.

Passionate and informed local submitter, Professor Dick Wettenhall, a biochemist who is expert in the risks posed by toxic chemicals leaching into ground water, applauded the forthright approach taken by the shire.

“Led by the Mayor Cr Michael Whelan, they’ve played a leading role in calling for higher levels of protection for the Western Port Woodlands and it’s up to the government now to see that this Distinctive Areas and Landscapes process acknowledges the national significance of the Western Port Woodlands and applies appropriate controls for its protection and the protection of the waterways and Western Port.”

But the shire stopped short, in its final submission, in calling for the Cape Paterson town boundary to be returned to Seaward Drive.

In answer to a question from Ms Mitchell about whether the shire council supported the application of a Protected Settlement Boundary, around the existing settlement of Cape Paterson, including the new development area to the north, Mr Vorchheimer said the shire said additional work needed to be done but was “not pushing for it to be excluded”.

But the wholesale application of Protected Settlement Boundaries across all of the shire’s settlements is an issue for the shire, frankly making the submission to the panel that the proper strategic work had been started but not completed.

He conceded that if the panel had a mind to, they could recommend for Protected Settlement Boundaries to be introduced around the shire’s smaller settlements, but not around the medium to larger settlements where the proper strategic work had not been undertaken and the nuances around growth had not been addressed.

It is the position of the shire that no protected settlement boundaries be introduced until the strategic work was carried out, but that the shire had neither the capacity nor the financial resources to take on such a big planning process and hope to complete it in a reasonable timeframe.

Panel chair Kathy Mitchell asked Mr Vorchheimer if the shire council had liaised with other municipalities involved in DAL processes if they had similar resourcing issues. Mr Vorchheimer took the question on notice but came back after lunch to say that there had been discussions.

"There has been no commitment from the department in terms of funding," he said, noting that Macedon Ranges had been waiting for years for the government to fund the strategic work.

"It is an issue and in our view that's front and centre for us," said Mr Vorchheimer.

Later, the legal representative for the government said it wouldn't be appropriate for the panel to make recommendations to the government on funding initiatives, that the government had to weigh up competing priorities which was a matter for government, not the panel.