Ordinary Meeting - September 2023 Transcript

2 CONFIRMATION OF MINUTES ¶

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Nothing was transcribed under this heading — a stretch of the recording with no speech the model could make out.

1 ATTENDANCE & APOLOGIES ¶

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00:01:00 So moved. Happy to second. Councillor Stockwell, Councillor Finzel. All in favour? Thank you. There are no... Yes. There are no mayoral minutes. I have a petition to present on behalf of 148 signatories submitted by Joyce Carolyn Brumley. I'll read out the substance of her petition. She writes, I'm the property owner of 191 Mary River Road, Cooroy 4563. I share access to my property with 201 Mary River Road and 10 Worley Court via Worley Court. Access in and out of my property has been restricted for over two years now and attempts to ensure my free access have been unsuccessful. The restriction is due to uncontrolled parking by customers of a busy roadside stall, food and drink outlet located at 201 Mary River Road. The numbers of cars parked along the road verge rope shoulder into my property blind spots, rural fire brigade as well as cars pulling into the roadside stall while other cars travel by at 80 kilometres an hour pose a daily risk.

4 PETITIONS ¶

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00:02:00 This risk especially applies to my school aged children who must cross the road five times a week to catch the school bus at the rural fire station. Free access to a home is a basic human right. My children also have rights on the road. Unfortunately some of the drivers turning into the businesses do not keep a proper lookout. In Queensland there is a law that drivers must give way to pedestrians. If a pedestrian is crossing the road into which their vehicles are turning this law applies whether or not there are stop signs, give way signs or traffic lights. As such we the undersigned humbly and respectfully petition Noosa Council to act upon the problems mentioned. We hope that this humble petition meets your kind consideration. I would like to move that this petition be received and referred to the Chief Executive Officer to determine the appropriate action. I second it. I second it. Councillor Gissler. I second it. I second it. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Yes I second it. Councillor Wilkie: Well she has a vote.

00:03:00 That's unanimous. Thank you. Karen. Councillor Finzel: Um okay. I present this petition today with 24 signatories submitted by Howard Sanderson on behalf of. Can we move that little thing? Of the owners and residents of Pines Avenue and Morning Glory Avenue, Coorooyba, requesting that Council consider undertaking major fire hazard reduction and the removal of large trees on the nature strip to be received and referred to the Chief Officer to determine the appropriate action. Councillor Lorentson: I'll take your second. Thank you, Councillor Lorentson. Councillor Wilkie: All in favour? That's carried unanimously. Can you go over the library? Speaker 2: Sorry. Thank you, Mr. Senior.

00:04:00 Councillor Wilkie: There are no notified motions. We have two deputations tonight. The first deputation is from Mr. Mitch Robson, Mr. Matthew Nofty and Mr. Greg Wood. Mr. Robson, would you like to come to the podium? I'm not going to come up first. Yes. That's all right. Yep. We have 15 minutes. That's allocated for your deputation. You have to go. Entirely. Entirely. Entirely. Matthew Nofty: Entirely. Hello. My name is Matthew Nofty, I'm from Kipkula, Kooroola and the three of us are here to speak with you in regards to the Kooroola Great Walk eco-tourism proposal. Firstly, you may be asking yourself, what does the proposal have to do with Noosa Council? We are more than aware that this project is being delivered by the State Government, but over the years that this project has been developed, Noosa Council has been given opportunities to provide feedback on the proposal and can still give feedback. This is evident through Noosa Council's 2019 submission and then also as Noosa Council has been listed as a key stakeholder in the State Government's 2020 consultation activities document.

7.1 MITCH ROBSON TOPIC - KEEP COOLOOLA COOL - Cooloola Great Walk Ecotourism Project (CGWEP) ¶

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00:05:00 Noosa Council has also met with CABIN, the selected tenderer. Yet, for some reason, Noosa Council has not met with the Noosa community, the people that they represent. In regards to the proposal, I believe that we have all been misled, led down the garden path. The main structural problem with the Kooroola Great Walk eco-tourism proposal is that it failed miserably in its community consultation. This has led to less than mediocre outcomes and has resulted in major transparency issues. If the State Government had genuinely intervened, we would not have been able to deliver this proposal. Noosa Council included the community in its decision-making process from day one. This proposal could have provided great environmental outcomes for the park and genuine opportunities for Kabi people. Many people live in Noosa because of the natural environment and we are incredibly lucky to be surrounded by such pristine and accessible natural landscapes.

00:06:00 Yet, these are only available to us now because of the tireless work by certain community members that stood up for parks' protection. Every year, urban development slowly erodes our green space. But luckily, we have national parks to act as a buffer zone. After years of campaigning, the most common response we get from people who hear about the proposal for the first time is, How can they do this? It is a national park. National parks are a place for nature to thrive. They are places that are free from commercial pressures and degrading infrastructure developments. Well, after speaking with many of your fellow constituents, that is what they believe. But unfortunately, no mistaken. That is what national parks should be and we believe that you can help to better protect them as currently the legislation that is supposed to protect national parks is obviously simply and plainly not good enough. This proposal has been presented as being necessary to address current degradation within the national park. We have lowered the bar down so far that in order to fix degradation within the park, we first have to agree to degrading the park.

00:07:00 This proposal has also been presented as being delivered to First Nations people. You don't have to look very far to realise that this is simply not true. These hollow misrepresentations by the state government don't only cover up the real issue. They distract us away from the simple fact that developments and unnecessary commercial pressures have no place in national parks. I believe that Noosa Council has also been drawn into these false narratives and are possibly circulating incorrect historical information that has been used to justify the Great Walk proposal. Therefore, I would again like to form a request that the Noosa Council see this proposal as being necessary. I would like to finish with a rhetorical question. When did it become acceptable for government departments to marginalise people for wanting to protect the environmental values of a national park? Shutting people out of proposals and decision-making processes that will clearly impact them is not the kind of governance we should be accepting in the 21st century.

