The Community Environment Network (CEN) has called on Central Coast Administrator, Dick Persson, to urgently sign off on an agreement with the NSW Biodiversity Conservation Trust (BCT) to permanently protect Porters Creek Wetland at Warnervale.
CEN Deputy Chair, John Asquith, said he wrote to Persson on November 10 requesting an agreement between Council and BCT be expedited and concluded as soon as possible.
“It is our understanding that Council and BCT were close to signing off on an agreement to protect the wetland when the councillors were suspended,” Asquith said.
“CEN has been working with Council and residents to achieve permanent protection for the Porters Creek Wetland,” he said.
The Wetland is owned by Council and comprises an area of about 700ha to the west of Wyong.
It is the largest wetland on the Tuggerah lakes system and filters a large area of developed water catchment to ensure that sediment and pollutants are filtered out of the water flowing via Porters Creek and Wyong River into the lakes.
The wetland is home to threatened species and endangered ecological communities (EECs) and also provides a back-up emergency drinking water supply, which was critical during the millennium drought.
The wetland was purchased by the former Wyong Council in the 1980s for the purpose of protecting water quality into Tuggerah lakes.
In November 2017, Central Coast councillors resolved to permanently protect the wetland south of the current airport runway from development.
They requested that Council staff prepare a report to protect the wetland, and in April 2020, Council’s Warnervale Working Group formed and progressed a Biodiversity Conservation Trust Agreement and other priority actions in the Tuggerah Lakes Estuary Management Plan.
Asquith said that recently, an arrangement to permanently protect the wetland was negotiated between Council and the NSW Biodiversity Conservation Trust.
“CEN hopes that Administrator Persson and Acting CEO, Rik Hart, will acknowledge the importance of the Porters Creek Wetland to this region and sign off on this agreement,” he said.
Source:
Media release, Dec 8
Community Environment Network.