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00:00:00 Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Good morning and welcome to the May 2022 planning environment meeting. I hope that all are in attendance and there are no apologies and that Councillor Lorentson is sitting here as an observer. We wish to start as we normally do to pay our respects to the traditional owners of this land, the Kabi Kabi people, and to pay our respects to their elders, past, present and those that are emerging and making a difference in this world. Okay, so I move on to item two, which is the confirmation of minutes. Would someone like to move those? Move Councillor Stewart, Councillor Finzel. I'm assuming there's no discussion. All in favour? That's unanimous. There's no presentations, no deputations. So we move on to reports of consideration of the committee. And the first one is proposed lease tenancy for Grinian Digital Hub. And our manager of the Digital Hub, Director, and Jennifer, can you give us a brief outline of the report, please?
00:01:00 Speaker 2: Thanks, Councillor Stockwell. The report is to award a lease to a new tenant in one of the... three office spaces that we have upstairs. We have three private office spaces, one of which has, up until now, been a larger space of around 100 square metres, where our previous anchor tenant, who'd been with us for three years through COVID, had ended their three... elected not to extend their three-year lease. And through a market process, we decided to create two tenancies rather than one, because we found there just wasn't sufficient demand for a space of that size. So what that's going to allow us to do is to have three tenants upstairs. We already have half of that office occupied by a tenant that we approved at the October meeting,
00:02:00 and we've been undergoing a market process since then to find the third tenant, which we've now done. This particular tenant is a high-growth software company whose founder moved up from Victoria a few months ago. And we're excited about their potential to grow and create high-value jobs in this ecosystem. There were multiple applicants, and it was a... As you know, I have an evaluation process to decide which potential tenants have the best fit with the digital hub, in terms of the... industry, profile, and potential contributions to the local economy. And by a small margin, this particular tenant was...
00:03:00 our prospective tenant was identified as the optimal fit. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Thank you. Do we have any further questions? Would someone like to move the recommendation? Moved. Council Fitts. Council Fitts. Do you want to talk about it? Mayor Stewart: No, thank you. Well done, Chris. I'm... I was... when I was reading about these... about CoLab, I hadn't heard of them before, but geez, they're an impressive company, and have moved very quickly in the space in such a short amount of time. So, I think they're a great addition. I think they'll be a perfect match for all of the digital hub, and what it aspires to do, which is be a leader in that innovation and technology. So, congratulations on securing such a great tenant. Speaker 2: Thanks, Mayor. I think it's a... you know, I would hope that we get more of this sort of thing going on where people moved to this area, but then they bring with them early-stage businesses that they can then grow and then create more jobs here in the region. Because as much as we have the ability to work remotely, a lot of these early-stage companies benefit from having people co-located in the same place.
00:04:00 So, there's a real opportunity to create some jobs here. Mayor Stewart: Yeah, absolutely. Councillor Wegener: And at the digital hub, is there extra-fast internet there? Do you have better than the rest of the place, which may attract people, like businesses like this? Speaker 2: We do have a gigabit connection, which is, you know, it was a pretty significant investment at the start when we established the digital hub. Because we recognize that to do a lot of the sort of high-tech work that goes on there really does need, you know, high-quality internet connection. So, yes, we do have that. Can you run one out to my house? Councillor Wegener: I'm going to hopefully to be true. Speaker 2: I can send you the link to the styling website, so you can get a satellite on your home. Yeah, fantastic. We've actually got a spare tenant, so you could. Councillor Finzel: Thank you. Can I just make a comment? Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Oh, sorry, you can cancel first.
00:05:00 Councillor Finzel: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, firstly, I'd like to say thank you, Chris. It's a wonderful place. It's a wonderful day that we can come here and see this move forward. And I'd like to take the opportunity to thank all the staff, too, and the hard work that they've done in the space around especially our economic development plan for Noosa Shire. And it's exciting to have the opportunity to diversify and have innovation. It's what we're trying to attract in our Shire and across the region, and especially the addition of high-value jobs and potential of employment. So thank you to everyone for the great work in the space. Thank you, Councillor. You're welcome. Councillor Lorentson: Just a question, Chris. In regards to the other applications, and you referenced they were high-quality applications. Have we given them an opportunity to connect with other enterprise precincts? We don't want these businesses to leave our Shire. Have we connected them with, for instance, the enterprise precinct where Tom is serving?
00:06:00 I think it's a fantastic suggestion, and we certainly will do that. Speaker 2: I suppose we were waiting to conclude this process, and then we'd have to notify them formally. And as part of that, we can client manage them and make sure that they get the support they need in other areas. And there's two bits to this. There's where's your physical location, of which we have a very limited amount of real estate. But then there's all the other support that we can provide, that we provide to hundreds of folks that are not based at the Digital Hub through events and activities and industry support. So we'll certainly be continuing to work with them on that. Councillor Lorentson: Fantastic. Thank you. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Ed, I suppose the key thing here is we're very different in the original Digital Hub from most commercial landlords. We don't want our tenants to be in the tenancy for long. We want them to grow.
