Around 140 Brunswick Heads residents – many of whom were ropeable – faced off the managers of the town’s three caravan parks over unwelcome expansion plans last Thursday evening at the Ocean Shores Country Club.
It lasted for well for over two hours. So did it achieve anything?
Not much other than perhaps ticking the box that the state government-run corporation, the NSW Coast Holiday Parks Trust (NSWCHPT), had fulfilled its requirement for ‘community engagement’ over its plans to develop the Terrace, Massey-Greene and Ferry Reserve.
With a lovely backdrop of the club’s commanding ocean views, a bureaucrat started the meeting by speaking so fast that his name was missed.
Mr Bureaucrat admitted early on that there was a ‘lot of negative feedback,’ and throughout the presentation he was asked by the audience to slow down, yet didn’t.
The NSWCHPT representatives – including CEO Steve Edmonds – were on the back foot the entire evening and their expansion plans were booed loudly.
‘Land grab!’ was shouted out on occasion.
Some of the biggest boos were over the plans for the Terrace park, where the Trust has subsumed a WWI memorial park (on Crown land) with cypress trees for camping/commercial purposes.
Sean O’Meara, who told the crowd he is a fourth-generation local, was cheered when he said there is no way you could lay plumbing down around the trees for built structures and still maintain the trees.
Another told the crowd that the trees were not planted by the RSL, but by the residents’ association just after WWI. Offically it is a remembrance, not a memorial, the crowd were told.
An interactive video demonstrating the Trust’s vision of the Terrace Park was also loudly booed as it contained nothing but drably designed high-density cabins.
But the NSWCHPT managers argued, ‘they are sustainably designed!’
Boundary issues
Over many, many years, the North Coast Holiday Parks Trust has been unable to produce boundary plans between the parks and public spaces to satisfy Council and the public.
It was a topic that took up a lot of time on the night.
While the Trust said there will be a 10-metre foreshore setback from creeks and rivers – allowing public access – members of the public challenged the validity of the boundaries themselves.
Retired Mullumbimby High School teacher Patricia Warren gave an account of why she considers it a ‘land grab,’ and was cheered.
Tricky deal
She told the crowd a tricky deal was done by a former Council staffer over park boundaries, which affects public foreshore access.
Later she told The Echo, ‘CEO Steve Edmonds stated that the operational boundaries were Council’s s68 Approved boundaries and these had been given to him by Council.
‘Those appear to be consistent with the licence issued under delegated authority by former staffer Jon Rusforth in 2007. They never went to Council.’
In August 2012, Council’s s68 Approval to Operate resolution 12-627 targeted the boundaries for the pending preparation of POM for the caravan parks. This was reaffirmed 3/237 of May 9, 2013.
‘On May 10, in goodwill, Council issued an interim licence to allow Massey-Greene and Terrace to continue to operate. [Former NSWCHP manager] Jim Bolger then took the interim licence and expired licence for Ferry Reserve caravan park, prepared the now-approved 2014 plans of management (POM) on those boundaries in full knowledge of the purpose of the August 2012 resolution and indeed the May 2013 resolution.
‘He presented to the newly formed board of NSWCHP the interim licence and boundaries for Ferry Reserve as Council’s agreed boundaries when in fact they were not.
‘It is gravely concerning that the Trust is now stating that these boundaries are still the operational boundaries of the caravan park and brings into question the credibility of whoever has been advising the Trust on this contentious issue.’
Ms Warren has asked for an explanation to explain ‘why the Trust ignores Council’s s68 Approval to Operate operational boundaries.’
A request for a copy of Thursday’s Trust presentation was not replied to.
Clarification is needed about the WW1 Memorial Pines, Terrace Reserve, Brunswick Heads. Firstly, the area occupied by the Memorial Pines is between 6-7000sqm. It lies outside the boundaries of Councils s68 Approval to Operate which has been ignored by the Trust to date. NSW Crown Holiday Parks Trust would like to develop the area for residential purposes and locate 16 long term tenants in the area. As part of that concept the Trust is stating that it will have a tree management strategy to protect the trees. Part of that strategy requires at least a 5m radius around the remaining trees (older trees with larger canopies would require more than 5m according to a local botantist). To date, that strategy, known to the Trust since 2010 has not been adhered to and in fact, practise has clearly demonstrated a determined effort to act against the recommendations of its own environmental consultant. The trees are already listed as a war memorial with the NSW State library, listed with the National Trust of Australia and as a war memorial under Treenet’s ‘Avenue of Honour’. Minister Rob Stokes has recommended the LEP for Byron Shire be amended to include the memorial in its Heritage provision.
Having set the stage, now consider the behaviour of members of the Brunswick Heads RSL sub-Branch. For years and in full knowledge of the information about the history of the WW1 Memorial Pines, the behaviour of some members can only be described as thwarting the process of having the area listed as a war memorial with the State RSL. That behaviour does not have the support of sub-branches in Bryon Bay, Burringbar and Bangalow. At the Far North District Council meeting of the RSL in Nov 2014 a unanimous vote was taken on having avenues of trees registered as a war memorial. Brunswick Heads’ sub-branch abstained from the vote. The resolution was supposed to go to the State RSL. The local sub branch needs to clarify if in fact it did and if not why not and why indeed the local branch abstained from the vote. But the behaviour of the Vice President at the information session held by NSWCHPT on 9.3.17 is extremely concerning. In response to a comment about the Memorial Pines he stated that the area was a rememberance area and that Brunswick Heads already had a memorial. The latter point does not exclude listing the Memorial Pines as a war memorial. However, apparently in RSL language the use of the term ‘rememberance’ downgrades the area from its intented purpose as a war memorial. Given the status in which the RSL is held, that utterance appeared to be accepted without question. Regrettably, it was only after an agitated phone call from a person involved in the RSL was the difference in meaning explained to me. But it gets worse. The original plantings were a project initiated by the Brunswick Heads Progress Association. The RSL did not exist at the time. The 500 odd plantings were done by soldiers from Gallipoli and the Western Front. They came in from the surrounding towns and villages, Mullumbimby, Bangalow, Byron Bay, Burringbar and Brunswick Heads. It should not be left to Brunswick -Billinudgel RSL sub-Branch to speak as the represenative authority on this issue, particularly when a number of the sub-Branches are opposed to the behaviour of some of the members of the local RSL.reluctance to have the WW1 Memorial Pines listed as a war memorial. One can only wonder at the agenda of the local RSL?
Raised from seed, planted out and cared for by hundreds of locals, over three/four generations. A hundred years, and now we are to accept that a few middle-aged trees could be the TOKEN Memorial Avenue. Sad that we cannot properly acknowledge the intent/respect of our forebears Col Draper