00:08:00 It only radicalises people as it forces them to jump up and down, make noise to be heard. It's such a waste of energy. It leads to transparency issues, which opens the door to corruption. We can do better. The community needs conversations and consultation. This is the only way to achieve successful outcomes for the environment and the people who live here. Mitch would now like to speak with you about the precise nature of the problem we are all facing. Sincerely, thank you for your time. Speaker 4: Hi, I'm Mitch. I grew up in Noosa. I was living in Tasmania when I first heard about this development plan that's being hoisted upon Cooloola Great National Park, which is a really important place for me. I was speaking to some friends of mine. They told me about it. I couldn't believe that it was actually possible that a national park could be, you know, set aside for development basically in private leases and so on. So, as I started getting involved in the campaign, I came back up here and I learned more about it.

00:09:00 And frankly, it's a sickeningly corrupt idea. One of the shocking elements of the development plan is the stealth and distortion which are being employed to cover up the plan's real form and impact. Sorry, I'm not much of a public speaker, so bear with me. I've since been assisting the community effort to promote the reality of the plan. And that has been, you know, formally projected around the plan. As I do this, I'm stunned by how few people know anything about it. We talk to people all the time. We canvass people at markets, at the area, Tewantin, other places. You know, 95% of people do not know that this is happening and they don't want it to occur when they do find out. So, the basic fact with the Great Walk development plan is that it secures private site leasing within Cooloola Great for development of commercial tourist accommodation at, you know, industrial scale.

00:10:00 Five different sites right up the guts of the park, including sacred sites for Kabi Kabi people. Strip bare of its PR terms like eco-cabin and, you know, all that kind of nonsense, this is private property development inside a local national park. Full stop. That basic fact and the impacts that evidently flow directly from it are what upsets everyone when they do hear about this proposal. A clear view of the project shows that it is in direct and fatal conflict with the cardinal principle of national park management in the state. The cardinal principle is to preserve the natural and cultural values of national parks. The development's priority is to create a commercially profitable operation by exploiting those natural and cultural values instead of preserving them. Construction upon lease sites within the park will necessarily displace and destroy the park. And degrade those key natural and cultural values.

00:11:00 This impact is magnified by the choice of development sites that maximize product value and do not minimize impact. As I mentioned, sacred sites, Lake Coonah, Double Island Point, the last undeveloped headland in southeast Queensland. Three other ones up in the middle of the park, including Noosa River. The development's priority is basically to create a commercially profitable operation. That's what it's about. And it exploits those key areas. And this equation sits in fundamental and dire conflict with the cardinal principle, as I mentioned. Those market-driven conflict actions include opening up of intact closed canopy forests in mature coastal areas, leading to increased sunlight, site desiccation, pathogens, weed ingress, and disturbed environment in general. The gutting of site vegetation is critical.

00:12:00 These species have their own intrinsic value and they deserve to have a home that is free from the commercial pressures which have destroyed and ravaged the rest of the country. That's what a national park is, that's what a protected area is. The other problems with this issue is that there are reckless and even deceitful placements of these luxury units under large trees that have been tagged for retention but are thereby doomed to canopy grooming and to mitigate litigation basically in the future. The degrading of the experience of existing Great Wharf users, Matt and I went into the park a couple of weeks ago and we checked out some of the sites. There are a lot of lies and spin about this proposal, one of them is that it won't affect the existing amenity of the Great Wharf because it won't be visible from the track.

00:13:00 We have video evidence of it being definitely visible from the track, so that's just one experience, one example out of many. So this conflicted situation diminishes and effectively destroys a cardinal principle in Cullula and by extension potentially other national parks in Queensland. This loss of core principle will constitute a massive change to the purpose and function of Cullula itself and again, potentially all of our national parks. It is being progressed under a cover of a number of demonstrably false, misleading and highly divisive narratives. For example, one of the things about this development plan is the Iliwa that is in place. Now there are many projects across Australia that should not go ahead and which many people agree that they should not go ahead. Like the Adani Carmichael mine, it has an Iliwa in place. Native title can be used to divide Aboriginal communities, which generally happens and can

00:14:00 impact and advance issues that are bad for the environment but you know, get put forward under the cover of the Iliwa. So that's what's happening here and that's why people are upset about it and we're seeking civic leadership on this issue. Thank you. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you, Mitch. Greg Wood: Thank you. I'm Greg Wood. I'm a long-term resident of Rainbow Beach. I'm all the way down here representing concerns of large numbers of recent residents about the long-term future of Cullula National Park. Now these concerns are validated within hundreds of submissions of objection put forward by them to this proposal. They're documented in our records. It's also constituted or substantiated in the results of a recent poll by Sandy Bolton where an overwhelming majority responded in opposition rejecting any commercial accommodation

00:15:00 development, not commercial operations, commercial accommodation development within Cullula National Park. It is just objectionable to most people. So we know that. Now, what should not be controversial? It shouldn't be controversial that Noosa residents feel this way. What should be controversial is that this program is progressing intentionally without the informed participation and consent of this local community and that is happening. It's been going for a number of years and as we find out from our routine involvement with people, an incredibly large number of people, proportion of people, that this program is going on. The majority of people, by a vast number, have never heard about it. And those that have, have some rather confused ideas about some quite simple and very vital aspects because the information is not clear. Around simple matters, the information is not clear and it's obscure.