00:07:00 And we have to keep on pushing. And this is what this is. I think you mentioned that this space was previously viable, and it's been a success. And some of their work is what drove us to do the Biotech Lab, and they're part of that. So to me, this is really important. And as you say, the model of the Digital Hub wasn't just about building and growing high-value jobs and building talent within our community. It was about attracting the start-ups from elsewhere. And this one shows that, you know, it's a shoot-off of a successful tech company that still will have the majority of its workforce working from home. And I think it's probably going to feel solid good, and they'll be happy that their boss is here. That's all from me. Would you like to close? Mayor Stewart: No need to close. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Thank you. All in favour? Thank you. Thank you, Bruce. Speaker 2: Thank you very much. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Thank you. Thanks. The next one is Economic Development Grant Program application by Newsom Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
00:08:00 Now, this has been referred to the General Meeting, and I'll then refer to the CEO if he can give an explanation of what might be a good process to follow from here. Speaker 5: Chair, thank you very much, and I'd like to thank the staff for the report and the recommendation that we have for this particular piece of work that's been undertaken. It's extremely comprehensive. We will get some additional advice in relation to a potential conflict of interest that a councillor may have. We'll seek further review of that, including this meeting. We'll be referring that to the next General Committee meeting. So it won't be decided upon today at this particular committee meeting. It will go directly to General, and all of Council will be able to review, and we will just get some additional advice over a COI that comes to light very early this morning. Thank you. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: I'll move the motion that the matter be referred to the General Committee for further information. Seconded by Councillor Stewart, all those in favour? Councillor Wegener: Thank you.
00:09:00 Deputy Mayor Stockwell: We move on to Item 3. Thank you. You're dead. I hope you can get a better look at that. Applications for a mine exchange for development approvals for Shire Business Council. This is the Shire Business Centre at 28 Diggie Creek Road, Noosaville. Patrick, would you like to give an outline on this one, please? Speaker 3: Certainly. This relates to a tenancy within the commercial precinct within the Shire Business Centre. The applicants seek to use that for the purpose of a fast food outlet, which would be consistent with the retail centre component of the Shire Business Centre. And they're seeking to do that by amending the approved plans and a condition of the approval to incorporate that tenancy within the retail precinct. We're supportive of the use of the tenancy for the purpose of a fast food outlet. However, we consider that it's more appropriate to amend condition 5.4 of the approval to facilitate that.
00:10:00 And by doing that, we ensure that the space can continue to be used for the purposes that it was originally approved for, such as commercial offices and the like. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Great. Speaker 5: Do we have any questions of Patrick? Mayor Stewart: I do. I know, Patrick, it's quite a very small point floor. I read an increase, 0.4% increase about the small amount of GFA proposed. It's great, isn't it? Speaker 3: So there's no additional floor space that's being proposed. So what it represents, I think it's 1.64% of the approved 5,000 square metres of commercial and business GFA. Mayor Stewart: So on page 37, sorry. The minor change does not impact on the function. This is the applicant maintains. And they've said the small amount of GFA proposed represents just 0.4% increase. Speaker 3: Yeah, so it's, as I said, there's no additional floor space being proposed.
00:11:00 But they've just done it as a percentage of what they're seeing as being the business precinct. Councillor Finzel: Okay, thank you. And just to clarify, Patrick, does that mean there's no change to the business precinct as it sits? The allowable uses? Speaker 3: So what you'll see, the recommendation for condition 5.4 seeks that there be an additional condition 5.4 that 82 square metres of that tenancy may be used for fast food premises. So what it's saying, there's no physical change on the ground. It's just the use of that premise within the business precinct for a fast food premise. Councillor Finzel: Yeah, okay. Thanks, Patrick. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Would anyone like to move the motion? Do councillors? No, you're not. You're a webinar. I'll take it. Do you like to talk to motion? No. Is anyone like to talk to motion?
00:12:00 No. All in favour? That's unanimous. Thank you, Patrick. Next one. That's right. We'll see you at the next item. So the next one is planning application decided by delegated authority. It would be noted that Councillor Lorentson is leaving the room and there are some other conflicts to address. Mayor Stewart: Thank you, Mr Chair. I, Councillor Stewart, inform the meeting that I have a declarable conflict of interest in this matter in relation to the application of Altam Properties Group listed at item 28 in this report and Altam Properties number 9. Priority Limited, TTE, which is listed as item 32 in this report. I have a friendship with Lee and Rob McCready, who are associated with the applicant. As a result of my conflict of interest, I'll now leave the meeting room and that is considered and voted on. Thank you, Mr Chair. Councillor Finzel: There is some wording in that that I want to change. Rather than involved, I'd like that to read as a volunteer, involved as a volunteer.
00:13:00 Can you read that and I'll take that? Yep, sure. I, Councillor Finzel, inform the meeting that I have a declarable conflict of interest in this matter in relation to the application by Altam Properties Group listed as item 28 in this report and Altam Properties number 9, PLTTE, which is listed as item 32 in this report. I have known Lee McCready, who was associated as a volunteer in my 2020 election campaign. Under future Noosa, which is no longer an entity. As a result of my conflict of interest, I will now leave the meeting room while the matter is considered and voted on. Councillor Lorentson: Can you just say the words again? I've known Lee McCready, who was associated as a volunteer. Councillor Finzel: Yep. Councillor Lorentson: What was after that? Councillor Finzel: Volunteer capacity. Involved. Who was involved in the 2020 election campaign with future Noosa, which is no longer an entity.
