Last night’s council meeting, to say the least was ‘interesting’. All the ingredients were there: wonderful grandstanding, the inability to answer questions directly from residents, and of course, the ‘gift’ of Wynne and labor culprits to camouflage the failures of Glen Eira City Council for the past few decades. Note: we certainly are not endorsing the woeful changes introduced into planning by Wynne. But to simply pass the buck and agree to everything is not in residents’ best interests either.
Here are some of the results from last night:
- The Nepean Highway 9 storey development was refused. Delahunty was the only councillor to vote against refusal.
- The Hawthorn Road 4 storey (heritage) development was also refused with an unanimous vote. Suddenly heritage was important, despite the fact that in Derby Road, these same councillors allowed a 12 storey development!
- The changes to the Bentleigh & Carnegie structure plans carried with only Magee voting against and arguing that heights should be mandatory.
- Open space strategy lauded as wonderful as is the 8.3% levy. Of course, no one mentioned that other councils were either pursuing, or had already achieved 10% for their entire municipalities! One comment from Delahunty was instructive when she implied that 8.3% was high enough not to stop development! Here is the bottom line we suspect: a 10% levy would greatly reduce developer interest and thus put some break on development in the municipality. That’s anathema to our council!
- In response to a public question council revealed that not too much of the 2014 open space recommendations had been achieved. Six years then of getting money and hardly anything to show for it!
Until these councillors are prepared to stand up and fight for residents, then we do not anticipate that there will be any positive changes in this municipality. The argument that everything is imposed by government does not mean that councillors and council remain silent and accepting
Glen Eira Debates 
February 5, 2020 at 2:28 PM
Mandatory heights have changed to discretionary. That means higher and higher developments. I could stomach this if council had the balls to provide any decent evidence as to why this change was made. How many more apartments do we need to meet projections? How many are now going up everywhere? How many extra apartments will discretionary deliver as opposed to mandatory? If they don’t know then it shows what a farce all this planning is. Nobody should be introducing stuff like this without at least providing all the facts and figures. There’s not a single line anywhere that shows why this is happening except that Labor is copping the blame. Not good enough from the government and council.
February 5, 2020 at 6:20 PM
What a sick joke, Mr. Magoo having sat on councils for the best part of a decade now realises we need mandatory height limits. Thick as a Brick
February 6, 2020 at 11:34 AM
Council is doing well by offering developers opportunity to carry out their construction with a reduced open space levy. Unfortunately, for current residents it works something like the effect of Queensland’s Premier Peterson in Queensland when he abolished probate.
There was amass exodus to Queensland just like there is an extraordinary “Apartment Building Boom” in Glen Eira.
February 6, 2020 at 1:29 PM
The Councillors predictably wailed and moaned about the Minister and Department, and then endorsed their demands. No councillor commented on the lack of strategic justification for the changes to C184 being demanded. Despite having 4 meetings between the Department and council officers, no minutes of the meetings have been published. No evidence to substantiate their claims has been provided. The myriad flaws, weaknesses, loopholes in the Planning Scheme are not to be fixed. The “Further Strategic Work” has been postponed indefinitely. Statistics from 1996 are to remain. Corruption will continue to run rampant. Worst of all, Council have accepted all responsibility for the very political decisions being made in rejecting the old C184 and replacing it with a new C184. There is now no political pressure on the Minister to lift his performance or that of his Department. At least none of them had the temerity to claim they were implementing the objectives of planning in Victoria. Although this item directly concerns Carnegie, I note only one of my ward councillors was present.
February 6, 2020 at 2:57 PM
The lack of substantiation is endemic in this council.
We have been told the following:
1. Council submitted their amendment C184 in January 2019
2. There have been 4 meetings with DWELP (the department). When these occurred we have not been told.
3. Doubtless countless other interactions between the various bodies too place as well. No data has been provided on any of these interactions.
Questions:
1. Were any councillors present at these meetings with department or Minister (apart from the Mayor perhaps)?
2. How much were councillors actually told/informed and provided with written documentation as to the progress or otherwise of the amendment?
3. Why throughout all of 2019 when the amendment was submitted are their only 3 mentions of the Bentleigh/Carnegie structure plans in the records of assembly (2 occurred for the 3 meetings contained in the December 2019 minutes)? Another mention was made in 1 record of assembly for the August council meeting. Surely given the importance of this amendment, councillors would have been kept well in the loop, or were they? Thus 3 mentions throughout all of 2019 hardly meets the requirements of ‘well informed’ and up to speed!!!
February 7, 2020 at 9:57 AM
If all indications are Glen Eira is going to meet its development commitments, then a 10% levy on open space would seem to be appropriate. Cr Delahunty’s comments on not wanting to slow development to reasonable and sustainable levels shows who sits at her table and shouts her cappuccinos.
February 7, 2020 at 11:41 AM
Developers win again!