00:16:00 So, the fact is the Noosa community was at the forefront of creating Cullula. Cullula, the park wouldn't exist without the efforts of this community in the past that worked to preserve this park. And this was because of the national, nationally significant, natural and cultural values of that Cullula landscape. That effort to create a national park was envisaged to protect those values with the Cardinal Principle. That's what it was. We want a national park because we want the Cardinal Principle. What those people fought to is the Cardinal Principle and what has now been quietly taken away is the Cardinal Principle. Right?

00:17:00 So, you know, those people that created this didn't envisage Cooloola Great being a platform for upmarket tourism accommodation within the surrounding sea of thickening urban development. You know, these places are a respite, not an extension of the norm. And we're seeing this invasion of a commercial function, which once it gets in there, has a relentless and understandable need to expand profit. And we're seeing already with the site choices, intrusion upon nature for the purposes of product development. And that's the kind of thing we don't want in there. It's a new cane toad for the park. So, our community action has sought to address this omission of community involvement and understanding. And look, we're just simply here to ask Council's consideration of assisting with that core democratic simple function, just the basic function of democratic involvement of people on an informed and, what do you call it, complicated view of the facts.

00:18:00 Now, Council has taken an interest and a role in this current development by its submission that was approved in the general meeting of 12 August 2019. Now, notably, this formal input was based on a report by the Council's Economic Development Manager. And it was also based on no available site-specific information or project detail at that time. So, you know, it was what it was. Now, it would seem that a review of that original submission is warranted, having full regard to the full extent of information now available, as well as the critical deficiency in that specification so far down the track. In fact, there's so many things that an infrastructure manager for any kind of project will go, where's that detail? I haven't got it yet. But they must have it. That's just where you start. No, they make it up as they go along. And that's the problem. And also, the extent of community concern arising from the project, which would, we believe, extend beyond the realm of just the Economic Development Manager. So, just one significant matter is that the original submission had concern that only disturbed site areas would be used as development sites.

00:19:00 Well, the plan details indicate that's been completely breached. Absolutely completely breached. One minute. One minute. Yeah, thank you. So, I also note Council's Destination Management Plan discussion paper, where Council states its governance roles to include community leadership, educator, advocator, lobbying and advocacy to other levels of government. We are simply asking Council to act in those ways. Just for the limited, I mean, you're great if you took a position, but you don't need to. We just ask for those leadership and education and advocacy roles in the construct of helping guide an equitable and involved public conversation around this topic. To that extent, we've got a few questions, and we'll give you a hard copy of all of this. We'd wish to endorse a public forum scope to ventilate an accurate account of the project and its critical details in the attended issues of community concern,

00:20:00 review its standing submission to the Great Walk managers, meet in a suitable delegation with community representatives to consider a way forward on the above points, an appropriate concentrated meeting to consider items published by Council that appear to be wrong, in fact, and possibly injurious to parties disaffected by that error. Matthew mentioned that in his statement. And also the opportunity to undertake some site visits with community representatives to see and understand what these issues on the ground are that are completely wrapped in rhetoric and euphemism within the boilerplate that's coming out of the government. So that's it. Thank you, Greg. Thank you. Thank you, Mitch. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you for my slight overrun. Thank you, Matthew. It's all right. You'll be sending us a copy of those. Greg Wood: I'll give you some hard copies now because everyone likes to take something home. We've only got five, but, you know, but we'll send a digital copy through as well. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mitch. Next, we have a deputation from Mr. Nick Cook, Mr. Cook,

00:21:00 for yours for 15 minutes. Thank you. Nick Cook: So good evening. My name is Nick and I'm here tonight to speak as a concern promoter resident about the placemaking study that has been thrust upon Pomona. I followed this study pretty closely. I've engaged in the process. I've engaged with the staff responsible for running it. And unfortunately, I've identified several issues with the consultation itself. This is very problematic considering this is one of the biggest town planning exercise Pomona has faced in years. And to have inadequate consultation is a red flag. The report to council from the placemaking committee back in February stated the placemaking must monitor, evaluate and report on the implementation and progress of the placemaking program. And here we are six weeks in and I don't feel like that's happening. I haven't seen it happening. At least I haven't seen it happening from staff or councillors. So I'm here today to address those issues, bring them to your attention, particularly these issues around communication, consultation, notification,

7.2 NICK COOKE TOPIC - POMONA PLACEMAKING STUDY ¶

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00:22:00 transparency and scrutiny of the actual process itself. I have a lot of time, so I'm going to just go across some of the main ones I've identified, particularly the communication and notification. The communication with residents so far has largely been inadequate. So many people in Pomona really don't know what's going on. It seems to be two camps in Pomona. You've got the people who have no idea the placemaking is even happening. And then the other camp where they know it's happening, but they can't tell you what it's about. They can't articulate it. I don't know what's going on. And it's creating angst in the community. If you ask most residents in Pomona, you'll find they'll say, we don't want Pomona to change, we want to stay the same. And to have a project like this come forward with, you know, very vague descriptions and not really clear and concise information, it adds to that angst. So the other issue is the fact that there

00:23:00 hasn't, or appears there hasn't been any consultation with the community to actually select Pomona as the pilot town. I see that it seems to be it was decided in the council meeting and that if you ask the people of Pomona, do you want to be studied as the guinea pig for Noosa? They would say no. And so I think that needs to be considered in this. You know, this placemaking study has been in the works for years from the research I've done. And in fact, the committee report stated that it was included in the 2019-2020 budget and there was also a placemaking workshop in 2022. So that's been in the works for years. But when it was released to the community for community consultation, we got approximately one week's notice. And those consultation events were crammed into two days, Friday and Saturday. Council have obviously recognised those problems and they've extended the consultation to the 8th of October, originally the 24th. But this is reactive and placemaking should never be reactive.