00:14:00 Deputy Mayor Stockwell: That's correct. I will now leave the room. Councillor Finzel: Thank you. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Yes I have a conflict of interest, it's one that I've read out many times before and if Councillor Wegener is happy we can take it as read on the screen and I wish, this is why I believe I can deal with the matter, I do not believe a reasonable person could have a perception of bias because councillors
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00:15:00 consideration is not approved or rejected, it's only for noting the decision that was already made by staff therefore I will choose to remain in the meeting room however I respect the decision from the Wiggins on whether I can remain in the state in the decision. Anyone else, Chair? Thank you Chair. Speaker 5: Councillor Wegener. Your views. Councillor Wegener: Okay well I will move that Councillor Stockwell stays in the room and that council note that declarable conflict of interest by Councillor Stockwell and determine that it is in the public interest that Councillor Stockwell participates in both on this matter because council believes that a reasonable person could not have a perception of bias because the ICEO review was advisory in service, not a statutory process and it's not a statutory process. Councillor Stockwell's queries at that time were in the public interest and neither her nor Ms. McCready stood to personally gain or allude from that advice and therefore a reasonable person would trust that the final decision is made in the public interest.
00:16:00 So carry. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Carry. Yes. I'm just checking whether it cancels or not. It's eight. I think you probably heard it. No, I did not. I did not do that. I was kidding. I was a little bit tongue-tied though. Okay. So do you wish to clarify or clearly any of the items on the delegated approval list? Yes. Councillor Wegener: 37 and 38. And the reconfiguration of lots of one into two. And the reconfiguration of lots of one into two.
00:17:00 And you see that? Little Creek Road to Thuribas. So we, did you see that Patrick? So we know that there's big lots out there and that, you know, you have every opportunity to, if you go to the certain rules, can you give me an overview of the rules that work? Because if it's a rural, it's a rural area. If it's a rural, it can't be under a hundred hectares. Speaker 3: That's correct. I'm not familiar with the exact site here. If it's a rural lot and it's a hundred hectares, there's a way to undertake a reconfiguration if there's a road between the parcel. So it's one, essentially one title, but it is, it sort of looks for all intents and purposes like two land parcels. There's a road that dissects it. So there's a provision within the state planning policy that allows for that to occur.
00:18:00 But if it's rural residential, the minimum lot size is 1.5 hectares. And so obviously you'd need a minimum of three hectares to proceed. And there are a number of lots within the rural residential area that would be of that side, if not more. And we do have a number of reconfigurations that go through that land zoning. The pertinent issues that arise. are generally around biodiversity and riparian buffer and the like. As you might be aware, some other applications that have come before council where boundaries might be proposed through sensitive areas, ecologically sensitive areas, and that would be a precursor to a refusal. In this instance, with it being approved, I dare say that all those matters have been adequately addressed. If I can add. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Go ahead. This is the street directly opposite the sub reconfiguration application that was with the council. And it's probably not a very strong enough to go into the meeting round last month. So from memory, it is rural residential.
00:19:00 It's in within the rural living designation of South East Queensland regional plan. It'll be interesting to see how we dealt with the flood in Cezanne as well. Speaker 3: Those matters were certainly addressed. Because the whole road is up in the flood. That's right. Councillor Wegener: And then as we spoke over the last one, we were talking about the sewage and the – they're not connected to town water obviously. So they're on tanks and they have a septic and all that. And that would come into the reconfiguration as well. Speaker 3: That's correct. Where there's no connection to reticulated sewage, the scheme calls for essentially a building envelope of satisfactory area. It's 2,000 square meters. It's for both building footprint and for the services to be provided. Yeah. Yeah. Councillor Wegener: And then also you consider that as the population grows out there, you need buses, you need services and all those other things that as – so that's why I'm always very looking
00:20:00 at that and trying to understand how you can have rural residential and all of a sudden be chopped up into smaller blocks and smaller blocks. And so that – I'm just noting – just talking to myself basically and wasting all your time. I'll give you . Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Councillor, while we're getting a few of this, is in the Noosa Plan 2020, we looked at the previous subdivision rules in the previous plan and identified that across the rural residential zone there was a mix of minimum lot sizes and so what we did was make it consistent across the whole Shire. And as long as they're in the South East Queensland Regional Plan, I think it's called Rural Living Footprint. That's right. I guess the next one out from the urban footprint. Mm-hmm. So there's a lot of subdivision. And so there's some of these blocks that wouldn't have been able to be subdivided under the last scheme that are – so that's what we're seeing. Why there's a few more now. Yeah. Is that they – that we've just reduced the size of the lot you need. Speaker 3: So under the previous scheme was two hectare minimum lot size.
00:21:00 Under the new scheme it's 1.5 hectares. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Thank you. And did you have another clearing on another application, 38? Councillor Wegener: Oh, those are – both of them were the same. One lot and a few lots. Yeah. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: One's an industrial area. Councillor Wegener: Is it? Really? Yes, it is. Yeah. Do you want to ask about that one? Deputy Mayor Stockwell: No. No. All good? Yeah. All good. Okay. Okay. I'll move the staff recommendation. I'll second it. And all in favour? Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.
00:22:00 Speaker 4: Aye. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: He did request it, but I think that we have a few questions, we might have a bit of a general discussion, but this item has been just referred to, but I think it's worthwhile in this case, just that we have a few things that I might suggest in changes. So if you'd like to give us an outline of the report. Speaker 1: So this is a specific recommendation of the Noosa Environment Strategy in 2019, which is to ensure populations of key threatened indicated species remain viable. So it's just really progressing that strategy to a more specific thing in terms of developing a roadmap, moving forward from identifying basically the key iconic species,
00:23:00 which has also been the subject of a previous Council deliberation called the Noosa 9, which some of you may recall. So it's looking at obviously threatened species, also their iconic status like koala, and also representing in terms of some threatened ecosystems as well but in fact, their central habitat. So it's moving to the roadmap, it looks at developing threatened species recovery plans, so it's probably what's really more important, is driving some organisational change, such as in areas of our operational activities and also our development assessment activities, so that we're really starting to take part of threatened species management work. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: People have questions? I'll have one for you. It's one that has probably come out, but we consult. On section 4.4 of the draft that we've got in the report, you list the nine across key habitat areas, which is that I think Dave was saying, this species, that habitat.
