A FREUDIAN slip in the Bass Coast Shire Council agenda for next Wednesday’s meeting, dealing with the issue of the shire’s proposed tip site in Gap Road on Phillip Island, reveals more about what’s not in the agenda than what’s included.
Responding to a petition signed by 32 people, calling for the council-owned site at 100 Gap Road to be rezoned from Farming to Industrial to facilitate the development of the long-proposed transfer station, the shire officer’s report claims there’s no need to change the zoning.
“There is no need to rezone the land to facilitate a transfer station as this is a permissible use within the current planning controls.”
However, the officer’s comments go further, raising issue of “recreational” use as follows:
“Given the size of the land, and the potential for recreational and environmental opportunities on site the Farming Zone provides greater flexibility to accommodate a range of uses on the land.”
Surely, there’s no suggestion that “recreational” uses would co-exist alongside a rubbish disposal facility and the $10 million Phillip Island Community Energy Storage System (PICESS), owned by a subsidy of Telstra, which already dominates the front of the site?
The author of the petition, Graham Jolly, offers a likely explanation.
“We raised two petition at the same time calling on the council to not only rezone the site at Gap Road, so they can finally get on and relocate the transfer station from the middle of Cowes out to Gap Road, but also to rezone the ‘Carnival’ site so they can get on and develop it for community sports and recreation.
“The rezoning process can take a long time so we thought it would be better to do both of them at the same time,” said Mr Jolly this week.
“They told us both issues would be put to this week’s council meeting but when the agenda came out, the carnival site rezoning was missing.
“Mind you, the inconsistency in the officer’s comments about recreation indicates they were also considering the carnival site but ultimately didn’t include it.
“The question I would ask is why not?” asked Mr Jolly
In light of the officer’s assessment that Gap Road doesn’t need to be rezoned, the shire’s administration is recommending “not to commence a rezoning process for 100 Gap Road, Cowes”.
There is no comment about whether council accepts that the carnival site needs to be rezoned.
The separate petition, signed by 38 people, reads as follows”
"As a resident of the Bass Coast Shire, I here-by petition Council to immediately advocate in writing to the Victorian Government Planning Minister and require the Minister to change the Bass Coast Shire Planning Scheme so that the property owned by Council (Carnival site property located at the corner of Phillip Island Road and Ventnor Road, Cowes) is rezoned from Farming to Recreational.”