00:24:00 It should be comprehensive at the beginning and it shouldn't be six weeks in already have these issues and these issues only identified by residents themselves. Some of them, like, for example, on Friday, there was a Friday social at 3 o'clock on a Friday and had no location online, so no one even knew where to turn up to. That was quietly changed on the website after I made complaints. There was nothing online of where to get a hard copy survey. That was again quietly changed on the website after the fact. Since then, Council have added another sketching workshop, another workshop through the town and two pop ups, one at the market and one at the Noosa show, which was problematic in itself because it's essentially behind a paywall where you have to pay to enter the show to engage in the consultation, which doesn't constitute equitable access. Again, it's reactive to add these things after concerns have been raised that should have been raised at the beginning, should have been identified at the beginning. One of the other issues a lot of residents are saying is that it's concerning that most of the consultation information is online only, mostly online, it should have really been sent to residents by post day one,

00:25:00 you know, because this is excluding people in Pomona that don't have internet access and people, you know, they know that Pomona is an aged population. The livability survey showed large section are over 65. In fact, two thirds of Pomona are over 45 years old and a large section of them are over 65. So it's not inclusive. It's not as it removes their ability to engage. They don't even know about it, which I'm finding and speaking to people. Also, the consultation documents are not freely available to all. For example, this Pomona Place Plans workshop booklet. It's actually quite a good consultation booklet, 16 pages long, and it goes through Pomona street by street. Yet this isn't made available to everyone. You only get access to this if you go to the workshop and if you actually register, which places are limited, so even if it did have good turnout, which it didn't. The one I went to only had five community members there. Only a small section have access. That should be online and everyone should be encouraged to fill it out.

00:26:00 You can't. And there's only a couple of weeks left for the consultation. The other issue is this testing of new governance structures. Pomona has been selected to pilot this new governance structure that there's not much information out there. It's also not included in any of the consultation information. It's not not discussed at the consultations either. But in discussions with the consultants, I found out that it would be a committee that would be representing Pomona and it would be more than a reference group and it would be active actioning projects on the ground, which sounds great, but there's questions around it. How will it be selected? Will council be selecting them? Will there be conflicts of interests? Will there be registers? Will there be checks and balances on that? Questionable. And will it still be subject to council determinations and not subvert the democratically elected councillors? The other issue, which I would say is probably one of the major ones, is who is responding to this consultation and how can council actually determine who's responding when there's no mechanism in place to determine the identity or location of the respondents?

00:27:00 This is concerning. This is concerning when because it opens up the consultation to outside influences and it is not unwarranted when Pomona is under the microscope with the South East Queensland regional plan, basically Queensland might focus on Pomona. It's been earmarked for development. So you've got external influences that want to get into Pomona. You've got town planning, construction companies, developers. One example of the outside influence is the QUT student study. This has been happening in Pomona for years, I think about nine years, and the students come in and they reimagine the town and places and buildings. It's great for the students. But this year, I don't think it's going to be great for the people of Pomona because it hasn't been a subject to community consultation. And it is, it's well, at the last, was it the sketching workshop? Councillor Lorentson said that she'd be working with, who was it?

00:28:00 Brian O'Connor from the Pomona Chamber of Commerce to work to get these students projects inserted into the placemaking study. It's absolutely concerning and it shouldn't happen because, again, it was not the result of the community consultation. The QUT students works were actually, they didn't have a limitation on what they could do. It was open to whatever they did. Like some of the students could do a zip line into Pomona. You could have a big water park at the theme park. It was designed for an academic exercise, not necessarily for implementation in Pomona. So I think that needs to stop if there's any plans in there to incorporate. That's that's an example of the outside influence, the data. Councillor Wilkie: It would be OK if you can attempt the comments that it doesn't personally target any individual in this room. Nick Cook: OK. That was the rationale for raising it. Councillor Wilkie: Yeah, OK. Nick Cook: Because I've always been told it was an academic exercise.

00:29:00 There's no right of reply. Councillor Wilkie: It's an unfair form. Nick Cook: OK, well, in general, no counsellors should be working to include any of these works into the placemaking study without consultation with the people. Well, at all, actually, because the actual study itself was not a result of community consultation. The other problem with the outside influence is the day after this QUT study that students come into town, which is the first study that was done, company called Built Environment Collective posted the Pomona Community Board online. Councillor Wilkie: Sorry, Nick, I think the point was that counsellor lies in dispute. That was the case. OK. That's an incorrect statement. Nick Cook: OK. So I'll retract the statement. Thank you. And I'll clarify that. Built Environment Collective. Yeah, so they're a town planning company, done lots of big projects across Australia. And they put this post in the Pomona Community Board asking the community what they wanted. And people in Pomona, you know, not unsurprisingly objected to it, asked,

00:30:00 what are you doing? What are you, what's your interest in Pomona? And they said the placemaking study had quite peaked out interest. So that's another example of an outside company from Brisbane that has an interest in this placemaking study. And without any mechanism to determine the location or identity of respondents, it's basically open to direction, driven to be driven in the direction of economic interests. So quickly moving on. Other issue is identifying and communicating with key stakeholders. There's been a bit of a lack of transparency around this. There hasn't been a list of key stakeholders released to the people to know who is counsellors liaising with. The other thing is that I don't know if community groups have been adequately identified. For example, Safe News Hinterland, which you know that I'm a committee member of, we have over 600 members, you know, in relation to the impacts of the Kin Kin quarry. Yet we weren't identified as the key stakeholder. Ironically, the quarry situation is a result of bad town planning.

00:31:00 Would have thought that we would have been included originally without even having to be asked. But we are included now after demanding it. Problem is we're not being offered the same consultation as other community groups. For example, the Pomona District Chamber of Commerce, who had a private consultation with Council and Cred Consulting, the consultancy company doing this, and after asking in emails. I don't I can't seem to get the staff to agree to this, which is inequitable access to this consultation to afford one group special privileges and not others is inappropriate, and I'm going to be putting that in writing as a proper complaint. I've already written complaints to the staff involved. It hasn't really been taken seriously so far. But what I've learned about this is that it seems that some community groups are more overly represented than others with private meetings. And also the fact that this placemaking study was a result of lobbying from a certain group.

