NSW Planning Minister, Anthony Roberts, has removed planning powers from Lismore City Council. Councillors failed, on February 14, to constitute a local planning panel (LPP), which is designed to ‘speed up planning processes to support flood-recovery efforts’ that would have allowed them to nominate two members to the committee from a minister-approved pool of candidates.
The NSW government’s LPP usurps Council’s planning powers.
In a letter to Mayor Steve Krieg, Roberts said the failure ‘may result in confusion and uncertainty for planning processes in Lismore LGA.’
Under (s) 2.17 of the EP&A Act 1979, Roberts appointed ‘members to sit on Council’s behalf’.
All associated costs for the panel will be borne by Council, Roberts added.
Disempowering communities
Cate Faehrmann, Greens MP, planning spokesperson and lead candidate for the Upper House said, ‘The Planning Minister has a track record of disempowering communities to serve developer interests’.
‘The NSW government needs to establish a process that gives Lismore residents agency over the reconstruction process, not one that will let developers roll over the community to squeeze as much profit out of reconstruction as they can’.
‘The Lismore community has been crying out for greater transparency and control over the recovery process. Instead, the NSW Government has disempowered the community even further,’ said Ms Faehrmann.
‘The people of Lismore are anxious about how decisions are being made about the future of their city. The last thing they need is an undemocratic planning panel making decisions for them about what reconstruction is going to look like.
‘The fact that Lismore council needs to pay for the staff and facilities of the government’s sham planning panel is completely unacceptable. It’s another flagrant example of state government cost shifting which will hurt Lismore council ratepayers even more.
‘I’m calling on the government to reverse this decision and at the very least pay for the costs of this planning panel,’ she said.
Lismore needs transparency
Local councillor and Green Candidate for Lismore Adam Guise said, ‘It’s outrageous that the Liberal Planning Minister is riding roughshod over our community and sacking Lismore councillors from local planning decisions. Councillors were never consulted on this extraordinary announcement made by the Minister last year only days before Christmas.’
‘Lismore Council decided at its February meeting not to constitute a planning panel. Councillors resolved to keep our planning powers so that planning decisions are made locally with community involvement.
‘Planning decisions will now be taken away from elected councillors and given to government-appointed bureaucrats who don’t live in our communities. The government claims this is to accelerate flood recovery but here we are 12 months on and thousands of people are still homeless and displaced.
‘What this means is that councillors will be sidelined from important decisions about where and how our community rebuilds.
‘Subdivisions will be allowed to bypass the normal development process and be carried out on land where it is currently not allowed by the local environmental plan.
‘Our community wants a say in our future housing choices and imposing inappropriate developments on the community in the name of flood recovery will cause conflict.
‘What we need is a wholesale reform of the planning system which puts people and planet first, rather than the profits of developers. Our community wants a say over our future and to be included in the decisions that effect them,’ said Mr Guise.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