00:24:00 I noticed that in freshwater waterways, wetlands and riparian land, you chose a species that only covers the merivacation. Speaker 1: Giant bowfrog? No, no, merivacation. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: You do list up above about oxalium, pygmy perch and honey blue olives, which are in the Wollum streams. Now I'm not sure why they rule that, but I'd like to just have a bit of thought before Monday about whether they're there, because I know that enthusiasts have found them in the Wollum streams here, and I know that they're sensitive to management changes, if the Wollum streams, for example, get too much lime on the football field next door, might lose habitat and that sort of thing, because they're reduced out of the city. So that's my request, just to have a think about it, whether that's something, or you would have scored it,
00:25:00 so why it didn't get, why they didn't get. But I just think noosa catchment, Wollum streams are probably an important habitat to keep an eye on. Absolutely. Councillor Finzel: Yeah, well I did have a similar question then regarding, yeah, how do you ascertain what goes on that, the endangered list, and what's the process around that, and I was thinking more along the line of like when we've got urban development, coming into areas around Cooroora Creek and things like that, and what's the process moving forward of how we identify and include species in that, especially around frog species and things like that. I noticed you've only listed two frog species. Speaker 1: Well, the report talks about a number of criteria they use, like their conservation status under the Nature Conservation Act or the EPBC, some sort of indication of what their population is actually doing, and that's probably the difficulty. We haven't got some really very good monitoring information, but generally also working with community groups like Mary River Catchment Coordinated Committee, who have been doing frog surveys for a long time, probably have a very good indication of what those population trends are doing.
00:26:00 And another indicator is like the actual essential habitat. The habitat they live in, whether it's riparian vegetation that's actually a threatened area. So, yeah, I think there's about 10 or 12 criteria. But also bear in mind that this is just a draft, and we're going out to extensive community consultation with all those things as well to come up with a final list. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: On that, so the giant bass frog is one that's in that Cooroora Creek catchment, and it's listed there for rainforest and scrub. Interestingly, the other one that's on the list here that was heard calling throughout the Pomona area during the recent floods was a pass frog. Speaker 1: Correct, yeah. Councillor Finzel: I think that's the issue, though, that the community groups can't collect the data, essential data, probably fast enough. How do we fund those groups? Speaker 1: Well, we do actually fund them to some of our environment living community groups, like MRCCC get funding to run the Find Frog in February sort of program. This has been going for a number of years, and that actually gives some idea of what populations are doing for threatened species.
00:27:00 Mayor Stewart: I've got a question. Just on page 82, the priority recommendations. Oh, sorry, just about the funding contribution. Does that money come out of the environmental levy? Speaker 1: Correct, it'll be project funding out of the levy. Mayor Stewart: Yeah, okay, thank you. You're welcome. Thank you. Councillor Wegener: You know, Deb, you're a man of action. And when I read this, it looks like a lot of words. I'm trying to get the translation of the words into the action. Speaker 1: And that's the thing that we're concerned about. There's just not going to be another plan sitting on a shelf languishing and going nowhere. So it's really, as I said before, it's really important that these threatened species plans, we can actually drive them to the organization. So really start to work with our operational guys in the field and also with development assessments. So we're actually driving some change. And that's not going to be easy, but if we've got a dedicated office of doing that sort of work,
00:28:00 you can actually start forming those working relationships with people. Councillor Wegener: Great. Great. And I see that there's a lot of community consultation. Correct, yeah. And I'll be looking forward to that. Because, you know, the country news and so forth. Definitely. I'm looking forward to see how that, how it plays out. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 5: Exactly. Councillor Wegener: Alliterative. Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah. Thank you. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: So, Kim Blum, did you have a question? Councillor Lorentson: Oh, I think Tom might have just answered it. Just in regards to external consultation, community groups were invited to give feedback. But I've understood in case we missed any, forget the community groups, but we've actually got some very knowledgeable colleges that are amongst us in the Shire, there is an opportunity for them to provide some information. Speaker 1: Yeah, and one of the background reports is actually commissioned by Racial Alliance and had a few expert people in that today actually informed this document. So, we're definitely going forward with the consulting. Councillor Finzel: Excellent. Thank you. Just a question.
00:29:00 When can we anticipate the consultation programs will start? Speaker 1: Well, pretty much as soon as we get endorsement from this. As soon as it's okay to draft. The project officer will start the consultation process. Fantastic. Councillor Finzel: So, we'll have a lot of people out there to get engaged. Speaker 1: Absolutely, yeah. Councillor Finzel: Yeah. Thank you. Speaker 1: Cool. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Now, there's a listed species that is very iconic, but it's not, sorry, an unlisted species that's very iconic, but has recently evidence showing that there's a steep decline in that . Was that considered despite it not being currently under the list of the Nature Conservation Act or the EGBC? Speaker 1: No, it wasn't. But if you feel it should, we can certainly add that to the list for consideration. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: You can look at the approaches from other councils more recently, and it appears that the science is emerging that there is like a number of species, and it is a good one in terms of... Indicator species. It's the water equivalent of the quail. Yeah, correct. Speaker 1: Indicator species. No worries.
