As the community waits for the outcome of the Public Inquiry into Central Coast Council and a decision on whether or not there will be local government election this year, the Community Environment Network (CEN) has put together its own Central Coast State of the Environment scorecard.
CEN Chair, Gary Chestnut, said prior to 2021 local councils were required to prepare a stand-alone state of environment report in the year in which an ordinary election of councillors was to be held.
“This is no longer a requirement; the NSW Government took it out of the Local Government Act last year,” Chestnut said.
“If 2022 turns out to be a local government election year for Central Coast Council, CEN thinks it is appropriate to examine how Central Coast Council during administration has delivered on one of the key themes in its own Community Strategic Plan (CSP).
“The Green theme in the CSP talks about protecting our environmental resources for the future and making sure the natural beauty of this region is cherished and protected – but, sadly, Council has abandoned its environmental responsibilities in the last 14 months.”
Chestnut said CEN had identified what it says are Council’s Top 10 Environmental Failures for 2020-21.
These included abandoning a Conservation Agreement with the Biodiversity Conservation Trust (BCT) of NSW to permanently protect Porters Creek Wetlands which was ready for signature prior to the dismissal of the councillors and failing to set any emission reduction targets for Council or the community to address the climate crisis, he said.
He said Council sold a strategic wetland located in a regional wildlife corridor at Doyalson when it said it wouldn’t sell environmental land pushed ahead on the preparation of another Master Plan for the redevelopment and potential privatisation of the Gosford Waterfront without community consultation.
Resolving to develop a Master Plan on an expanded Warnervale Airport without first taking into account to the fullest extent possible all matters affecting or likely to affect the environment is another fail, Chestnut said.
CEN also cited allowing ecological vandalism in reserves and the Coastal Open Space System (COSS) land through illegal mountain bike trail building and use and reducing expenditure within the capital works program on Natural Assets to just 0.3 per cent and Open Space Assets to only 3.5 per cent of total capital works as further fails.
Further criticism was levelled at Council for: ending support for Volunteer Groups such as Bushcare and Dunecare; rewriting Council’s Community Strategic Plan 2018-2028, on the justification of the community’s anger over the special rate variation; and rescinding a Council resolution on which the community has no knowledge of what has been rescinded.
“The recurring theme here is clear,” Chestnut said.
“CEN knows the people of the Central Coast care about our environment and want it protected but Council is failing in its duties.”
Source:
Media release, Feb 8
Community Environment Network
The list of environmental failures are growing! As the residents of Davistown hold a candle lit vigil for the Davistown wetlands the Administrator has moved it from environmentally protected to a ‘Deferred Matter?’ leaving it unprotected and venerable to predatory developers that the bottom line is a massive profit such as the Warnervale Council land sell off. ($120 million profit in 21 days) The traffic would be horrendous shifting hundreds of tons of fill soil would pollute the waterways removal of mangroves would reduce fish breeding habitat. Where would the Central Coast Council environmental protection credentials be then?