Author: David Harrison

PARENTS are demanding a meeting with Red Hill Consolidated School principal Leanne Marshall over the serious gastro outbreak among pupils and staff just before the Easter holidays. More than 100 pupils and six staff were affected and the school was closed a day earlier than the scheduled break. Balnarring primary school, a few kilometres from Red Hill Consolidated, has also had problems with contaminated water recently. A parent said junior students were directed to drink only from tanks supplying the grade 5-6 area. The problem was resolved only after a five-month battle with the Education Department, the parent said. Red…

GETTING jet skis banned from Port Phillip could be a long, hard grind for its current sole public advocate, Cr Hugh Fraser. His first hurdle will be to persuade a majority of his council colleagues to support him. But Cr Fraser, veteran barrister at law, can be persuasive and determined. Mornington Peninsula Shire has no policy position on jet skis, says Cr Bev Colomb, currently president of the Association of Bayside Municipalities (ABM), through which Cr Fraser must advance his case for a ban. His first task will be to convince his councillor colleagues – a number of whom could…

AN irregular-shaped block of surplus railway land at Somerville is proposed to be sold for housing. For train aficionados this would represent a much sought-after opportunity to get close to passenger and freight services. Residents could look forward to unparalleled growth in container movements, based on the Mornington Peninsula Shire’s dream to help create a massive port at Hastings, with kilometre-long freight trains running day and night. The proposal, discussed at council on 15 March, comes from VicTrack, a state-owned business enterprise run by an independent board. It plays a pivotal role supporting the state government to provide improved public…

A MORNINGTON Peninsula councillor wants municipalities around Port Phillip to ban jet skis. Nepean ward councillor Hugh Fraser will try to drum up support for a jet ski ban from the 10-member Association of Bayside Municipalities. If they agree, the state government would then be asked to implement the ban. “This [ban] has been successfully accomplished on Sydney Harbour and I simply ask the question, as to whether that is a matter of interest to the association,” Cr Fraser said. He raised the jet ski ban at the 15 March council meeting, asking Cr Bev Colomb – Mornington Peninsula Shire’s…

IT WAS a small gallery that gathered at the shire’s Rosebud bunker for the council meeting of Tuesday evening, 15 March. And a diminished roll call of councillors: Anne Shaw and Andrew Dixon had been felled by ’flu; Lynn Bowden was also an apology. It was the day after the Labor Day public holiday and the festive feeling lingered. Fred Crump of Mornington had brought his kite, in the shape of an eagle, that had soared recently at the Rosebud kite festival. And he brought a question. Shire tree planting in Mornington Park, including a banksia that had been moved…

A $15,000 fine imposed on a bush block owner for illegally clearing land could be a warning to property owners that Mornington Peninsula Shire intends to take a tougher line with law breakers. The shire has not been noted for such prosecutions since in one notable case it won a conviction but never collected the $1145 fine when the property owner challenged it. In more recent high-profile cases land owners were successfully prosecuted, one for illegal land clearing, the other for illegally dumping sand on a property. The shire hailed the cases as a victory but declined to reveal whether…

SHIRE staff have given councillors revised details of their spending on seminars and conferences during the current council term that began in late 2012, as directed at a meeting last month. The new information will not be made public until about 24 March, after councillors have met and discussed the figures. The News believes the revised information will require at least one councillor to repay a substantial sum above the $4000 a year each councillor can spend over their four-year term. The amount of the overspend is not known. Two councillors, David Gibb and Antonella Celi, were attributed with overspending…

Blairgowrie Yacht Club Monday 22 February – the year’s first community meeting. A capacity house, which got its fill of healthy food and news of progress in the shire, especially works completed and on foot in the local ward, Nepean. COUNCIL Watch has great affection for coastal council meetings. One is usually able to find a seat where, if the subject at hand becomes a drone, the waters of Port Phillip lull the senses. The evening started with a presentation on what was occurring in the ward – much of which had the nautical flavour one would expect on this…

MORNINGTON Peninsula Shire officers have been ordered to compile up to date figures on how much councillors have spent on conferences and seminars. The statistics dating back four years are to be delivered by 10 March and follow the release last month of a table which showed at least two councillors had overspent their $16,000 four-yearly allowance. It has been alleged that some figures in the table were inaccurate. However, any over-spending will have to be repaid by councillors within six months of the 10 March deadline. “The onus is on us to make sure we don’t overspend ratepayers’ money.…

SHIRE officers are examining a Supreme Court decision that effectively excluded a third of properties from a footpath special charge scheme in Jan Juc because they would not get the required special benefit from the proposed path network. The case could be relevant if the controversial Somers path scheme – which proposes charging properties up to two kilometres from the proposed $1.5 million concrete path – is taken to VCAT, as some Somers residents have threatened. VCAT’s decision-making history could mean the Somers appellants could face a huge legal bill whether they won or lost at the tribunal. They could…

