GE Service Performance

Archived Posts from this Category

December 13, 2023

Child Care To Close!

Posted by gleneira under GE Kindergartens/Childcare, GE Service Performance
[2] Comments

PS: Please read – https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/police-investigate-after-egg-hurled-at-councillors-mid-meeting-20231216-p5erx8.html

We should all condemn what occurred at Tuesday’s meeting. All it achieves is a further widening between residents and our elected reps and ultimately a further erosion of transparency and accountability.

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At last night’s Special Council Meeting, councillors voted 5 to 3 to close the 3 early childcare centres. The only concession was that it be delayed until the end of March 2024 instead of the end of this year.

Voting for closure were: Magee, Esakoff, Cade, Penniciuk, Parasol. Those who voted against were Anthanasopolous, Zhang and Szmood.

Much was made of the failures of both State and Federal Governments in funding appropriate childcare and how this impacted on council. Nor was much credence given by those voting for closure to the interest of parliamentarians and their promises to ‘assist’. There was doubt as to whether any funding would ever materialise. The over-riding argument by these councillors was the need to serve the entire community and to do so with sound fiduciary oversight. That’s the role of a councillor they repeated ad nauseum. It’s just a pity that fiduciary oversight does not encompass extravaganzas such as the Carnegie swimming pool and multimillion dollar sporting pavilions plus borrowings of $60M over the next few years to fund these projects. Nor do we have any idea of how much waste occurs each year and how council is attempting to rein this in.

The fundamental question was put by Magee – should council get out of early learning centres? The cited loss of $500,000 per annum is literally a drop in the ocean given council’s overall budget and revenue stream. Readers should remember that for nearly a decade Glen Eira had one of the highest rate increases per year – 6.5%!!!! To therefore argue that lack of federal and state funding and the rate cap is to blame is irrelevant in answering this question. If the community as a whole wants aged care and child care maintained then that should be the priority. This question has never been asked of the community.

December 5, 2023

Victoria In Future 2023!

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[4] Comments

In September 2023 the state government released its latest version of Victoria In Future (VIF). Promoted as a yearly document, this one only took four and a quarter years to materialise! Councils are directed to base their strategic planning on this document. What is interesting about this latest prognostication is that instead of Glen Eira’s projected 188,000 in the 2019 version, the 2023 version projects the number of residents in 2036 to reach 174,000. In terms of dwellings required this has now changed from 78,500 to 79,090. Thus VIF 2023 projects that between 2021-2036 Glen Eira will require 12,850 net new dwellings to meet population growth needs.

The latest VIF data can be accessed via https://www.planning.vic.gov.au/guides-and-resources/data-and-insights/victoria-in-future

Glen Eira however continues to base all its strategic planning on facilitating far more than 13,000 net new dwellings by 2036 as evidenced in its latest structure plans, the housing strategy and Amendment C220. If our projected population has dropped by 14,000, together with a decline in required housing, then why are we still going full bore for more and more development?

If we look at our major planning documents (ie structure plans and priority development zones) and what these documents forecast, the true picture reveals itself. Background papers for these plans forecast the following (conservative) numbers of net new dwellings over the next 15 years –

Glen Huntly -410

East village – 3000+

Caulfield village/Caulfield Staion – 3,500+

Bentleigh – 2388

Elsternwick – 2000+

Carnegie – 2,500+

TOTAL: 13,798

It should also be remembered that both Caulfield and East Village are only ‘preliminary’ figures. In both cases they can well and truly exceed these forecasts as the permit for East Village has already enshrined! Thus if we simply focus on the above we already surpass the proposed target, without even counting development that is occurring in our eleven neighbourhood centres, and residential areas. Yet council is not satisfied, and with the housing strategy recommendations ALL of Glen Eira will be turned into a developer’s paradise.

Please note that our Housing Strategy and Amendment C220 forecasts the rezoning of over 10,000 sites and this includes the removal of the mandatory garden requirement for ALL sites zoned General Residential zone, and the creation of a new zone NRZ2 which will increase the permissible site coverage and reduce current permeability requirements. All engineered to allow more and more development on single sites.

