Deputations and public questions to council, each opening on what council's minutes record of it.
2024-06-20
Public question
Ordinary Meeting June 2024
Andrew Mccarthy
Heard at the meeting. Council's recording has these questions from 55:28; our transcript is below.
▶ Hear it — council's recording, from 55:28
The feed timestamps the whole public question block rather than each speaker, so this starts at the top of that block.
What the minutes record
Question 1
Having regard to the following commentary made by MSQ General Manager Mr Kell Dillon, appearing in Noosa Today on 10 May 2024: We are the state marine regulator, no one else is, and we intend to regulate the Noosa River through proper zoning and planning, recognising that it is an important resource for the state, and maximising its use for all people, not limiting it. Will the Noosa Council remove all references to vessel restrictions from the draft Noosa River Catchment Management Plan and all other Council plans and documentation that exist both now and in the future?
Response from Director Strategy & Environment, Kim Rawlings
Management of the Noosa River involves a number of stakeholders working collaboratively to address complex issues that surround the environmental, cultural, commercial and recreational elements of the river. The river is a dynamic system where actions and impacts need to be considered in an interrelated manner, rather than in isolation. Examples of this include riparian vegetation impact and bank erosion caused by excessive boat wash, downstream public health issues from illegal waste discharge and altered flood regimes from increased system siltation from the upper catchment. Catchment Management requires collaboration and working together to manage interrelated issues. There are multiple agencies with varying responsibilities across the river, many of which have interrelationships with others both in terms of planning, regulation and management. Noosa Council will continue to have an advocacy, partnering and collaborative role with all key stakeholders to ensure the strategic goals of Council and the community as articulated in key strategies are considered by stakeholders and various agencies when making decisions and reviewing current activities. Council will continue to work closely with and have an advocacy role with MSQ to ensure there is safe and equitable access for all users of the river, whilst ensuring the environmental values of the river and catchment are maintained.
Question 2
Mr Sengstock, it's been almost eight months since the October 2023 Draft Noosa River Catchment Management Plan procedural motion requiring the Council to undertake full community and stakeholder consultation and report back with final and fully costed NRCMP in July 2024. We have seen no Community Consultation on the NRCMP. Does that mean the Noosa Council will ignore the October 2023 DNRCMP procedural motion in favour of Cr Stockwell's December 2023 notified motion Accelerated River Action? If so, what is the value of a Council procedural motion?
Response from Director Strategy & Environment, Kim Rawlings
Council have not ignored the motion from Council from October. The motion of October however unfortunately did not adequately take into account the impact of timing as a result of caretaker period, the election and induction of new Council, taking approximately 5-6 months collectively. As previously advised, Council staff have been working with the new Council as part of a comprehensive induction process to bring new Councillors up to speed across a large array of information and projects. The River Plan is but one of these issues amongst many our new Council is seeking to consider and determine a way forward on.
This is council's own minuted record, in council's words. Nothing is reworded: the questions, headings and bullets are laid out as the printed minutes set them. Left out are the speaker's name (it heads this page), the minutes' page-header dates, and any “meeting adjourned” line the extract caught. Where an officer answered, the answer is minuted with the question and appears above.
Transcript of the recording
What this is. Transcript of council's recording, produced by automatic speech recognition and not checked line by line against the video. Names and figures are where this kind of transcript fails first. It is our transcript, not council's record. Recording © Noosa Shire Council. Council's own recording is linked above; where the two differ, the recording governs.
55:28 Mayor Wilkie: Next question is from Mr Andrew McCarthy. Mr McCarthy is not here in person tonight. So I ask our Director of Strategy and Environment, Kim Rawlings to read his questions and provide Council's response. Thank you, Kim.
55:47 This is our Acting CEO, Mr Larry Sengstock. Thank you.
55:52 Speaker 1: This is our Acting CEO, Mr Andrew McCarthy. Having regard to the following commentary made by NSQ General Manager, Mr Kel Dillon, appearing in Noosa today on the 10th of May, 2024, where are the State marine regulator? No one else is and we intend to regulate the Noosa River through proper zoning and planning, recognising that it is an important resource for the State and maximising its use for all people, not limiting it. Will Noosa Council remove all references to vessel restoration? These are all restrictions from the draft Noosa River Management Plan and all other Council plans and documentation that exist both now and in the future. The response to Mr McCarthy. Management of the Noosa River involves a number of stakeholders working collaboratively to address complex issues that surround the environmental, cultural, commercial and recreational elements of the river. The river is a dynamic system where actions and impacts need to be considered in an interrelated manner rather than in isolation. Examples of this include riparian vegetation impact and bank erosion caused by excessive boat wash, downstream public health issues from illegal waste discharge and altered flood regimes from increased system siltation from the upper catchment.
57:14 Catchment management requires collaboration and working together to manage the situation. There are multiple agencies with varying responsibilities across the river, many of which have interrelationships with others both in terms of planning, regulation and management. Noosa Council will continue to have an advocacy, partnering and collaborative role with all key stakeholders to ensure the strategic goals of Council and the community as articulated in key strategies are considered by stakeholders in various agencies. When making decisions and reviewing current activities. Council will continue to work closely with and have an advocacy role with MSQ to ensure there is safe and equitable access for all uses of the river whilst ensuring the environmental values of the river and catchment are maintained. Thank you.
Also by Andrew Mccarthy
Others who spoke that day