For Kerry Pauley and the six other remaining permanent residents at the Glen Villa Resort on Butler Street, Byron Bay, news of the luxury retirement village that has been proposed for the site at 80-86 Butler Street has been devastating.
‘When I sold my house in South Golden Beach and moved here 12 years ago this was my retirement home,’ Kerry told The Echo.
Kerry points out that she thought very clearly about where she would set herself up for her retirement and chose this site because ‘it’s flat and close to town. I knew that once I couldn’t drive I’d still be able to walk to town to get shopping and catch up with friends.’
Told ‘property was in trust’
‘I went through several interviews to be approved to buy this house and was told by Peter Croke, who originally owned this place, it has now gone to his daughter, he told me that it would never be sold. He told that to the others who bought in as well. He even told one person that the property was in trust so it couldn’t be sold.’
When permanent residents bought in they were buying the home they would be living in and leasing the land it sat on from the Glen Villa Resort.
‘I pay a lease for the land,’ explained Kerry.
‘I own the house, which I must maintain myself. They do absolutely nothing for me. I’ve got to do everything myself to the house you know, and they don’t even mow the lawn.’
Unfortunately, for the permanent residents the developer DD Resort Living is putting together a development application (DA) for this site called Oasis Byron Bay, and the site of 12 Bay Lane as an affiliated club house, for luxury retirement living with one-bedroom flats starting for lease at $2.5 million.
The rumours
When Kerry first heard the rumours that the Glen Villa cabin, caravan, and camping site was on the market Kerry said management denied it. A few months later the resort manager came to Kerry and told her that it was being sold and that the owner, Peter’s daughter Holly, had ‘a certain contingency’ to buy out permanent residents ‘but that she didn’t like lawyers and if I was you, I’d get in now’.
While several permanent residents took that advice and sold their houses Kerry rang her daughter who advised her that she should get legal advice. Which Kerry and six other permanent residents have done.
‘I was in tears for six months,’ Kerry told The Echo.
‘Peter had said this could be my forever home.’
Instead of a forever home the developer is proposing to build 200 senior living apartments on the environmentally-sensitive site which is adjacent to wetlands.
‘The developer told us that they would start selling the one-bedroom apartment leases at $2.5 million,’ said Kerry.
When the residents met with the developers the suggestion that they be provided with an apartment in exchange for their existing sites was immediately rejected.
‘They didn’t even pretend to give it consideration,’ said Kerry’s daughter Simone.
At the meeting with residents the Gold Coast-based developers tried to tell them that they would only have 60 days to vacate the site. Fortunately, the residents’ pro-bono barrister Bill Priestley was quick to inform the developers, ‘I think you may be unaware of NSW laws in relation to tenancy laws. The residents will have a minimum of 12 months, and if they wish, they can petition to NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal (NCAT) for a further six months to negotiate terms of purchase of their sites.’
Kerry and Simone have highlighted the stress and pressure these elderly residents have been under throughout the process. With Kerry saying those who have already sold have said they sold out for far too little.
‘It’s just heartbreaking to watch people be treated with what I feel is callousness and disregard,’ said Simone.
‘This has been going on over nine months now, my mum’s physical health has just diminished. She has nightmares. She thought she had set herself up for her retirement. She doesn’t have anything to fall back on and it is the way she’s been treated, that’s what upsets me the most.’
Not aged care
The developer has previously clarified with The Echo that the site does not provide an aged care facility, and both former Byron Shire Councillor Cate Coorey and the Byron Central Hospital branch of the NSW Nurses and Midwives Association (NSWNMA) have made it clear that they have ‘grave concerns’ about the development and that ‘this development will have a detrimental effect on the fabric of the Byron Bay community’ highlighting that there isn’t enough aged care facilities in the region to support a significant increase in older people in the town.
‘Almost the whole site is mapped as High Environmental Value (HEV) vegetation and it is surrounded by koala habitat,’ says Ms Coorey.
‘The Oasis development seeks to inflict an inappropriate development on one of the most environmentally constrained sites in Byron Bay – it is in a flood zone and Belongil Creek flows through it.’
The DA is due to come to Byron Shire Council in the next few months and residents and the community are asking people to take a look and make sure they put in individual submissions to highlight their concerns with the DA.
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