00:32:00 I don't know how much time I've got, but I might skip this part and go straight to the last part, which is four minutes. OK. A lot of community concerns about Pomona becoming a smart city or a 15 minute city. This is not out of the question when the placemaking information online states that the pilot location for this placemaking study must align with the council plan, strategies and resources, and it cites the corporate plan. And if you go to the corporate plan, it specifically mentions smart city and smart biosphere, town planning aspects for innovation to transform the way we move around, engage in the community. If you type in placemaking and 15 minute cities and smart cities, you get tons and tons of results and it's clear that they are related. These concepts are related. And I think what needs to happen is there needs to be more transparency from council. Is Pomona going to have these smart city

00:33:00 town planning concepts involved with this study or at all, which also then flows onto the rest of the community because Pomona is the pilot and what we learn from this study will be applied to the rest of the Shire. This is, I believe, Kin Kin and Tewantin. So that's something that council needs to address and be really upfront with the people. Is it going to be a smart city? What is smart city as defined in the town plan? And will it be applied to this? Lastly, to finish the recommendations from all of this that I've followed. I think in light of all these concerns, the placemaking study needs to be suspended immediately. We need to go back to the drawing board, review the whole processes, the concerns I've raised and improve the adequacy of the communication, the explanation to the community, the notification and the consultation itself. I think one of the best ways to do this is a town hall meeting to clearly explain the placemaking study in very simple terms and field questions from the community. This should hopefully address the angst that is around the community of Pomona.

00:34:00 I think we need to implement mechanisms to confirm respondents' identity and location. That's for all submissions. That includes, say, submissions in this workshop, which has no way to put your name on it. That's in the survey, any even the stickers in in the consultations at the pop ups. Also, I think council needs to undertake a liveability survey for Pomona itself. A liveability survey was done in 2021 November, right before the mandates, right in the peak of the pandemic. We had 1,700 respondents in a town of, what, 60,000 people. And we're drawing the base values to inform the survey from that. And I think there needs to be one specific to Pomona, especially when Pomona is the guinea pig. We need to, you need to properly engage the key stakeholders, as previously mentioned, and provide equitable access to consultations. You need to review the dependents and the influence of specific not-for-profits that seem to have a disproportionate say in this whole study.

00:35:00 Make a list of key stakeholders public. Review the staff that are involved with this placemaking study and the way they have addressed complaints to date, which has not been adequate. You need to post a placemaking pack out to the residents. It needs to include all the info, all the surveys, all this booklet here that doesn't seem to be available so that people who don't have access to computers or internet can easily engage. And finally, I think councillors need to be more involved in the active scrutinising of this study, especially because it's a pilot and we're sort of learning as we move forward. We can't just rely on council staff. We're going to need every councillor to keep an eye on this and make sure, like, we're six weeks in and these issues are pretty concerning. The placemaking study can be real positive for Pomona, but only if it's done correctly, if due process is followed, if everyone has equitable access and if the consultation is adequate. So the real point of this consultation for this deputation is to call for

00:36:00 suspension and review and immediate action to remedy the issues I presented today. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you. Thank you for your personal perspective on that process. Thank you, Mr Cook. Mr Cito, is there anything, there's a lot of issues, is there anything you want me to respond to? Speaker 3: Yes, this is a deputation, but just for councillors, I think just to, I respect the fact that this is a personal opinion from Mr Cook and and he's got to be right to say that, but I think that particularly to single out a councillor and make a point of that is not fair. There is no right of reply and I think that that's something that's retracted, but I think it's still something that should be made and addressed as I am. Right now. In terms of this was, Pomona was selected through a council process, as you know, it's been through this room and before that selection. So it has been a process.

00:37:00 In terms of the activities that are going on out there, to elicit responses from the community, there's been the Friday social sizzle on the 25th of August. There's come to a pop up event on Friday the 25th, Saturday the 26th. At different times, Friday the 8th, Friday the 22nd, Saturday the 23rd, Pomona markets, different places, different times to try to make sure that we do get a good cross section of the community and where we can only do what we can do in terms of getting the community to come along to these events and make them available to them. Walk Shops, Saturday the 26th and Friday the 20th, August 22nd of September. Again, in different places at the Pomona District Community House and Soboso Park, the Pomona urban sketching workshop. Nick Cook: Is this in line with an education? Speaker 3: This is, I'm speaking to my council, if you don't mind, Mr Cook. This is not a interaction.

00:38:00 Councillor Wilkie: I've asked the CEO what have we done in terms of public consultation out there. Speaker 3: And then Saturday the 26th of August and Saturday the, two different times on the 26th of August for that. And then on Saturday the 23rd of August, Thursday, there's more to come. So there's more consultation happening. And then there's also a separate workshop of all community organisations, as Mr Cook alluded to, at the end of October with a date to be confirmed. So there's quite a lot of activity that's been going on. I just wanted to make that point. Councillor Wilkie: Mr Cook, if you email us your deputation, we'll get a formal reply. Thank you. All right. We're now up to item eight, consideration of committee reports. As Mayor Clare will need to know, if it leaves me by 6.30 tonight, I'd like to be present for the following report. We're going to bring forward item 6.1, which is the Noosaville catchment management plan from the general committee report. So it will be dealt with as the first item on tonight's agenda.