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00:30:00 Councillor Wegener: And Councillor Wieman? I was just going to say, page 66, there's a table there, and it talks about the different funding for projects, for the things. And I guess I always have to bring up the Noosa Biosphere Reserve Foundation that's just put $50,000 into the koala and an enormous amount of work into the Glossy Black Cockatoo with the sound engine to find the sound. Sound records, yeah. And so that's funded partially through council, and there's a chart there that looks like it's missing, but... Yeah. You know, make sure that... Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So it's kind of like citizen science, so that's really valuable that we tap into all those sources of information. Yeah. To get some idea of what populations are doing. Councillor Wegener: That's it. There's so much... There's so many... That's the thing, and this is what you're best at, is pulling all this information from all the different groups, because they're all doing stuff. Speaker 1: Exactly. And it just needs that resource to be able to do that. You know? Yeah. Yeah. It's quite time consuming. I can imagine. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Yeah. Someone wants to move the recommendation? I'm happy to move that. Canceled. Councillor Lorentson: Seconded. Canceled. Sorry, Brian.
00:31:00 Oh, that's right. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Oh. We're lucky. Speaker 1: We got it. On the ball start. Yeah. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Good job, CEO. It's been very good. Yeah. The matter being referred... And what Council week it was actually moved? Or was it the matter being referred before the significance of the matter? I'm happy to second that. I'm happy to second that. That's what you were saying. Happy to second that? All in favour? We move on to the next item, and it is another inspiring agenda, and it's about, you're going to be the spokesman, how we manage to get the project up to date. Speaker 1: Guys, does everyone know Vanessa Moscato? Councillor Finzel: Yes, I'm Vanessa. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: So is Vanessa going to give us the overview of her report? Yes. All right.
00:32:00 Speaker 6: Really? Speaker 1: Do you want me to do it? Speaker 6: So the, I'm just reporting on the progress to date, and yes, we've achieved 30% of the Shire so far, about 170 of the one kilometre grids, and unfortunately the map doesn't take into account the topography, but we do a little bit more walking and driving and that. Speaker 1: Do you guys know the background to this? Do you want to do it? Yeah, we've had a previous report. Yeah, you're good? Yeah. Okay. Speaker 6: So we've made significant changes to some ecosystems, maybe 60% of the 68, we started off with 65 ecosystems, we now have 68, because there's two... Newly sort of described ones, and then one that we've split, 12, 9, 10, 17, was split into A, B, C, D.
00:33:00 So we've increased the number of ecosystems, and of those 68, probably about 20 or so had less than 5% change, and the other 40 ecosystems had between 5% and 600% change. So it may not look like we've done a lot in terms of the area of the Shire, but there's been a lot more changes than we anticipated. And a lot of those changes were because of the geology and the soil mapping. Initially, we decided to not go there with geological discrepancies, to just pick the best ecosystem that would fit the geology, but that was creating inconsistencies. Initially, we decided not to look at national parks, conservation reserves, low priority for development, but that also created inconsistencies in terms of discontinuous alluvial corridors. So we, the initial brief, it's turned into a lot more than the initial brief, I guess.
00:34:00 But I felt like it was more important to get a smaller amount done accurately than to get a larger amount done, and continue on with the discrepancies that we've had forever. So yeah, I've just, I've brought it back to a more achievable goal, but it's not the goal that we set out to have. Yeah. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Council, it was very interesting in your discontinuous alluvial corridors. Very impressed. Speaker 1: Very impressed. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: What we're talking about there is pop-flat plains on creeks where it would have previously not been picked up by the... Speaker 6: Yeah, so Waroi State Forest, north and south of Cooroy, Noosa Road, Tewantin State Forest and Ringtown Forest is where I've spent a lot of time, and found, you know, mature branders and rainforest, pockets of rainforest and wet sclerophyll. And so that's all been dissected now, you'll, you'll, what used to be a heterogeneous polygon of eucalypt forest,
00:35:00 12-5-3, 12-5-6, has now got 12-3-1, 12-3-2, 12-3-5, 12-3-4, through the eucalypt forest. Mayor Stewart: Can you break that down for the, sorry, the... Deputy Mayor Stockwell: If we can use the strippers rather than the ringleaders, isn't that right? Yeah, just in layman's terms. Speaker 6: It just would have been a mixed eucalypt forest with different dominant canopy species, different species of eucalypts, and now we have the, where the water runs through the landscape, we've cut those, those corridors through the eucalypt forest, so we have moist rain, more, we have a 30% increase in gallery rainforest. It's not that we've increased the amount of rainforest, but we've increased its representation on a map from about 400 to 500. In the third that I've done, if I continued for the whole Shire, we could potentially increase it by 50%. That's an endangered ecosystem, just from, because the rainforests are confined to the alluvial corridors, and they would have been, they would have been below the threshold at a 1 to 50,000 scale.
00:36:00 They wouldn't have been picked up. A lot of them are between 10 and 50 metres wide, probably 30 metres wide. So it doesn't mean they're any less significant because they're narrow, but they're about 100 kilometres, and they connect the landscape, and in a dry period, it's where all our species may take refuge. Even koalas can come into the Grandest Forests, looking for some juicy weeds, and it's too dry everywhere else, and the frogs, they're, they're sort of the lifeblood. So if we can, our ecosystems were very well-connected. We just haven't represented that accurately on the map. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: And from, from a legal planning perspective, it is quite important, the difference between a, a gallery rainforest, I think 1231A is the one that triggers the highest level of, under the Medication Management Act, but they're also under the Environment Protection, Biological Conservation Act, it's known as a threat to the ecological community.