When other councils are trying their hardest to stop their municipalities becoming congested and environmentally unsustainable areas, Glen Eira is doing everything it can to achieve the opposite. Here as some example quotes from these councils’ Housing Strategies. Compare these with the Glen Eira vision and what is proposed:

Boroondara

The BHS (Boroondara Housing Strategy) recognises that the need for housing diversity should also be considered in conjunction with the capacity and functions of key infrastructure, such as roads, sewerage, drainage, public services and public transport. If these services cannot sustain additional population in particular locations, it would be unsustainable to increase densities in these locations until the necessary infrastructure can support the change. (page 2 of the Housing Strategy)

COMMENT: In the Glen Eira documentation, there has been no assessment that we are aware of which provides any analysis of existing infrastructure and future need. No costings have been provided; no time-lines have been provided, and no evidence to support the sustainability of 13000+ net new dwellings.

Bayside

The Review also found that Bayside’s growth locations have sufficient housing capacity to meet anticipated population increases over the next 15 years to 2036 as required by State planning policy. (page 3)

….the overarching spatial approach outlined in the Housing Strategy, 2012 and in this update to the Housing Strategy, is delivering increased housing in Bayside in locations that are well served by public transport, shops and services. This is the most sustainable approach to delivering increased housing density and is in line with State Government planning policy. Should further housing capacity be required in the future, a future review of the Housing Strategy can consider other locations that may be suitable for increased housing density in addition to those already identified in the Housing Strategy. This approach allows Council to direct and manage growth in the short to medium term. (page 6)

Retain the existing residential zoning in Bayside. This clearly implements the Housing Strategy’s vision and spatial approach to managing housing growth in Bayside

COMMENT: Bayside sees no need to change zoning given the growth in its major activity centres. Glen Eira on the other hand intends to ensure that 10,000 sites will be rezoned when our major activity centres alone can meet projected growth.

YARRA

As shown by the assessment of the Yarra’s activity centres to accommodate future housing growth, Yarra can rely on existing capacity and does not need to make significant changes to rezone other land at this time to provide additional housing supply. If housing delivery trends continue to be strong in Yarra, within the next 5 to 10 years it will be important to identify key precincts to undertake further strategic planning to identify long term housing land availability. (page 67)

COMMENT: Yarra takes a similar approach to Bayside. Capacity is sufficient and if there is a need for more dwellings then this can be addressed at the time. In Glen Eira, policies/zonings once introduced stay there forever. The residential zones introduced secretly in 2013 have not had a thorough review, and certainly no public consultation. No attempt has been made in 12 years to address shortfalls in permeability and site coverage requirements when countless other councils have up to 40% permeability requirements for their General Residential Zone areas. And yet, we are supposed to have an Urban Forest Strategy and a concern about sustainable development.

CONCLUSION

With the latest projections provided by VIF 2023, council must review its strategic planning and assure residents that development at all costs is no longer necessary nor sustainable in our municipality.

December 2, 2023

More Sleight Of Hand?

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
1 Comment

Not for the first time do we have council handing over full control of planning to the Minister and the Department. We ask readers to carefully compare and consider the following screen dumps. They involve adopted amendments and the resolution to send the amendment to the Minister seeking approval for advertising and formal submissions.

The Whitehorse resolution contains no mention of the Minister or the Department as does the Glen Eira one. One may quibble as to the interpretation of ‘intent’ but giving the Minister the right to change whatever he likes can still fit into ‘intent’ given that this basically means to produce documentation for land use.

Here are a couple of other resolutions from Boroondara and Stonnington. Again, note the absence of mention of Minister and/or department.

So why has Glen Eira resorted to the inclusion of this phrasing when other councils haven’t? The repercussions can be immense as proven previously with the increased heights for Carnegie and Elsternwick through the interim DDO’s. It also means that residents will not have any future say – it will be fait accompli. Instead of ensuring that what was decided upon remains, this clause simply allows more changes without community input.