8 CONSIDERATION OF COMMITTEE REPORTS ¶

▶ 00:38:48

00:39:00 Councillor Stockwell, you've got a conflict of interest to declare? Deputy Mayor Stockwell: I have. I was informed at the meeting of my declarable conflict, as provided in my written declaration, that I won't be beginning as it's been through this chamber many times before. I do request that I remain in the meeting room to participate in the decision. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you. Councillor Jurisevic: Councillor Joe, I'll move that Council note the declarable conflict of interest by Councillor Stockwell and determine that Councillor Stockwell participates in this matter, because Councillor Luce is a reasonable person who trusts the final decision is made in the public interest. Councillor Wilkie: Do I have a second to that, please? I second that. Councillor Wegener, Councillor Joe. Councillor Jurisevic: I do so on the basis of this being a consistent position the councillors had with regard to this conflict in the past. Councillor Wilkie: Any other discussion? Put it to the vote that's in favour. That's unanimous. Councillor Stockwell did not vote on the above motion.

00:40:00 Deputy Mayor Stockwell: I have another. Councillor Wilkie: Yes. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Another conflict of interest. Yes, I have a conflict of interest in this matter regarding my longstanding relationship with the Mayor of the Catchworth Coordinated Committee, which once again is within the written declaration that I read out on Monday and have read out similar ones previously, so I won't read it again. I have a request that I remain in the meeting room to participate in the decision. Councillor Jurisevic: Thank you, Councillor Durris. I once again move that Council note the declarable conflict of interest by Councillor Stockwell and determine that Councillor Stockwell participates and votes on the matter because Council believes that Councillor Stockwell does not stand to gain personally and materially through noting this report and therefore a reasonable person would trust the final decision is made in the public interest. Thank you. We have a second for that please. Councillor Wegener, Councillor Joe. Once again, I do so on the basis of being consistent with decisions made in the past on this declaration of a conflict of interest by Councillor Stockwell. Councillor Wilkie: Any other comments from councillors?

00:41:00 That's unanimous and Councillor Stockwell do not vote on the above motion. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: And I would like to move the motion. Yes, Councillor Stockwell. And it is a staff recommendation from the report to the General Committee with an additional item C and I'll read out that additional item C. Request that the CEO consult with relevant stakeholders group as part of staff's consideration of action 1.1 relating to a conservation park covering the fish habitat areas. Councillor Wilkie: I'll second that. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: I do so. Councillor Wilkie: Councillor Stockwell. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: I think it's important to understand where we're at. And if I could have that presentation. Yep. So in 2017, the Council resolved to do a catchment management plan as a whole of catchment and to consult the community on it. In 2000 and in July, July to August in 2018, it was the first round of consultation.

00:42:00 You see one of the results of that consultation, which highlights the priority of the community of the time, you see the high level of importance placed on managing pollution and litter running into the river, protecting wetlands, riparian areas and coastal areas, and the third one there is about reducing sediment from upstream entering the river. So we go to the next one. Thank you. You also then had a second round of consultation between December 2019 and a month later. In 2020, this term of Council, we actually moved to establish the Noosa River Advisory Group and in the initial motion, which was moved by Councillor Stewart, similar to when I moved in the committee before then, and it identified that the purpose of that group was to be more broadly involved in the finalisation, the implementation of the Noosa River Plan. And next one, thanks.

00:43:00 So we also said March 22 after a report from that Noosa River Stakeholder Advisory Committee, we also then had a motion that said asking for a further report giving advice and recommendations of the Noosa River Stakeholder Advisory Committee in regard to the relevant issues and proposals in the draft Noosa River Plan. So we've had a number of opportunities over a number of years for the community engagement. I do have a question. I'm going to think that it's important if there's something in that where we've come to and where staff have got to, to give the opportunity for those stakeholders to be involved in the further development of the proposals. The one that appears to have got some groups interested that they'd like to get their head around is the next one, thanks, is the proposal that I mentioned in the resolution. So the areas of fish habitat, now this is an excerpt of the map of the lower area. You can see that fish habitat areas don't cover the whole river. In fact, a lot of the area that's most in use are not in fish habitat areas.

00:44:00 You can see the areas where the Stakeholder Advisory Group spent a lot of time with Council staff and MSQ to look at the better management in terms of boating, in terms of mooring, in terms of liveaboards, is in the area outside the fish habitat, whereas the proposal in Action 1.1 is about those fish habitat areas. And if I can, it's really important to note that these are protected areas. If you look here from the State Government, they're part of the Global Marine Protected Area Initiative. OK, they are about high productivity estuarine and coastal fishery habitats that are cleared and mapped and therefore protecting fish habitats such as mangroves, salt marshes, seagrass, sandbars, mudbanks, rocky outcrops. So to allow legal, commercial, recreation, indigenous fishing. OK, they also have some restrictive elements in terms of development around them. So what's different between a fish habitat and what we're proposing in the conservation park? In the original draft in 2018, there was proposals about what are the options

00:45:00 for Council to get more involved in the management of the river? And in the interim time, we've looked at lots. We've looked at something like the Gold Coast Water Waste Management Authority and discounted it. We looked at things like creating a Noosa River Improvement Trust under the Water Act, but it's sort of not a great fit. We've looked at other options like marine park zoning or marine zoning under the MSQ legislation. They all just don't quite fit. So this is quite the proposal, which is only going to be considered, is really quite an elegant solution because it says in those areas that are already protected. And if I go to the next slide, we want to be involved in that. And that's what it says. The 1.1 is the action, but there's a descriptor here. It talks about a conservation park represents various opportunities in terms of greater compliance support to state agencies, attracting funding and investment for wetland and riparian management, scientific monitoring and biodiversity interventions, council potentially having more responsibility in saving the management

00:46:00 of the river and providing an education awareness piece to drive greater community ownership of focus on biodiversity and protection of species habitat within and adjacent to the conservation park. It's really important, but the only real add on other than the part that it gives council a seat at the table is in terms of it talks about providing opportunities for educational recreational activities in a way that's consistent. It's really just another layer that will give us a head of power to start doing some of the things that we'd like to do. And it needs more understanding of the community. Hence why I put in seed that as part of that consideration that we do do a round of consultation with stakeholders with an interest in that. I think it's important to do that properly and at the right time. I don't think the next month is the right time. I think when we're actually considering it is more important to do it.