RATEPAYERS on the Mornington Peninsula could be required to contribute to special charge schemes for footpaths in their area but never get one built past their house. This could occur if the Somers model – charging almost an entire community for a single footpath to be built – became a template for other areas, shire chief operating officer Alison Leighton told council’s 8 February meeting. The Somers path is two kilometres away from some properties being asked to pay. “It’s not something that I can unambiguously rule out,” Ms Leighton said in answer to a question from David Gill, a…

THE first thing the alert observer noticed at the Monday 8 February meeting of Mornington Peninsula Shire Council was the changed seating arrangements for councillors. David Gibb was not sitting beside Hugh Fraser. He had broken away from the ward-by-ward seating arrangement, leaving  Antonella Celi sitting alone at the far left end of the councillor half-circle. Cr Gibb had moved to the seat usually occupied by Red Hill Ward councillor Tim Wood, beside Cerberus ward’s representative, Cr David Garnock. Cr Wood was ensconced beside fellow lawyer Cr Fraser, in Cr Gibb’s previous seat. Since it is not like Cr Gibb…

TWO Mornington Peninsula Shire councillors have overspent their seminars and conferences allowance, one by more than 92 per cent. Figures up to the end of January included in a councillor briefing show Cr Antonella Celi has racked up $30,810 against an entitlement of $16,000, which is $14,810 (92.6 per cent) above her entitlement. Fellow Seawinds ward councillor David Gibb has spent $19,147, an overspend of  $3147 or 19.6 per cent. Chief financial officer Matt Hubbard said the extra expenses incurred by Crs Celi and Gibb had been approved by “council resolution” for them to attend “additional professional education programs governed…

A COUNCIL decision to retain Rye tip has been overturned after a searching and sometimes spiteful debate at the year’s first public meeting of Mornington Peninsula councillors. At the height of the disturbance shire governance manager Joe Spiteri advised councillors they should stop their unruly behaviour and return to order – the first such intervention by a governance officer veteran council attendees could recall. The power struggle over shire waste was sparked last September when councillors voted to close the tip and move shire household waste off the peninsula. Then in December they reversed that vote, with opponents of the…

CAN it be the coming council election? A series of malignant New Year resolutions? Whatever it was, hopes were dashed early at last Wednesday’s first Mornington Peninsula Shire meeting of the year, a hope that good behaviour, forbearance or courtesy would be prominent in 2016. The chamber was brought to order by the calm, firm and admirable governance manager Joe Spiteri, who should never need to perform such a role for a meeting of presumed grown-ups. Perhaps it is not within his remit, but it needs doing. So normal has discourtesy to the chair and contempt for the public become,…

DESPITE the recognised high risk of catastrophic bushfire at Arthurs Seat, there are no plans to build a public bushfire shelter. Residents and other people caught in the area during a major fire would have to make their own plans because numbers would be limited in the summit station of the Skyift gondola. Emergency plan documents make clear that when built the Skylift’s top station will cater only for its customers and staff. The Skylift group is not required to provide shelter for the public. The building’s capability to defend against a bushfire meets all standards, Mornington Peninsula Shire councillors…

CONCERN and annoyance are growing as details of a footpath special charge scheme in McCrae become clearer. The project is going ahead despite claims of overwhelming community opposition to it. One cause of concern and bewilderment is a discount given to some residents on the grounds that their street is used via a freeway underpass by nearby residents. That in itself is prompting questions about the rationale for the discount and why the part of the footpath cost is not being met by the residents who use the underpass route and gain a direct benefit. An amendment introducing the discount…

LAWYERS and an internal governance team helped draw up a newspaper advertisement which appears to contradict a Mornington Peninsula Council decision to close Rye tip by 30 June, 2018. The advertisement, published on 28 October, stated that the shire was “strongly considering” closing the site – certainly not an accurate reflection of the councillors’ decision. Without closing the tip and exporting its waste off the peninsula the shire will almost certainly be unable to meet its aim of being “carbon neutral”. Keeping its waste on the peninsula could also be embarrassing in the wake of the shire being named as one…

FIREFIGHTERS in the Main Ridge-Red Hill area are alarmed that the succession of fires starting under powerlines will continue through the next several months, into the drier high-risk fire period. The big fear of some is that the next fire in the sequence of the eight or so blazes in the area so far – blamed on faulty bundled cabling currently now being replaced – will occur in dense bush and not be noticed until it has become a serious menace. “I can’t sleep on these windy nights, when conditions are right to set off the fires,” one veteran said.…

A COUNCIL decision to close Rye tip appears to have been misconstrued by Mornington Peninsula Shire staff, demonstrated by the wording of a newspaper advertisement seeking expressions of interest for disposing of shire waste from mid-2018. Councillors resolved on 14 September that the controversial landfill would stop taking waste after 30 June 2018. The advertisement, published on 28 October, stated that the shire was “strongly considering” closing the site. The News has sought clarification from shire officers but has yet to receive a response. To compound the confusion, councillors overturned the September decision at their last meeting for the year…

