The community is becoming frustrated as Byron Shire councillors call repeatedly for affordable housing while they allow the old Mullumbimby Hospital site to languish with no tangible public, social, or affordable housing plan or development of the site.
Meanwhile, some councillors have repeatedly claimed that resident groups like the Mullumbimby Residents Association (MRA), are against development and affordable housing in the town, simply because they have opposed the flawed 57 Station Street carpark development by Byron Shire Council (BSC), and have questioned aspects of other proposed developments in Mullumbimby.
The community has fought for decades for public, social, aged care, and affordable housing on the large, 13-acre, flood-free site of the former Mullumbimby Hospital. When the state government closed the hospital and said they would sell the site, the community came out and protested; the Mullumbimby Hospital Action Group (MHAG) and then the Mullumbimby Hospital Project Reference Group came up with suggestions on how to proceed with development of the site. In 2022, BSC published its preliminary vision that they said incorporated ‘all of the 2018 endorsed recommendations from the Mullumbimby Hospital Project Reference Group’ on how to progress the development.
Asbestos remediation of the site was completed in 2023, and according to BSC documents, a planning proposal was lodged with the state government on 17 August 2023.
The community has supported the rezoning of the height limits of this site and the surrounding streets from 9m to 11.5m.
This is a site that has had, and continues to have, community support and social licence to be developed with medium to high-density housing. The proposals for the site have moved from 100-129 dwellings and a commercial development hub at the site to up to 300 residential dwellings.
In July 2024 a $263,000 federal grant was awarded to Byron Shire Council for a masterplan and development strategy for the former Mullumbimby Hospital site. BSC staff then recommended that the entire site be sold to a developer in November 2025, causing outrage in the community.
Many pointed out the lack of community consultation leading to this recommendation, and stressed that while the site had cost BSC close to $6m to remediate, this was significantly less than the overall value of the site. This provides a prime opportunity for the state and/or federal government to buy it back at a lower price point than any other land of this size available in the region, at a time when the NSW government’s stated policy is to address the ‘current housing shortage’. The hospital site is walking distance from Mullumbimby High School and the town centre.
At this point BSC backed away from the sale to a private developer and instead said they would seek to sell the site to the state government ‘for the delivery of public, social, affordable and Aboriginal housing’.
The third round of the federal Housing Australia Future Fund (HAFF) funding was announced on 30 January, ‘the largest funding round under the HAFF’, yet according to Mayor Sarah Ndiaye Byron Shire Council ‘has not yet made a formal determination on a HAFF Round 3 application for the Mullumbimby Hospital site’.
It is now time to take action and join MHAG, the MRA, the broader community and Greens councillors at the public forum they have called for Monday, 23 February at the Mullumbimby Ex-Services Club auditorium from 6pm to discuss the future of the site and apply pressure to local, state and federal government to get this project going.
Aslan Shand, editor
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