Inverloch: Anti-development campaign “a disgrace”, they say

THE campaign by the South Gippsland Conservation Society to stop developers from building a $35 million, four-storey residential hotel on a centrally-located site in Inverloch has been described as “appalling” and a “disgrace”.

Legal counsel for the developers, the Forte Group, Dominic Scally principal of Best Hooper Lawyers, referenced a promotional pamphlet put out by the society, a ‘Go Fund Me’ page and an information stand at a local Farmers’ Market, when criticising the group for their “appalling methodology” during an address at a VCAT hearing during the week.

The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal hearing, presided over by Senior Panel Member Laurie Hewet, was considering the appropriateness of the 42-apartment development for the site adjacent to the Inverloch foreshore.

And Mr Scally was summing up at the conclusion of the conservation society’s case when he let loose.

Referring to the campaign material, Mr Scally listed a number of statements made by the group, which leases the building next door to the proposed development, that he claimed were false or intentionally misleading.

“Bass Coast Shire Council has given a big city developer approval to build a multi-storey residential hotel in the centre of our foreshore,” Mr Scally read from the society’s information pamphlet.

“My clients are local,” he said.

“And the land is privately owned. It has never been part of the foreshore.”

“Save the soul of Inverloch, it says. It’s been an absolute disgrace,” Mr Scally said of the conservation group’s campaign.

“It’s not the Gold Coast on our foreshore,” he said going on to read from the ‘Go Fund Me Page’ set up by the group to try to attract supporters and others prepared to fund the group’s legal action.

So far, the ‘Save the Soul of Inverloch’ Go Fund Me page has attracted $754 of a target goal of $30,000.

“Our foreshore will be dominated by this inappropriate, disrespectful, enormous, multi-level, 42-room residential hotel unless we act now,” he quoted from the Go Fund Me site.

“We have a once in a century opportunity to get this right!

“You can help by donating funds to support the legal and other experts we need to fight and stop this development.”

This, Mr Scally said, was a disgraceful way to treat a legitimate application for a project that met all the required standards of the Bass Coast Shire Council’s DDO1 coastal design objectives.

He said he could “only imagine how they would have been geeing everyone up (at the conservation group’s market stall). It’s a disgrace… an appalling methodology”.

Mr Scally didn’t leave it there.

Describing his exchange with the society’s technical expert, noted urban designer Amanda Roberts as “combative”, he alleged her presentation wasn’t so much the evidence of an expert witness as it was pure advocacy for the conservation society.

“Amanda Roberts has a vision for what she thinks is right for that site and it’s not this building,” he said.

He said the project complied with all the objectives of the shire’s planning scheme, and while Ms Roberts didn’t agree, it was very much in line with the other fashionable, front-row residential projects along Ramsay Boulevard and The Esplanade.

“Sure, I like the house in Venus Street too, with its rammed earth and use of timber, who wouldn’t, but these are the houses you will see when you visit the site,” he said, referring to the white, modern styling of homes recently built in the vicinity of the proposed apartment building set for the old Inverloch Marine site.

But the developers didn’t have it all their own way in crying “foul”.

Counsel for the South Gippsland Conservation Society, Barnaby McIlrath, and executive member of the conservation society, Jonathan Upson, criticised the Forte Group and the consultant they hired to prepare a montage of photos for the application, describing how the proposed building could be seen and would impact nearby locations around the Inverloch CBD, especially the public areas including The Glade and the Rainbow Park playground.

Cross-examining the photo submission made by Ben Wilson, both Mr Upson and Mr McIlrath alleged Mr Wilson had instructed his photographer to use affectively a “fish-eye” camera setup (a 24ml wide-angle lens downgraded by the camera to 18ml) to reduce the bulk of the building, make it look smaller and further away from the main street, The Glade and other viewpoints.

Mr McIlrath even went so far as to argue that the entire submission of photos should be rejected by the VCAT panel for completely misrepresenting the impact of the project on the surrounding area.

Although Mr Scally for the developers objected, a decision by the panel might be pending after Mr Hewet agreed to Mr McIlrath’s request for ‘AO’ poster-size prints (841mm x 1189mm) of the photos to be produced to get a better perspective when the VCAT panel visits the site at Inverloch.