00:37:00 So there should be higher levels of significance. So if we didn't have that there, we might have missed that within decision-making and, you know, what I was referring to. Um, previously, recently about the trail network, dissecting all those things, and the importance of sediment and erosion control, and we've got the giant fire frogs and the tough frogs living in these small gallery rainforests. They've got this overall, very rich and diverse ecosystem that follows their creaking wetland way. Speaker 1: Could I make a comment, please? Uh, and the other really salient fact is that, having improved vegetation mapping, our bushfire management planning has been significantly increased, so we've got more, so the vegetation basically influences the bushfire hazard. By having more accurate vegetation mapping, we're really starting to get a handle on, on fire hazard mapping. So that, and that was, that was essentially the initial, uh, thing that we got sort of, uh, bushfire recovery funding to initially fund this project. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Because, um, a, a true rainforest fire hazard here,
00:38:00 the ecotunnel, wet spherical fire hazard up here. Mm-hmm. Correct. So it's a significant difference and a, and a, um. Councillor Finzel: I just have a question. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, sure. Thank you for the report. Um, I'm interested in the rationale of the project, and applying the knowledge, and the report, and the work that you've done in a really practical sense. Um, so I'm interested in how we avoid, mitigate, avoid, um, impacts on our environment around especially infrastructure, page 97 in the report, about infrastructure development. How does the knowledge that you've collected and put into these reports speak to council when it comes to example like moving vegetation from roadside, um, you know, bridges and things like that, so that we avoid sediment and we look after species and plants and trees that hold the banks together? So for example, like up in the hinterland, if vegetation is cleared, how will the knowledge that we've got here in this report inform, for example, our infrastructure and civil
00:39:00 works department when it comes to clearing roadsides? Speaker 1: Um, so again, having improved vegetation mapping, um, is, is going to add with our decision making. And the second point, as I said, with the fauna report is that we're actually starting to go out into the organisation now and starting to engage with people exactly who send civil works and make them aware of these issues through having, attending toolbox talks with the guys on the ground and making them aware of erosion and sediment control, organising training for them. And just trying to build that knowledge base and yeah, so that's, that's, that's really the pragmatic, the practical aspect of this, but in terms of improving the knowledge base, I think that's really good. I mean, I think the existing mapping was possibly 70% accurate. We've got, we're probably going to race to 85, 90% accurate in the areas we've done. And that, that, that makes a big difference, you know, because, and once we've got that, the other thing to realise is that we've actually worked very closely with the Queensland Herbarium.
00:40:00 So they're the lead agency when it comes to vegetation mapping. So we're fitting that information directly into the herbarium. It's going to incorporate that into the next iteration of the regional ecosystem mapping. Councillor Finzel: Fantastic. Speaker 1: And so then moving forward, the two products will be consistent. That'll inform council's biodiversity layers. So once this work has been done, it's pretty much the herbarium that takes it over from Councillor Finzel: That's great news. Given the amount of money that, you know, this council and other departments fund to keep our river pristine, it's nice to know that in the hinterland we'll be mitigating threat to, you know, species that are really important, you know, along our riverbanks and creeks and water catchment areas. My other question is then it's how do we translate this great information and data in a practical sense? Because some of these roads and area around bridges is not under council control, their TMR. So how do we take this great information and push that back to other people that are
00:41:00 doing clearing in our Shire along those roads? Speaker 1: Well, if it's a state controlled road, I don't think we've had much jurisdiction over what happens on state controlled roads other than just sort of advising them. Like we're currently feeding information to the Six Mile Creek Bridge Replacement Project at the moment. And just sort of getting some ideas about what's going to happen there and trying to influence that decision. So, but I just really don't know how much power we have in that space, to be honest. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: We have good relationships with their environmental management. I hope that's sort of equivalent to you. Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. Well, I hope to hear from him soon. Speaker 5: And through the Shire Council, Finzel, as that comes to council from a referral agency perspective, that's when we can start to embed that. But from my perspective, the work that the team have done, we start to build into our processes that when we get contact from government departments, when you come to Noosa Shire, here's the things that you need to do. Yeah, that's great. Yeah. While we don't have jurisdiction to enforce as such, it should form part of that decision making process.
00:42:00 Councillor Finzel: Yeah, fantastic. Thank you. Councillor Lorentson: Thank you. Hi, Vanessa. Page 90. There's reference to editing of 58 properties. So the view of land for wildlife property reports across the Shire has identified that regional ecosystem changes are required on 58 properties. Have those properties been notified, the owners of those properties? And are we talking privately owned properties? Yes. Yes. No, we haven't. Speaker 1: Yeah. So they've been notified. And my other job, I run the land for wildlife program, so they're all property owners I know. And so they're coming from an environmental perspective. And you're exactly right. If we're going to do any vegetation or regional ecosystem mapping changes on those properties, we'll be notifying them. Councillor Lorentson: And are there planning implications if that mapping does happen? Speaker 1: Definitely. Yeah. Councillor Lorentson: So they'll be restricted as to what they can or cannot do? Speaker 1: Well, they could be. It could be going from what's mapped as actually remnant to non-remnant as well.
