A fabulous turnout at last night’s Save Glen Eira inaugural meeting with an audience of over 100 concerned residents. And, their concern, anger and distrust of Council was palpable.
The evening began with several presentations from 5 residents. Four of the presentations honed in on current planning applications, their impacts especially on neighbouring sites and how little Council has done to ensure that such outrageous applications are doomed to fail at VCAT. The final presenter queried council’s prognostications as to the required housing needed to cater for the expected population growth and showed that at current rates Glen Eira’s building boom is close to double what is needed. The question thus was: why double the size of activity centres? Why insist on 12 storeys across the board? Where is there any strategic justification for such a ‘vision’?
The evening was then thrown open to the audience for a Q & A session. The questions and statements covered a range of topics, including:
- Lack of genuine consultation and help from council
- The need for sustainable development (and please remember that Glen Eira has no tree protection on private land)
- The power of lobbying and lobbyists
- Unifying community voices everywhere
- Electing councilors who will truly represent the community
Much, much more was said. The overall feeling was that Save Glen Eira had taken a very positive step in uniting residents across all areas of Glen Eira. Planning incompetence touches everyone, especially when we have a council that refuses to listen to its residents. This was the real take home point from last night.
Also present were David Southwick and Kelvin Thompson.
July 30, 2019 at 3:37 PM
Congrats to the organisers. I attended last night and found it informative and it gave me the chance to speak with people from other areas. We’re all in the same boat so great to exchange views and learn a lot from their experiences. I look forward to the next meeting. Hope it is real soon.
July 30, 2019 at 4:37 PM
Great job by the organisers for arranging.Let’s unite the groups across the municipality that have all been fighting the same battle.This Council must be called to account.
July 30, 2019 at 4:50 PM
Well done to all, the night was well presented and everyone showed respect and courtesy, a very different experience than if councillors had been present. I for one was greatful the turn-coats didn’t show their faces and try to waste our time.
I’m a tad suspicious of Southwick’s motives, he seems genuine enough, but his Liberal Party’s past record on planning and over development hasn’t been good, and of course his close connections and actions of his fellow Liberals cohorts on Glen Eira Council doesn’t really align what he is saying or by default will what he proposing be carried through by a re-elected Liberal Government. Matthew Guy was a dud of a planning minister and was lucky to escape corruption charges over land rezoning on Phillip Island.
Hopefully this may be the beginning of the end for Rebecca McKenzie who initially showed promise, but has slumped into basically becoming an anti resident, secretive bureaucrat, seemingly having thrown her lot in with the developers.
July 30, 2019 at 6:09 PM
It’s fair to be suspicious of the motives of the many involved but no one more than Torres who is central to the Glen Eira planning mess.
July 30, 2019 at 11:25 PM
David Southwick , the former disc jockey come “adjunct professor” is always there making crowd pleasing actions but forgetting when it comes to the real vote.
July 31, 2019 at 10:10 AM
He showed up. Where was labor?
July 31, 2019 at 10:20 AM
Possibly having a free dinner with their developer mates at their favorite venue the Lobster Cave.
July 31, 2019 at 11:48 AM
Good to see so many people show up. Council is on the nose and they had better start listening to residents all over the place.
July 31, 2019 at 12:22 PM
The approach by this council on development is a disgrace.Spin doctoring, silence, excuses and very poor leadership. Not good enough by a long way. People have had enough of this crap and being treated as second class citizens.
July 31, 2019 at 6:12 PM
Crap is right. They are great at paying off consultants to produce 1000 of 1000 pages of crap and nice cute pictures but to hide the truth. Disgrace does not describe this council. That is being kind. I’ve got about 20 other words I would use starting with traitors, liars, gutless and so on.
July 31, 2019 at 4:03 PM
Trying to get heard by Council as they are supposedly representing the community is a farce. We certainly need to support each other and work together to get our voices heard. Let’s keep going! Well done to all who organised the event.
July 31, 2019 at 4:06 PM
I’m sorry I couldn’t be there but pleased that so many others could, and the reports sound promising at least. I’m behind it every inch of the way.
July 31, 2019 at 4:08 PM
Uniting disparate groups across Glen Eira is a wonderful objective. Council in the past has profited from individuals or small groups fighting their own individual battles against developers. Uniting the entire municipality, sharing experiences or information as someone has already said, and offering support (financial or otherwise) can only be a good thing. It also means that council cannot get away with so much any more. They will be called to account not by a small enclave of individuals, but the entire group. I say well done to Save Glen Eira and may you continue to grow and grow.
July 31, 2019 at 4:20 PM
Funny isn’t it currently the wreckers ball is demolishing the beautiful former McKees ware house. Today the GEC announces in paper that it is the site of the new market. If it had been fitted out it would have been like the former Caulfield, the current Prahran and Victoria MRKETS. Good ratepayers we foot the wasteful bill again for the sake of CFMEU employment.
July 31, 2019 at 5:17 PM
Yes, it would have far better if they had repurposed the building, but the kick-backs would have been less, the more expensive the project the bigger the kick-backs are. With this type of regime in place there is no incentive to preserve and conserve.
July 31, 2019 at 6:24 PM
I’m angry and on board.
August 1, 2019 at 8:27 PM
Let’s hope they can mobilize everyone to come together and fight the greedy developers. There’s far too much damage been done the the suburbs already. All driven by excessive immigration.