Last month I wrote about West Ballina’s $75 million DA to construct some 148 residences on wetlands. These wetlands were completely inundated in last year’s horrific floods. Ballina Shire Council had subsequently lodged a submission to rezone the site as C2 Conservation, which would have effectively stopped that DA madness and maintained the unique biodiversity of our ‘paradise’.
Council have a meeting scheduled for Thursday 22 June to finalise their submission and their agenda states that some 42 local submissions were received supporting their endeavour.
So, I would like to sincerely thank this group of 42 residents for making the effort to help ‘save’ our paradise. You have done a great service not just for Ballina, but for the wonderful place that the Northern Rivers is today. Hopefully this will be enjoyed by the next generation, whether they are ‘thinkers’ like yourselves or not.
The remainder of people, whether they were flood-affected or not and didn’t lodge their support, I would place into two categories:
Firstly, those who were unaware of their opportunity to protect their paradise, and secondly those who were – but simply couldn’t be bothered.
To the former group I sympathise with you, (I personally made in excess of 400 local letter drops, which is the limit of my meagre financial and physical capacities). I would suggest to you though, to endeavour to rectify this lack of information from recurring by making contact with Council, who are very happy to alert you when a DA is lodged that may impact on your lifestyle for whatever reason. Additionally, if, like me, you are not computer literate, the lovely people at your library are only too willing to guide you through the process, for example, of ‘DA tracking’ online.
To the third group (and I hope this is just a tiny fraction) I say this: Even though you may or may not deserve to live in paradise, by your silent inaction you have inadvertently made a huge contribution to the future of our paradise.
You have clearly demonstrated to future developers that even though we went through the worst and most devastating flood in living history, as a result of, and/or exacerbation of, tampering/interfering with the unique biodiversity of our wetland ecosystem, only a mere 40 or so were upset enough to take five minutes of their time to ensure it doesn’t happen in these catastrophic proportions again.
So, I can hear ‘em saying: ‘Hey, game on! Let the best lawyers win!’
Remember guys, you can’t unscramble an egg. When paradise is lost, it’s gone forever!
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. 