November 24, 2023

Bentleigh Structure Plan – Feedback Summary

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[5] Comments

Once again a whopping agenda that lumps together some of the most important planning issues that confront the community. These are:

Bentleigh Structure Plan community feedback
Bentleigh East Neighbourhood Centre amendment
Elsternwick Structure Plan amendment
Carnegie Structure Plan amendment

Very little has changed in regard to the Major Activity Centres, especially in relation to heights, and overshadowing. All this despite the fact that the majority of responses were opposed to various recommendations in the structure plans and the mooted DDO’s. Carnegie did not even have community consultation following the abandonment of version one (ie Amendment C184)!!!!!!!

We will deal with each of the above as separate posts beginning with the Bentleigh consultation summary.

Bentleigh Community Feedback ‘summary’

There were 106 survey responses, 17 emails and a petition of 221 signatories. Council states that it sent out 4,101 letters to surrounding households. The feedback equates to a pathetic 2.56% response rate for the survey. Why? Are Bentleigh residents so apathetic that they don’t care? Have residents given up on believing that their voices can affect outcomes in Glen Eira? Or is there something drastically wrong with the way in which council communicates its intentions? We have yet to see any analyses EVER of why feedback is so low and what can be done to improve this. It serves council well to simply go through the motions of ‘consultation’ despite the fact that survey after survey has been anything but a genuine attempt to elicit relevant and valid responses.
Again, we are not privy to the raw data. No publication of the responses as has happened in the past. Instead we have a ‘doctored’ summary that falls far short of reporting on what was actually said/written.
Language used remains a problem. The officer’s report is vague and imprecise with terminology such as ‘mixed responses’, ‘about half’, ‘support for accommodating growth’, ‘some support’, etc. Very little is quantified.
The summary report itself is nothing more than a public relations exercise. For example: On ‘retaining character’ we find this conclusion in the report – 55 percent of participants indicated that accommodating growth above the commercial strip was better than doing it in other parts of Bentleigh. Ostensibly this sounds like a majority are in favour, but one must query the value of the question itself. There could very well be support for greater density in the commercial core, but THIS DOES NOT MEAN that respondents are in favour of 8 storeys (discretionary) adjacent to heritage homes. The value of any response and what conclusions might be drawn are 100% dependent on the quality of the questions asked. The online survey as we’ve commented on before was carefully engineered to avoid as much as possible any responses that could be interpreted as ‘negative’ or opposed to the recommendations of the structure plan.
The above criticisms can also be directed to this conclusion – 51% of participants indicated they ‘strongly agreed’ or ‘agreed’ that measures such as height limits and upper-level setbacks for new development would help to retain the character of Centre Road. Of course people want height limits. But we were never asked what those height limits should be!!!!!!!
On page 4 of the summary report we are told that 20 percent of participants indicated they would like a building height limit reduction in the centre when asked about retaining character in a growing centre. This sounds like a clear minority in favour of reduced height limits. But this alleged 20% is only from those individuals who took the option to write something in the text boxes. And again, no question asked what is an appropriate height limit?
More concerning is that the above cited 20% does not correlate with what is then presented in the following table:

We’ve highlighted all those responses which could be seen as pertaining to the issue of height. The totals are far in excess of the previously stated 20%!!!!!! However, without full publication of all the responses then it is not possible to determine whether the 20% is anywhere near accurate or council’s fudging of the responses. Transparency is again the victim in this reporting.

CONCLUSION(S)

Until this council is prepared to undertake genuine consultation that includes full oversight by councillors and the community engagement committee in the drafting of survey questions then residents cannot hope to be participants in anything but a carefully orchestrated farce that fulfils legal requirements and nothing else. Nor can residents have any confidence in the resulting feedback summaries when the raw data is with-held. When council fights so hard to avoid full disclosure one must surely doubt the results.

As stated earlier, there must be a full analyses of why consultation in Glen Eira is such a failure in terms of community feedback. This should start at the first stage of notification to residents – are they provided with enough detail to engage their interest/concern? Are they expected to undertake hours of reading that involves hundreds of pages instead of succinct summaries? And how many residents have simply given up because they don’t believe that anything they put forward will eventuate? This isn’t apathy we believe. It is simply distrust of council and the predetermined nature of all decision making. If residents truly believed that council was ready to listen and act, then we are confident that feedback would quadruple and that residents could actually believe that council was acting on their behalf. Sadly this is not the modus operandi of Glen Eira City Council!

