Item 9.2 – Centre Road/Browns Road, Bentleigh East.
Application is for a part 3 and part 5 storeys building and 67 dwellings. Officer recommendation is ‘up to 63 dwellings’. Of the 67 proposed dwellings 60 are to be single bedroom apartments, 6 double bedroom apartments and one 3 bedroom apartment. Officer recommendation is to ‘amalgamate’ some of these so that another 3 two bedroom apartments are created and one additional 3 bedroom apartment in the revised dwelling numbers of 63 units.
Whilst this represents an interesting new position in that this is the first time we remember an officer’s report commenting specifically on the issue of ‘diversity’ and imposing conditions that will only marginally increase the number of 2 and 3 bedroom apartments, we remind readers of the following comments made by our wonderful councillors in previous decisions. Once again the question of consistency and arguably integrity (depending on who the applicant is) raises its ugly head.
HYAMS on the MRC Amended Plan for Caulfield Village where 3 bedroom apartments were gutted to create more single bedroom units so that just on 61% of the proposed 463 dwellings got the nod to be single bedroom dog boxes – “‘I don’t know that there needs to be that diversity in every site – there needs to be diversity across Glen Eira’. . So even though there will be many one and two bedroom places there are ‘family sites around the area’ so that’s the diversity.
PILLING (on same item) – On profit council has to look at the ‘planning process’. 26 3 bedroom places ‘are a plus’ but’ not for us to determine’. Said that council ‘can encourage but we can’t actually have that law’. And this also applies to ‘social housing’. This will ‘happen’ at some point and ‘it’s up to the developer to provide it’ even though council might like it in ‘every part of the development’. Just because council doesn’t ‘like’ it isn’t enough reason to vote against. Council has to make its decisions on ‘good planning’ processes such as the planning scheme, incorporated plan and development plan.
OKOTEL (same item) – was ‘concerned’ about the reduction of three bedroom apartments but she accepts that these could ‘be difficult to sell’ and ‘nobody wants to see vacant dwellings’ especially when ‘there is such a need for housing’. ‘It’s better that apartments are built and purchased’.
The above quotes speak for themselves!
Glen Eira Debates 
December 14, 2015 at 11:53 AM
Small wonder that local government is bagged continually when councillors have no scruples and will do and say anything to advance the position of the moment.
December 14, 2015 at 2:16 PM
The mrc was always going to get what it wanted. If that meant councillor mental contortions then so be it. Not the first time mind that such gymnastics have taken place.
December 14, 2015 at 4:43 PM
The Act allows Council to be hopelessly inconsistent—after all, Council isn’t obliged to apply its own Planning Scheme, as the Minister recently reminded us. There are no decision criteria to guide decisions either. However the Planning Scheme does say amongst its purposes that it is to provide a “clear and consistent framework within which decisions about the use and development of land can be made”. It is clearly a failure. Despite this, it has a LOT to say about housing diversity that contradicts Council’s Lack of Diversity policies.
C60 remains an example of much that is broken with planning in Glen Eira. Something very dodgy must have happened behind closed doors. They didn’t have to comply with residential amenity standards, or deliver housing diversity. The fact that EVERYWHERE in the site the housing is one storey taller than the “indicative storeys” contained in the Incorporated Plan is a reminder of the extent to which Council colluded with the developer. Then when Council unilaterally decided that balconies could stick arbitrarily far out beyond the building envelope without even providing a strategic justification, it confirmed just how shonky they are.
December 14, 2015 at 5:56 PM
You are being far too kind Reprobate. The “inconsistency” has got nothing to do with the planning scheme and 100% to do with getting the Melbourne Racing club its permit and profit. The most disgraceful aspect of this is the arrogance displayed and the belief that residents are stupid enough to swallow the lies that are trotted out on cue. They simply don’t care. What people think is irrelevant. If it wasn’t irrelevant and if this council wanted to really be open and transparent we wouldn’t have had the 11 cents letter and we would have had some decent consultation before the zones were introduced. None of this happened because we have got a council administration and a group of useless councillors who will do anything to assist their friends and bring in more money to council coffers that can then be squandered on useless projects or countless new staff. Others have said it along with myself – all of them have to go.
December 14, 2015 at 10:13 PM
Maybe it is better late than never for council to start worrying about how many developments are going to include family oriented dwellings of three bedrooms or more. Having said this, it doesn’t excuse all the thousands of applications that have come in in the last few years and they have been granted permits and this issue has never come up before. That tells me that even officers are getting worried about the state of affairs. If they were decent planners and we had a decent council then this should have been looked at and taken seriously years and years ago.
With the Hyams pilling and Okotel quotes they are basically sick. Council isn’t there to worry about the developers welfare and whether or not he can sell his dwellings as Okotel thinks. Anyway, reports in the papers keep saying that people are looking for larger units so they can raise kids and not tiny ones that you can’t swing a cat in. Pilling is just a fool and a robot and will say whatever he is told to say. Hyams is the real snake in the grass for me. The one who keeps telling residents that he applies planning law to everything and then says this rubbish is a sign of the person he is.
December 15, 2015 at 2:30 PM
There is very little planning law for Cr Hyams to apply. On the rare occasions there is something relevant in the Act, Council finds a way to balls it up. The Act specifically says that the Responsible Authority [sic] may decide to refuse to grant a permit on any ground it thinks fit. Contrast that with Crs Sounness and Lipshutz who have argued that a permit should always be granted, especially if they believe VCAT will give the developer what they want, irrespective of what Council’s policies are.
Then there’s the infamous C80 development that Council decided should be rezoned for commercial development with no height limits or residential amenity standards. The applicant puts in an application that includes offices on the ground floor, an as-of-right use in C1Z, and Council puts in a permit condition demanding they be deleted—without a legal basis to do so.
Or the extraordinary decision by Council to allow C60 to stick its balconies out to the property boundary, way beyond the approved building envelope. NOBODY ELSE in the municipality has that right. It makes a mockery of the setback amenity standards, which C60 violates even without the balcony largess. The whole Incorporated Plan was built on a lie designed to deceive, hence everywhere the incorporated plan states “indicative storeys”, the actual development is one storey higher. We were lied to, and that’s not a good look for a Council to be part of such a sham.
We also know Council has evaded transparency and accountability provisions by getting Council officers, without delegated authority, to request the Minister to uses their discretionary powers to make unilateral changes to the Planning Scheme and to dodge the scrutiny that a review of the Planning Scheme would bring.
When councillors talk about “planning law”, they’re really telling the community “get f–ked”.