Ad in Wentworth Courier

Welcome to those of you first coming to our site today after learning about it through the Wentworth Courier.  Since we placed the ad a few things have happened:   The ALP Bondi branch approved a motion strongly condemning the Hugh Bamford sub-depot proposal. And the Mayor Sally Betts has released a statement committing to withdraw the proposal.  We had also announced a rally this weekend, which we will be sending cancellation notices for shortly.

However, SHOULD ANYTHING CHANGE in the short or long term, we will need your support to protect Hugh Bamford Reserve from development again.  So please email us at hbprotection@gmail.com to join our database and, even easier, join us on Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/hughbamford

If you do still want to send your concerns to Waverley Council, please do so and CC us at hbprotection@gmail.com so we can register your concerns too and ensure they are counted.

Depot Proposal to be withdrawn.

The ALP’s Bondi branch approved a motion yesterday strongly condemning the Hugh Bamford sub-depot proposal. And the Mayor Sally Betts has released the following statement committing to withdraw the proposal.

Mayoral announcement on the proposal of the underground sub depot at Hugh Bamford Reserve:

With the support of my Liberal colleagues and Independent Councillor Miriam Guttman-Jones, I intend to use my casting vote to approve a Mayoral Minute at the next Tuesday’s Extraordinary Council Meeting – 9 February – to withdraw the proposal to build a sub depot under Hugh Bamford Reserve. I made this decision some time ago, however, as Mayor its my role to be the figurehead and spokesperson for Waverley Council.

My comments to date were aimed at dispelling inaccuracies and misconceptions – not a reflection of my personal opinion. I was originally reticent about announcing this decision before the public exhibition period closed on Friday 19 February. However, the depth of community angst and concern has become increasingly clear. It would be irresponsible to not publicise my decision about this proposal as I believe the community deserves to know now, rather than later.

Congratulations to the Hugh Bamford Reserve Protection Group for such a professional and well coordinated campaign, it’s the best I’ve seen in my 12 years as a Councillor, and its a sign of true democracy at work.

Rates to rise 11% per year: doubling within 7 years.

We have now discovered the council is going to increase our rates by 11% every year for 7 years to partly pay for the mining of the sandstone cliffs at North Bondi and other expenses involved in building this outrageous council truck depot.   You may like to read the media release and coverage in the Telegraph.

The lengthy council document, their Long Term Financial Strategy, that details these increases and lists this Hugh Bamford Reserve project as one of the major expenses is available here.

Celebrating the wins

Thanks to your support we have achieved some great successes:

1.  The deadline for public comments (originally timed to quietly slip through during the holiday season) got pushed back to Feb 19th.

2.  The Greens have made an official statement opposing this “irresponsible development”.

3.  The mayor, although still fighting for the depot, was forced into fire-fighting mode and has released several statements, all riddled with factual errors minimising the development, making her stance look very suspect.  Her participation in the Facebook group has also clearly demonstrated unwillingness to answer various questions from the community, despite their repetition.

4.  Lots of media coverage – Sydney Morning Herald (this issue featured as the TOP story online, with a large picture at the top of the homepage), Telegraph, Aquabumps, ABC News, Wentworth Courier, Bondi View, Bondi FM  and Streetcorner amongst others.

Notification in the Nth hour is not consultation

The deadline has been extended to Feb 19th, announced with much waffle about community consultation.

But make no mistake, the Council would have rammed it through with a vote after the Jan 15 deadline, if we hadn’t started banging the drum. It was very deliberately under the radar. Look at their December newsletter – not a word about it, even in the building works section. They had been working on this for about 2 or 3 years and they’ve spent 10s of thousands of dollars on the plans, and they didn’t breath a word to the residents until the very end of last year. They talk a lot about community consultation, but the lack of it in these past years is breathtaking.

Their ‘have a say day’, so poorly notified that only about 40 people had heard of it, had the tone of “this is what we are doing and it’s great, want to make any minor tweaks to it?” They weren’t open to the idea of not doing it. Notifying the community in the Nth hour is not consultation. It is a miracle that we have managed to apply the brakes a little on this development juggernaut.

This deadline extension is a victory due to you.

THANK YOU TO YOU – YOU FANTASTIC COMMUNITY!

The Gift

I’ve been thinking about poor Louise Bamford devastated and trying to protect the gift of her generous grandfather.  She would be a multi-multi-millionaire now, or living in the most exquisite place in Bondi if he had left that land to her, but she lives in a humble dwelling on Beach Road, because he was a devoted President of Bondi Public School and he left that beautiful parkland on a hill covered in lush vegetation, home to birds and animals, so that the children of Waverley could have a place to play.

And now the council want to blow it up, excavate it, destroy the bushland and fill it with a honking great truck depot.  Then they think that throwing a bit of turf on the roof means they can say “there’s your park boys”.  What an abuse of a beautiful gift.

Welcome

Welcome to the Hugh Bamford Protection Group.

We are campaigning to stop the $20 million, 5,000 sqm industrial-zone depot development being scheduled on protected land, by Waverley Council.

Council plan to locate the Depot in Hugh Bamford Reserve on the Bondi Coastline, a site of heritage-listed features both military and aboriginal.  It is currently in a quiet, residential area, that the Council intends to rezone the area to enable the industrial development to go ahead.  Take a look at some of our research about all the impacts on Bondi and further details of the issues.

Please take a look at what you can do to help stop this.   There are many easy things you can do.