November 22, 2023

Boroondara Versus Glen Eira

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[3] Comments

Earlier this month Boroondara City Council voted in a resolution which basically condemned the flurry of planning changes introduced by the State Government over the past 18 months or so. The vote was a result of a detailed officer report outlining the consequences of these changes and how they would impact the Boroondara community. In Glen Eira, apart from a bit of fear mongering by some councillors used to justify their voting patterns on activity centres (ie we would get worse results if the minister calls it in, blah, blah, blah) there has not been one report, analyses, or discussion similar to the Boroondara stance. In all likelihood, residents have no idea of what these changes to the planning system entail, or what they mean for future development.

If councils are truly working for their residents, then it is incumbent on them to provide their communities with the necessary information and to work collaboratively with various community groups in their advocacy roles. None of this has happened in Glen Eira. Why not? Why can’t we have an officer’s report which is out in the open and discussed in council chambers so that everyone knows what this council stands for?

The Boroondara vote can be watched via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4f_0Tab2Ag. It starts at approximately 52 minutes into the webcast. We’ve also uploaded several pages from the officer’s report. It was lengthy, but the highlighted comments here are important and reveal the primary concerns of Boroondara. Are these shared by Glen Eira? Who knows?

Again, we have a myriad of questions:

Have councillors even been briefed on what each new piece of legislation means?
Have options been presented to councillors on what can and should be done in response?
What communications have taken place between officers and departments? Have councillors been made aware of all such communications? If so, have they seen hard copies of this communication or simply had to rely on officer’s verbal summaries?

Residents deserve heaps better from our council. Or is the truth simply that the Glen Eira administration is fully behind the government’s actions in removing as far as possible all third party objection rights and allowing more and more development?

October 13, 2023

Elsternwick: May Street Finding!

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[3] Comments

We’ve received the following media release.

A myriad of questions result from this:

If in 2008 legal advice found that May Street was indeed a ‘road at law’, and that council officers were informed and certainly aware of this finding, then where is corporate memory? The Woolies vcat decision goes back years and certain officers such as Torres et al were certainly working for council in 2008 and also up until recently. Surely it is part of their responsibility to have been aware of such documents – or was a blind eye turned on this ‘evidence’ because it would have made things far more difficult for Woolies?
Why has no mention been made of this 2008 decision? Why weren’t councillors informed? What does this say about council’s required record keeping and its required role in informing councillors of all relevant information prior to their decision making?
Council claims to have received its own ‘legal advice’. How does this supposed ‘legal advice’ refute the 2008 advice and STET’S own comprehensive legal advice? Council has done nothing in the intervening period to change the status of the 2008 decision – ie. no zone changes, no attempt to remove the ‘road’ status, etc. Until everything is out in the open so that the community can gauge for itself, then the perception the council has indeed failed in its ‘due diligence’ remains.
This is more than a simple failure to locate, assess and acknowledge the ramifications of a previous finding. It raises very real questions about the integrity of this administration and how far it will go to facilitate major development.

October 5, 2023

Childcare

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Service Performance
[3] Comments

The following Media Release is on council’s website –

Council made a preliminary decision on Tuesday night to close its three small Early Learning Centres in Caulfield, Carnegie and Murrumbeena.

Statement from Glen Eira Mayor Cr Jim Magee: Preliminary decision on the future of Council’s three early learning centres

We are now consulting directly with impacted families, staff, and the community before making a final decision by the end of the year.

We recognise this will be a challenging time for staff and families and are here to support them.

Council’s three Early Learning Centres were established at a time when opportunities for families to access childcare services were limited. In the decades since, a radical change in government funding and policy has led to a boom in the childcare market and slowed demand for Council’s centres.