00:43:00 So it could actually go the other way. It could go to actually areas that are actually mapped as remnant or actually to swaddle regrowth or whatever. So it could go both ways. So it could actually sort of free up the restrictions that's currently over them if they have a biodiversity overlay over their property currently. But the notification would definitely be part of that on private property, yeah. Councillor Lorentson: Fantastic. And also, in the services and organisation meeting, there's a report coming to council about a new technology called SYNT Table. And I don't know if there's any application or synergy between this report and the SYNT Table. But I'll talk to you about it afterwards. But that's basically an education and awareness technology to help community understand hazards such as flood. So it's a system that can be used to help people understand hazards, flood spires, and droughts. And it's really innovative and visual and exciting. And it'd be great to have all this information into that system.
00:44:00 I don't know if it can or can't be done, but just thought I'd throw that at you. Speaker 1: Thank you. Thank you. I'd like to hear from you about that. Thank you. I'll just comment. Councillor Wegener: The voluntary conservation agreements that you do, because we're in budget right now, and it's been noted that under the Sunshine Coast Council, when people made it a voluntary conservation agreement on their land, making sure that that land is tied up, they don't have to pay rates on that chunk of the land anymore. But when we are de-amalgamated, is this right? Yeah. When we are de-amalgamated, we now make them pay rights on the land that's for voluntary conservation agreements. So I just wanted to flag that, because all the Councils are in the room, and that's something that I'd like to change. Do you want to clarify the current situation? Speaker 1: That's correct. The VCA policy, as it stands, when we de-amalgamated, didn't allow for rate refunds over that portion of the land. We are considering doing a review of the VCA program in the new financial year, which
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00:45:00 is a good thing, because at the moment we've got a two-tiered system. We've got the existing VCA property owners, 18 of those who are pre-amalgamation, who get a rate refund, and the ones after de-amalgamation who don't get a rate refund. So it's a bit inequitous, really. Yeah. Yeah. It's a great incentive. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 4: I was showing them the manager. Would you like to talk to them? And as part of that discussion, we'd actually have to look at the review of the environment levy policy to actually fund that, because VCA's are an incredibly good mechanism to achieve our 50% conservation tenure status, because it actually remains in private ownership rather than public ownership, and there's some internal blockers that we have between our rates rebate VCA's and environment levy, which actually stop additional VCA's.
00:46:00 So I just wanted to note that if we're looking at that, it would be a holistic program, and it's not about a reduction in rate revenue. It would have to be funded through the environment levy, but actually achieves our other stated aims of achieving a larger land in conservation tenure. Councillor Finzel: Can I just ask a question to Sean? I don't know if this is the right place to do this. Vanessa, you can say that. Mayor Stewart: Yeah, we can question Vanessa. Councillor Finzel: Coming off the back of the review for the VAC policy, or the VCA policy, sorry. I'm interested in looking at also the preservation of agricultural land for regenerative agriculture. Is there a way when we're doing that review, we could look at also capturing with sort of a land for wildlife, but a land for agriculture, to be able to protect our agricultural land moving forward?
00:47:00 Speaker 4: Probably not. Use of land for agriculture is generally quite different to use of land for conservation purposes. Obviously, when there's... riparian areas or ecological corridors through that site, you know, that has value, and our land for wildlife program, Keep It In Kin Kin program, the hinterland extension program that we fund through Landcare and MRCCC, already fund, you know, significant improvements of conservation on agricultural land. I think a scheme to, you know, encourage preservation of land for agriculture would require a totally different focus, you know, to do with agricultural economy and other benefits. I don't think it would be appropriate to sit it under the environment, maybe, because, you know, a lot of the problems we're having, for instance, in the Kin Kin catchment and six-mile catchment with sediment are from agricultural land uses, so, you know, use of agriculture is quite different to conservation, and, you know, we're always trying to achieve a balance between the two, but putting agriculture under the conservation, maybe, I don't think is an appropriate approach.
00:48:00 Councillor Finzel: Thank you. So, through the Chair, is there a way, then, that the Council could look at opportunity to put some type of value, I don't know how it would work, framework around our agricultural land in terms of keeping it in the Shire and usable, and how we protect and look after it? Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Are you acting as the CEO, or you would like me to be the CEO? Councillor Finzel: Well, I think it goes through the CEO, because I guess it's a framework around procedures around how, can Council fit in that space, or is it more a state place? Speaker 5: Thank you for your question, Councillor Finzel, and in response to the Chair, good quality agricultural GQL land is land that does have specific protections from the state government level, and we do recognise that, and my understanding is, through our planning scheme, that it would be more so in the space of the state government and primary industries, and, actually, the person that could probably answer this best at the table is even the Chair himself, so I might refer to the Chair, hopefully, I've gone down a correct path.