ANALYSIS THE state government’s recent move to tighten rules to control councillors and council staff raises some interesting issues, the basic one being: how much control should one level of government have over another? And secondly, how much control should council bureaucrats have over councillors? If, for example, federal politicians enacted a law giving them the power to stand down or suspend state MPs, how would the “inferior” state legislature react? Yet the Andrews government, through Local Government Minister Natalie Hutchins, intends to do precisely this with new laws to “strengthen local governance and reduce councillor misconduct”. The legislation received…

COMMENT UNITED Energy recently letterboxed areas of the Mornington Peninsula with a letter informing householders of the diligent work it is doing in supplying safe and reliable power. Some readers were less than impressed. Overnight a power cut had set every electronic clock in the district flashing. Again. Also flashing, at the top of White Hill Rd and at the Red Hill village end of Arthurs Seat Rd, were the large signs advising that power line work was continuing “July to December”. The month had recently been revised from “November”. Will it become “January” in a week or two? About…

FLINDERS and Red Hill residents concerned by predictions of an intense fire danger season are meeting Mornington Peninsula Shire officers to discuss ways of making their communities safer. A blocked escape route is causing a double problem for residents of William and Bourke roads in Red Hill – residents cannot get out and fire vehicles cannot get into the area other than from Arthurs Seat Rd. It is believed the CFA is reluctant to enter parts of the area because of access problems. Twenty local residents met last month to discuss the blocked track that would enable them to reach…

ANOTHER Sorrento development proposal in the historic commercial precinct of the town has effectively been rejected by way of last-minute councillor changes. It is almost certain to go to VCAT, where the planning tribunal recently overturned an earlier refusal by Mornington Peninsula Shire in the heritage Ocean Beach Rd. Council is considering taking that tribunal decision on appeal to the Supreme Court. Such appeals can only be made on points of law. Nepean ward councillor Hugh Fraser and Red Hill ward councillor Tim Wood are both experienced lawyers. In the current application, council planners recommended approval of the mixed use…

FRUSTRATION boiled over into bitterness and rowdiness at the 23 November Mornington Peninsula Shire Council meeting, with two councillors exiting the chamber before business was concluded. Tension had been building over a series of meetings as a group of the more conservative councillors led by Antonella Celi and Anne Shaw were outvoted on topics generally dealing with development and planning. On 23 November, with Cr Graham Pittock in charge of the first meeting in his mayoral year, the unruly behaviour began when Cr Antonella Celi tried to head off a move to change the name West Rosebud to Capel Sound.…

THE mayor and deputy mayor swapped roles in the election for new leadership at Mornington Peninsula Shire last week, ensuring continuity until elections on 22 October next year. Cr Bev Colomb handed the gold mayoral chain to her deputy, Cr Graham Pittock, who received eight votes to defeat the other candidate, Cr Andrew Dixon. Cr Colomb was then voted in as deputy to Cr Pittock for the next 11 months. Cr Pittock presented Cr Dixon with a bottle of wine given to him for his achievement in winning the mayoralty, to mark Cr Dixon’s contesting the position. Cr Dixon, a…

MORNINGTON Peninsula farmers are gearing up to oppose any cut to the farm rate “discount” for agricultural land. They now pay 35 per cent of the general residential rate. A message originating from Dromana farmer Cr David Gibb appears to have begun the rural mobilisation. It was prompted by Mornington Peninsula Shire’s planned review of its rating structure. Cr Gibb emailed on 4 November: “The Farm rate for rural properties, many of whom are Landcare members, is under threat.” The message went to the Dunns Creek Landcare Group, with which Cr Gibb is associated, which sent it to its membership…

COUNCILS looking to get around the state government’s rate cap plan are believed to feel they have found an answer – special charge schemes, which are specifically excluded from the rate cap rules. Large city law firms who specialise in local government are advising councils, which hotly oppose the plan to end the pattern of big rate rises, on how to deal with the cap. Councils use special charge schemes to require landowners to pay part of the cost of such works as footpaths, bicycle paths, street kerbing and channelling, drainage, roadworks and off-street parking. Of these works, the Local…

THE seemingly long wait over, it was all eager anticipation on 14 October at the first Mornington Peninsula Shire Council meeting in almost a month – at least for the eager ratepayers who filed into the gallery to observe democracy at work. There were … oh, let’s see … at least three or four of us. Councillors were not exactly tripping the light fantastic as they took their places. Their feet seemed leaden. CW sensed a frisson, always likely to produce some reportable highlights. They came, but CW was slightly repulsed by several of them. A significant sight for the…

THE Melbourne Press Club last week commemorated the death of Graham Perkin, one of Australia’s great journalists, 40 years ago. He was vitally alive in that room for the many who worked with him, and for those honouring the legend he has become, an enduring and inextinguishable presence in the annals of Melbourne. Ranald Macdonald, a former managing director of David Syme and Company who now lives at Flinders, appointed Graham Perkin editor and with him revived The Age, making it a newspaper of world renown. He spoke at the commemoration dinner. This is an edited text of his address:…