00:47:00 I don't think trying to squash it into the next month is where we should be at. On the other hand, on Monday, we have to do a council submission on the South East Queensland Waterways River Investment Initiative, which will lead into the Resilient Rivers approach. That's up to $40 million of funding across South East Queensland and what's required to access that fund. We need to have an endorsed catchment action plan. So that is why I believe it's really important both to respect the fact that some committee and stakeholders have an interest in that, learning more, doing that at the appropriate time, but making sure we've given staff the go ahead that those actions that relate to works that can start now is there and is agreed upon. I think it's really important to note that what's in the proposal is very consistent with what has occurred over the last six years since we moved it in terms

00:48:00 of where the community puts priorities and I think that the addition of seed will address some of the concerns that were talked about at the general committee. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you, Councillor Stockwell. Can the councillor speak to the motion? Councillor Lorentson: I have some questions. Councillor Morrison. My first question is how much funding is potentially at risk by us not having a river plan and when are the deadlines for funding? Speaker 4: Good question. Councillor Wilkie: Kim Rawlings, are you able to assist with that, please? Speaker 2: Through the Chair, there's various programs of funding. So there's a resilient rivers funding that is part of the central program and that's $40 million. That's over the next number of years. One of the one of the requirements will be to have a catchment action plan in place. That program is not underway yet, but I don't have in terms of timing.

00:49:00 We are just still being consulted on the strategy to input into that process. There are other other funding programs available. So the Q Coast program, the disaster resilience, disaster response funding, the urban rivers program through the Climate Council. There's a raft of funding available that we could be attracting that we need, you know, clear strategic plans around our priorities that are based on risk assessment and scientific information. We need to be able to access those. They're all they all operate in different time frames. I don't have those time frames at hand. What I what I did share with you on Monday, General Committee meeting is we do know, I wish I had the figures with you, but we do know catchments like Mary River Catchment Coordinating Committee have attracted significant funding well beyond what we have because they've had strong,

00:50:00 robust catchment management plans in place. We've had a lot of cash for that catchment for many years that we just haven't been able to leverage or access because we haven't had a clear catchment action plan in place. Councillor Lorentson: So does Council need a formal River Plan endorsed because my understanding that this is a live document and that we're continually going to be working on it. We're still, you know, the amendment is request, the CA to consult with relevant stakeholder groups as part of staff's consideration of action one. So, so we're still going to be consulting with stakeholders. It's not a formally, it's not a complete plan. Speaker 2: Absolutely, like any of our plans, like our environment strategy or housing strategy, or our, you know, any plans we do, they're not complete the day you endorse them. They're actually, that's actually just the start. They actually don't, you know, there's a, there's,

00:51:00 this is a five year plan with a range of actions that will need to be consulted on and absolutely. But what it does is it gives us a solid, robust framework and roadmap about what are the priorities, what are the things we're going to address, what outcomes we're wanting to achieve, whether it's a ground river plan, housing, whatever. That's what a good plan does. And a good plan, as you know, positions you well to attract funding when you've got clear indication of what your priorities, strategic priorities are and outcomes you're achieving. Councillor Lorentson: So the original motion that we moved at the general meeting, which was to defer the matter for the next round of meeting. So one month, does that jeopardise these funding deadlines? Speaker 2: Not necessarily. There's nothing that's due tomorrow or next week. Other than what I would say is we should have had a catchment action plan in place.

00:52:00 It's been, it's taken many years to get to this point. And we're so close. And there are a range of opportunities, not just funding that we're not able to implement. But the sooner we can have that in place, the better. Excuse me, Councillor Wilkie. Councillor Wilkie: Yes, Mayor Stewart. Mayor Stewart: Councillor Wilkie, I just want to clarify. I've just been on the text message to Scott Smith, the CEO of the Council of Mayors. I'm getting some clarification in regards to Councillor Lorentson's question. The question I posed was, do we have to have a catchment action plan to receive funding through Resilient Rivers? The answer was, no, you don't. We would do a catchment action plan as part of our program. So it doesn't have to be done by you before. So that's just been confirmed by the Council of Mayors. So funding isn't at risk. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: Is there a point of order or understanding, or is the action taken by the Mayor actually contrary to standing orders?

00:53:00 Councillor Wilkie: I think it's relevant to the question of the discussion. And Kim Rawlings, you've got a response to that? Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not my understanding. So we're aware of the understanding that there needs to be catchment action plans in place to access the funding to deliver on ground work. So that's pretty clear in the draft investment strategy. It's pretty clear on the website. So, yeah, sorry, that's not staff's understanding. Yes, Councillor Cazale. Councillor Finzel: Thank you. I have a question through the Chair to Councillor Stockwell. In your little speech just then, you raised this thing about the timeframe related to funding. Can you please clarify where you got this information from? Deputy Mayor Stockwell: The advice was we need to make a submission on the investment strategy by Monday. And when did you find out, Councillor Stockwell? I'm from the Director of... Councillor Finzel: My question to you, Councillor Stockwell, is at what point did this come to your attention?