00:49:00 Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Sure. So, it is something that has been proposed in 1980s. We've actually proposed at the beginning of land care to do rope relief for properties that have come on and signed up for a land care management plan over the whole farm. At the time, the Council actually said this should be something across the whole state, put it to the LGA conference, and they refused to put it on the agenda for a vote. It's interesting. There is, obviously, it's an economic development, but also it is soil resources linked to, you know, you're talking about regenerative agriculture, so what you're saying is there a mechanism that Council wants to actually have, realise the non-market value of ecosystem services, so they're improving the carbon capture, they're reducing the run-off. Certainly, that is a policy option. When I moved from here, I did introduce the rate relief for conservation, but the Cooroy Council also introduced the rate relief for farm forestry, and it was the first in Australia to do that,
00:50:00 and it was a very successful field that attracted a lot of, you know, previously probably overgrazed cattle land to go back into farm forestry. So there is certainly, whether it's a rates mechanism or some other incentive mechanism to internalise the, what we really want from a public perspective, is that the farming enterprise is reducing public goods, which is, you know, clean air, clean water, and good soil. Mayor Stewart: Thank you. Vanessa, I've got a question for you. You talked about regenerating the rainforest by about 30%, but you could do potentially 50% given the opportunity. What do you need to do that? Do you need more time, more resources? Speaker 6: Yeah, we need more time. More time, okay. Speaker 4: So Vanessa's project was originally funded through the bushfire recovery living. So with Leo and Kim's assistance and the executive team, we supplemented that funding,
00:51:00 because Vanessa was originally meant to finish in March, and we extended it through to the end of financial year, with use of some of the environment living funds that were under spent in particular areas. So we haven't actually put a budget bid in to continue this work for the next financial year. But we have been talking to James Elay from disaster management because there still could be some funds available under category D for bushfire recovery. Mayor Stewart: And is this something that we can look at under the environmental level that we know is quite strong? Speaker 5: Through the chair, it's actually a decision on a matter for the council. It's to the projects, the environment, the levees funding. We've already got some park funding for this particular role. There's an opportunity. That's the view of the council. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Yeah, I'll do the same sort of thing. The benefits, since a lot of the changes were around the creek, maybe it's also plugged in after recovery. Not this bushfire.
00:52:00 I think the other aspect of it, which we haven't pulled up, is how it fits into the plan scheme. And Vanessa, you've identified that really the controls around, or the differentiation between old growth forests, or old growth ecosystems versus other, just by their type and their extent, is not currently catered for in the legislation. But from a conservation perspective, old growth forests have a range of values for habitat dimensions, and hollows and things like that. That's probably another driver for why we may want to do it more broadly, is to look at a future plan scheme amendment that specifically identifies these, you know, they're probably already in the biodiversity overlay, but having specific provisions that says when we've identified this as old growth forests for hollows, it ratchets up the levels of conservation significantly.
00:53:00 And to me, that's another driver. Do we wish this to go to the general committee to have a further discussion about budget, or do we want to do that as part of a budget deliberation? I think it's budget deliberation. Councillor Finzel: I think it's a budget conversation. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Councillor Wegener: Yeah, just a quick comment. You did mention the hollows and the various areas where there's more hollows than trees that are not. And that's really significant, isn't it? And it's significant because we need old trees to do that. So we've really got to protect this handful of old trees. Speaker 6: Yeah. Yeah. I have been picking up old trees where they're not in the remnant setting, where they're just in a regrowth in a paddock, because they have that high conservation value. And yeah, I think down the track, we should be looking at an old growth layer. Speaker 5: Yeah. Speaker 6: I think, and that feeds into Karen's comment, how can we tie this simple information into infrastructure? And then what we need to do is look at it at the design stage rather than once they've sent the brief and here's the plan for the bridge.
00:54:00 We come in before that and try and influence that early, the preliminary design, which Councillor Wegener: is almost like an overlay early on. Like, yeah. Oh, wait a minute. We have this here. Speaker 6: Yeah. Because if it's small linear corridors, 10 metres wide or small areas less than 25 square metres, there's exemptions for public infrastructure. It wouldn't even matter if it was federally listed and full of glossy black cockatoos, koalas and endangered frogs. It wouldn't matter. It wouldn't meet the threshold. Yeah. Speaker 4: Yeah. Through the Chair, noting that our budget submissions are prepared in December last year and this information that we've been working on has been over the last five months and if I know what I know now, I would have put this up for a budget submission in December and particularly in parallel with this project, my better understanding of our offset strategy to reduce our emissions floor and we're doing the accounting procedure at the moment to account for existing vegetation in the Shire to hopefully reduce
00:55:00 our emissions floor. So again, this project also informs that. And I just want to note that the accuracy of that we're doing the mapping here is leading South East Queensland and just having accurate vegetation mapping just informs everything that we do. And the bushfires, where it comes from. So I certainly encourage the discussion and of course there's lots of priorities that need to be considered but I think in hindsight that this should be considered. Councillor Finzel: Thank you, yeah, thank you, we've got the budget. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Just one more, I noted your external consultation. Two very, what must be, quite old heads. One is Wilma, who is the Commissioner of Geography for the Sunshine Coast, but also Bill Thomson. Bill Thomson, yeah. So Bill was actually, did the initial land resource assessment for the strategic plan in the 90s.
00:56:00 Yeah. And has been called the very experienced self-scientist land resource. Speaker 6: And he's not charging for his services and Warwick charged a very humble amount for his services. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: So yeah. But that's highly regarded. Speaker 6: And David Tricise. Speaker 5: Just through the Chair then, we just took this, we'll discuss with the staff and bring forward a bit of a, I suppose a bit of a, yeah, some costings around in terms to expand it. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Yeah, that's right. And in our next, yeah. Speaker 4: Yeah, the last time to go away and put some figures together. Thank you, thank you for your considerations. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Thank you. Thanks everyone. Mayor Stewart: Thank you, thank you. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: We moved the recommendation. Moved Councillor Winslow, seconded by Councillor Finzel. All in favour? That's unanimous. Thank you. Our next item is. That's it, that's it.