From the Far End of the Council Table - 13 December 2009
Date: 13-Dec-09
Author: Councillor James Ryan
Supermarkets all over the place.
What was supposed to be the last meeting of the year was also one of the longest - going from 6-30pm till 10-30.
The new Supermarket at Branxton was approved with only myself and fellow Greens Councillor Chris Parker voting against it. This was surprising because the Supermarket has been the focus of a big campaign by the community to save Branxton as a village. Branxton is heritage listed and if you stop in the main street and look around you can see why. Most of the beautiful old buildings are still there. And they look terrific. Branxton and Wollombi are the only areas in Cessnock that have a heritage listing.
It clear to me that the new supermarket will be a huge concrete box (as most supermarkets are these days) and will detract from the attractiveness of Branxton. It is also clear that traffic problems will occur. It is also likely that some of the smaller traditional shops in Branxton will disappear. In my view it was a poor result for Branxton - good for big business, bad for the traditional village and community spirit of Branxton.
One of the more interesting aspects of the debate was a survey done by the developers of 500 residents in Branxton. This was obviously not an independent survey, however it was claimed to show that Branxton residents supported the development. When we were shown a copy of the survey questions it was clear that residents had NOT been asked about this particular development, nor it's size, look, location or traffic problems. In other words it was not possible to use this survey to claim residents supported this Supermarket proposal. And yet the ALP Councillors did just that! Mind boggling.
In an interesting bit of drama one of the prominent members of the Labor Party in Branxton stormed out of the Council meeting when the Labor Councillors started to speak in favour of the Supermarket. I would like to be a fly on the wall at the next Branxton ALP meeting!
The new Coles supermarket which will replace Bi-Lo in Kurri was also before Council last week. Council heard from one of the adjoining residents as well as from the developer. There will be a special meeting on Tuesday 15th December at 5-45pm to vote on the proposal.
The ALP are showing signs of reverting back to their old behaviour from the past Council. There were constant moves by ALP Councillors to close down the debate at Council last week. I think it is a bad sign when one side of politics actually doesn't want to listen to everyone in the Council Chamber.
On a positive note the Council gave the Richmond Vale Preservation Co-operative Society a loan of $25,000 to assist with there operation of the historic railway and museum. The Council has made loans to the Society on two occasions in the past and both loans have been repaid. The interest rate on the loans will be lower than those commercially available.
Make sure you have your say.
Comments (1)
Posted: 13-Dec-09 12:04 by Peter Firminger Permalink
I agree that the ALP behaviour was very strange.
When debating the motion put by James Ryan (regarding alleged intimidation and harassment of E3 supporters and the need for identities to be hidden on LEP submissions), Cr. Smith guillotined the debate just as his ALP stablemate James Hawkins was about to give what was arguably the most relevant portion of the debate, given that he was the ONLY Councillor actually present at ALL the Wollombi meetings.
What he was about to say would have been totally in line with the other Labor councillors and against the Ryan motion which was lost 11/2.
The local ALP branches seem to be as confused and cannibalistic as the rest of NSW Labor.
James Hawkins seems to be the most progressive of the ALP councillors (and is certainly making a name for himself in Wollombi/Laguna by showing up to every LEP-related meeting, including the Greens meeting yesterday) and they appear to want to shut him down. They are clearly losing that battle.
Like or dislike him (and the ALP), at least he shows up - something that Councillors Main and Burcham (and Davey given that she ran in Ward A) could well emulate.
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