The number of childcare places in Glen Eira has doubled since 2010, and increased from 3,966 places to 5,731 places since 2019, an increase of 44 per cent. Nine further non-Council centres now in the planning phase will offer a further 919 places.

A service review found we provide quality care and have excellent educators, however our older centres no longer meet contemporary building and service standards that modern childcare centres provide.

Our centres are expected to operate at a loss of at least $570,000 each year. Amid increasing costs and economic uncertainty, it is getting harder for councils to run services and we need to make responsible choices and provide value to all the community.

The municipality has a vibrant childcare market that provides choice, competition and capacity. We have confidence that the supply of childcare places will meet current and future demand. Our centres now account for just two per cent of the childcare places available across the municipality.

If Council decides to close the centres, the final day of operation is likely to be Thursday 21 December 2023. We will help families find alternative care that best suits their individual needs and help staff find a new role through redeployment to another Council role or career support.

To learn more about the Council preliminary decision and provide feedback, visit www.haveyoursaygleneira.com.au/childcare.

Media contact: Alex Leamy on 0409 086 361

PS: The Age is also running a story on this issue. See: https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/glen-eira-council-to-close-three-childcare-centres-before-christmas-20231005-p5e9yc.html

September 20, 2023

More Stuff-ups?

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Consultation/Communication, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
1 Comment

On Tuesday night there was a Special Council Meeting to (re)consider submissions on the closing off of Orrong Crescent/Alma Road in order to facilitate the proposed pop-up park at this corner. What is staggering about the processes involved is that council never seems to get it right – despite all their planning and traffic departments and legal advisors. It is clear that what motivates this administration is to implement something that has already been determined regardless of what the legislation requires! Council wants the pop-up park in spite of previous consultations that were strongly opposed. The first step to achieving this is the closure of the intersection. Thus the two are intricately linked. Trouble is, the law has been ignored!!!!!!

Please listen carefully to the following submission made on the night. It highlights the legal flaws in what council has done as well as the lack of required evidence to support the proposal of closing off the intersection. This new attempt comes on top of the failure to properly advertise and seek submissions on the first attempt.

There can be no excuse for what is happening here. Due legal process has not been followed; pivotal research such as traffic reports have either not been done, or not provided to councillors. Not the first time that councillors are expected to vote on an issue without all the relevant information before them! Even the officer’s report distorts what the submissions say in the claim that 4 were in support and 7 opposed. Of the four allegedly in ‘support’, the focus is exclusively on the pop-up park and NOT the closure of Orrong Crescent which is what this item is about! Council’s approach is akin to a bull in a china shop where the objective is to ram through whatever has already been decided.Hardly transparent and good governance!

September 13, 2023

Bogus Reports: Bentleigh & Elsternwick

Posted by gleneira under GE Consultation/Communication, GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[4] Comments

Council’s consultants are maestros in camouflaging the real facts and figures that should be the basis of all decent strategic planning. This of course only reinforces our view that the role of consultants is to provide any so called ‘evidence’ which will support decisions already made by this planning department.

This post focuses on the two traffic reports for the Bentleigh & Elsternwick structure plans. Both were done by the same company – yet they are very different in important components. Why?

We will start off with Elsternwick. On page 28 of the study we have this image:

We are told that: Dwellings in Elsternwick are a split of single detached dwellings (57%) and multi-unit dwellings (43%). The phrasing of ‘single detached dwellings’ would imply that these dwellings are stand alone houses and ‘multi-unit’ dwellings are interpreted as flats. Are we therefore witnessing some sleight of hand, when these figures are compared to what the 2021 Census results tell us? If our interpretation of ‘single detached dwellings’ coincides with the ABS interpretation, then these results are far more than bogus – they represent a deliberate attempt to distort and hide the true facts. Interestingly, we can find no definition in the consultant’s reports of what ‘single detached dwellings’ and ‘multi-unit dwellings’ means.

Compare the above with what the census reveals below:

38% compared to the reports 57%!!!!!!! We can only assume that the 38% has been added to the 19.3% to come anywhere near the stated 57%. If this is the case, then it is entirely misleading – especially since the consultants provide no definitions or explanations.

