Glen Eira Debates

Over the past few years more and more residents are feeling aggrieved at the bogus consultation methodologies that this council trots out. Here is a summary of what is wrong with the entire process –

• Survey questions are designed to elicit the required response. They are either totally irrelevant to the core issue or are simply vague and nothing more than motherhood statements. We are not told who designs these questions but more importantly whether they are first road tested with councillors and the community consultation committee. The latter group remains nothing but a public relations enterprise given that they have no real input into design or decision making of surveys or issues.
• Public forums are also carefully manipulated and engineered. Half of the time officers present their  (positive) take on an issue and little time is left for resident queries and comments. Secondly the chat function is often turned off so that participants can’t communicate with each other and again recordings of the forums seldom are available to review. The latest forum on the Queen’s Avenue trees is the perfect example with council stating that they can’t release the video because of LXRP ‘requirements’ and conversely the LXRP stating that it is council’s forum and hence up to their discretion.
• Consultation summaries are anything but accurate representations of what was stated. Often residents have to be satisfied with a sprinkling of what participants said instead of being able to read in full everything that everyone stated. FOI requests are met with sheer nonsense such as releasing all commentary would be an impingement on council resources and take time away from their other business. When the survey responses are anonymous and collected in a single file the excuse of a drain on council resources is sheer bunkum!
• Often residents find themselves having to plough through hundreds upon hundreds of pages in order to get to the crux of the matter. Council refuses to provide short summaries of the major issues so that residents can know exactly what is at stake.
• Meetings with officers are generally a waste of time. They trot out all the positives but neglect any negatives. Furthermore the times set aside for such activities are mostly during the day – hardly suitable for people who work, or have small children.

So how can all this be fixed? Here are some suggestions that we’ve made in the past –

• Ensure that survey questions are reviewed by both councillors and the community consultation committee before anything goes public. Avoid generalities, closed questions, motherhood statements. Provide a short, succinct summary that addresses all the pros and cons of the matter. For major issues a Discussion paper is vital.
• Given that council was quite prepared to release all commentary on its consultations several years ago, the current approach on the most contentious issues such as structure planning and the housing strategy, has been to cover up and hide as much of the negative feedback as possible. This has to change. All comments, emails (redacted to protect privacy) must be available.
• Major consultations remain at the ‘consult’ level. According to the IAP2 we should surely be at the very least at the ‘involve’ level. Councillors have the power to ensure this occurs.
• Forums either public or Zoom must include the chat facility so that participants can interact. Secondly the full version must be available for those who missed out. The focus should always be on resident feedback and NOT officer reports.
• Finally, it is imperative that before residents are asked for their views, all information is provided to them. We have had councillors complaining that they don’t get to see some documentation prior to their voting, or that not sufficient time has been provided for them to digest the data. Residents also need to have all the facts before they commit to providing responses.

All of this is important if the community is to have any faith and confidence in this council. Refusing to implement genuine consultation only serves to foster suspicion and shows how the essential priority of transparency is moribund in Glen Eira.

Over the past few years we have heard time and again that rate-capping and cost shifting by federal and state government has caused uncertainty in Glen Eira’s ability to resource all its services and infrastructure. This has resulted in the closure of our early learning centres and the attempted sell off of aged care.

But how much is this financial ‘stress’ due to Glen Eira’s own grandiose plans and refusal to impose any sort of financial imposte on developers?  In 2016, the planning scheme review noted time and again full resident support for a development contributions levy (DCL) and even a car parking waiver levy.  Glen Eira used to have a DCL but it was allowed to expire in 2010 and has never been reintroduced. Even when the latest structure plans came up for decision the officers’ reports paid short shrift to the idea of introducing such a levy. Over the years we have had statements such as the following:

Incorporating a Development Contributions Plan into the Planning Scheme for Carnegie will not be able to be undertaken as part of Amendment C184 due to the length and complexity of this process and may be worth examining at a later date. (January 2020)

And in the November 2023 planning scheme review (without community consultation!!) we were told that the DCL is: On hold. Pushed back owing to other major strategic planning implementation, such as controls to implement structure plans.

Thus, since 2010 Glen Eira residents have been subsidising developers and there is no indication when this largesse will cease!

Other councils thankfully have not been so backwards in getting their priorities right and working to ensure that their residents aren’t subsidising developers to the hilt. The following screen dumps are all from councils which have been successful in introducing a DCL in the past 18 months into their planning scheme as well as a car parking waiver

WHITEHORSE

STONNINGTON

MERRIBEK

MARIBYRNONG

BRIMBANK

The first screen dump is from Whitehorse council. For its Box Hill Activity Centre the levy is $2,100 per residential dwelling. Glen Eira forecasts over 2000 net new dwellings just for Elsternwick alone. Doing the sums, with a DCL comparable to Whitehorse that could bring in over $4,000,000!!!! Add to this all the other major activity and neighbourhood centres alone, then the income could well and truly be hitting the $20M mark.

AND SOME CAR PARKING LEVIES

Over the years Council’s excuse for not (re)introducing a DCL was that the cost involved far outweighed the benefit! Surely this kind of argument would also apply to all of the above councils? Yet they have forged ahead. If the cost was truly prohibitive then surely they would have refrained?

The question remains: if other councils can achieve the gazetting of their DCL’s and car parking levies, then why is Glen Eira so reluctant to introduce something that was promised seven years ago and hasn’t existed for 14 years now?  Instead of continually crying wolf and bemoaning rate capping etc Glen Eira Council needs to look at its own back yard. It can increase its revenue via these levies! It can cut spending by refusing to build taj mahals that are in the vicinity of $85+M and incurring massive  interest repayments for the next decade and more. It can reduce spending on useless ‘consultations’ that are anything but genuine. There is no excuse possible for the failure to rein in costs and to source new revenue funds via these developer levies. Maybe then council might stop trying to flog off all our services such as childcare, aged care, home support, etc.

The Victorian Electoral Commission (VEC) ran a recount vote this morning to elect a councillor to replace David Zyngier. Jane Karslake won the recount. We are yet to see the actual numbers on how the voting fell. This will be available in the next few days on the VEC website. Assuming that Ms Karlake signs the relevant papers she will represent Camden Ward.

Ms Karslake has twice stood for council elections in the past. We wish her well for the remainder of this term.