Another aspect of the above page is the claim that 12% of HOUSEHOLDS don’t own a car. The resorting to ‘households’ instead of dwellings is interesting. When we look at the car ownership per dwelling we get a completely different result (see below).

The Bentleigh transport report doesn’t follow the Elsternwick version. Instead we now get comparisons on page 128/9 to Windsor!!!! Readers should remember that we have been repeatedly told that we CANNOT compare one municipality to another. Yet, this is exactly what this supposed traffic analyses has done. And it doesn’t hold up to scrutiny when we find that Windsor compared to Bentleigh is an entirely different proposition!

For starters, we now are looking exclusively at PERCENTAGES and not NUMBERS in the attempt to prove how similar these two suburbs are. What is not stated are the following that completely change the conclusions. The table below is derived from the ABS 2021 census data.

Please note:

Bentleigh’s population is close to 3 times that of Windsor
The number of dwellings in Bentleigh is double that of Windsor
The number of dwellings without cars in Bentleigh is 446 and Windsor is 344. When these numbers are calculated as a PERCENTAGE of dwellings without cars, then of course Windsor will have a higher percentage given it has half of the dwellings in Bentleigh.

There is much, much more that could be written about these traffic reports and the invalidity of what is presented. Yet these documents are supposed to form the ‘evidence’ for structure plan recommendations. They fail dismally and are there simply to fulfill all legal requirements instead of providing an analyses that does hold up to scrutiny. We can only wonder how much these reports have cost ratepayers!!!!!! Undoubtedly money well spent when the objective is to facilitate more and more development with increased deterioration of residential amenity!

September 8, 2023

The Elsternwick Debacle!

Posted by gleneira under Councillor Performance, GE Council Meeting(s), GE Governance, GE Open Space, GE Planning, GE Service Performance, GE Transport
[3] Comments

The above image of the August 15^th pre-council assembly meeting reveals everything about the lack of governance and the manipulation that occurred. Here are the important things to note:

Cr Pennicuik DID NOT declare a conflict of interest at this meeting nor at any of the previous 9 assembly meetings where the Elsternwick Structure Plan was listed for discussion.
This pre-meeting lasted exactly 54 minutes and we have to wonder when in this 54 minutes was the Cade amendment discussed by councillors? – ie at 7’oclock? 7.20?
Responses to public questions at the last council meeting declare that In the case of the Amended Motion on item 8.2 passed at the Ordinary Council Meeting of 15 August, Councillors received written notification of all of its component parts at 5.10pm that afternoon. We assume that this was via email. Thus, did all councillors manage to access their emails prior to the assembly meeting? And when were councillors forwarded all the other proposed amendments – especially the Zyngier one? Were these discussed on the August 15^th pre-meeting, or any of the earlier ones?And how much time (if any) was devoted to each proposal?
As cited in some of the public questions on Tuesday night, council’s governance rules include the following: Members have sufficient information available to them to make good and informed decisions. Good decision making requires time – this was clearly not available pre-meeting and certainly not available to Cr Pennicuik to seek independent legal advice to confirm or deny that she had a potential conflict of interest.
In another response to a public question we get: There is no requirement under Council’s Governance Rules or the Local Government Act 2020 for a proposed Amendment to a Motion to be provided to other Councillors in advance of an Ordinary Council meeting, although it is encouraged as good practice. Correct that there is nothing specific in either the governance rules or the Local Government Act to determine WHEN amendments should be available to councillors. But this has not stopped Magee from ruling out of order a proposed amendment on the Bentleigh Structure Plan by Zyngier on the July 4^th council meeting when he said:

Not only was the Zyngier attempted amendment disallowed on the claim of a non-existent ‘no surprises policy’ but that it also was not discussed at the pre-meeting. But in several responses to public questions we have the above council quote – no ‘in advance’ notification is required. Thus Magee basically gagged Zyngier!

For all the mumbo-jumbo, and claims of sound governance, what occurred on August 15^th can only be seen as deliberate manipulation to ensure that only 8 councillors voted and that the casting vote was left in the hands of our compliant Mayor.

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