00:54:00 Deputy Mayor Stockwell: When I answered it this afternoon. Councillor Finzel: So this afternoon, just prior to this meeting? Yes. Thank you. I have a question through the Chair. Councillor Wilkie: Yes, Councillor Finzel. Councillor Finzel: To the staff, how long have they known that this deadline was in place? Because I have not heard about it prior to Councillor Stockwell making a comment. Speaker 2: We've been working as a collective through the South East Queensland Council of Mayors offices around a whole range of regional issues. So there's been a number of workshops in the development of the South East Queensland waterways investment strategy for the last number of months. We as officers were provided with a copy of the draft strategy maybe one week ago with a request to provide some feedback and a submission on that actually by yesterday. But we've said we've just got a lot on at the moment. Could we have till Monday? So it's only just to happen to Councillor Finzel.

00:55:00 Councillor Finzel: But through the Chair, I have a question then to the Councillors. Given we put forward a recommendation that was supported four to three and the vote the other day at our previous meeting, given that this information has only come to light, how are you going to, how are we going to discuss how we're going to move forward on this in terms of this is new, brand new information that has come to the table now. I wasn't aware of it before. Councillor Stockwell had privy to that information prior to this. I'm wondering why it wasn't sent or did I get it on an email and I've missed and how we're going to proceed forward. Speaker 2: Can I clarify? Just to be clear without conflating these issues, we are in a process around providing input as one of the councils into a South East Queensland overall strategy

00:56:00 that is setting up a framework to determine how the Resilient Rivers funding will be allocated. So as part of that process, it's our understanding that a catchment management plan needs to be developed. That is not, our submission into that strategy is not contingent on tonight's decision. We, that's a separate process. We're providing input into that overarching strategy and we're also developing a catchment action plan. What we presented to you on Monday in the council report is that having a catchment action plan clearly demonstrates that we'll be better positioned to access funding and there's a raft of funding that is available. So let's not overly confuse those two, those two tasks that are happening at the moment. Councillor Wilkie: As Chair, I should answer your question, Councillor Finzel, in terms of process.

00:57:00 So the, all the recommendations that were passed as motions at the Monday's General Committee meeting only had the status of recommendations for tonight's meeting. And every councillor is your democratic right to pose an alternate motion or a new motion for each and every item on the agenda for tonight. And in terms of how new information becomes apparent, well, for instance, we've had since June 22nd this year when some of these new additions to the plan were brought to our attention in the council workshop to go up to staff to seek information. Since Monday, we've had three days to seek to ask questions of staff to find out information that pertinent to us as well. So, yeah, open process is, it's up to the councillors to ask the questions of staff if they find them relevant. Councillor Finzel: Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the clarification.

00:58:00 A question through the Chair to the councillors. What other councillors prior to this meeting this evening were aware of the deadline? Of this, what's that called? Through the Chair, what's the deadline for this application? Sorry? Yeah, what is this deadline? The deadline for Councillor Stockwell. Yes. OK, through the Chair to Councillor Stockwell, what is the name of the, I don't know, what is it called, this deadline thing? What's it called? Speaker 2: It's called the South East Queensland Waterways Investment Strategy. Have I got that right? Yeah. And Councillor Stockwell asked me a question following what I said on Monday about funding opportunities and what's currently available. And I provided some information verbally in response to his question. Now, I gave some information at the General Committee meeting on Monday, Councillor Finzel, at this standing right here about funding opportunities.

00:59:00 And I made the reference to the Mary River Catchment Coordinating Committee, having a strong plan. They had a catchment plan in place and using them as a comparison when they had a catchment plan in place to attract funding. And there are a number of current opportunities around funding. Councillor Stockwell has asked me today, can I tell them what they are? I've told them what they are. And I'm now going to share that with you following questions here at the table. OK, thank you. Councillor Jurisevic: So just with regard to the deadline element that Councillor Stockwell alluded to, and that's where Councillor Finzel, I think, is going to, what is contingent on Monday's deadline for you to deliver on the strategic element of that with regard to the River Catchment Management Plan? Speaker 2: Like I said previously, it's a separate process. So irrespective of what's decided or not decided tonight, we will still provide input into that solution. Speaker 4: Thank you. Speaker 2: Separate processes. They're linked only by the fact that it's our understanding, because the documents say

01:00:00 you need a catchment action plan in place that does a prioritisation process and a risk assessment ultimately to attract this funding. So there's a link from that perspective. But in terms of, that's a separate process. Councillor Jurisevic: One doesn't, one doesn't, one is unconditional on the other. Thank you. Councillor Finzel: Questions to the Chair? Thank you. Thank you, through the Chair. I'm just interested in knowing at what point did the staff know this deadline was tomorrow? Is it tomorrow? Speaker 2: As just previously answered that, we were advised last week to provide comments on the strategy by yesterday. We've requested to have till Monday because of workload this week. They've agreed to give us a till Monday. Councillor Wilkie: Any of the councillors wish to speak to the motion, the substance of the motion before us?

01:01:00 Mayor Stewart: Can I ask a question? Councillor Wilkie: Yes, yes. Mayor Stewart: Kim, where the misunderstanding could be, would it be that, I understand what you're saying about we need a catchment plan, but would that be something that we would do in conjunction, this is what they seem to be saying as part of the program, with the Council of Mayors separately, so that it's a bit different to needing to get our own in straight away? Would that be where the differentiation lies, so it's not as, the deadline's not as prudent? Speaker 2: I'm not sure, Claire. I'll need to have a look and maybe give Scott a call. Mayor Stewart: Yeah, because I don't mean to be argumentative, but this is, you know, I'm just, this is what I'm getting at. It may be different on the website. I've said to him, well, your website doesn't seem to say that. That's what I'm hearing. So I'm just not sure if it is as urgent as what we think, you know,

01:02:00 or whether there is some flexibility there based on that information. But maybe that's something that we can take on notice for clarification. Councillor Wilkie: Hi, I'm Kim. Yes, thank you, Chair. Speaker 1: Just wanted to add that there are areas that are part of the South East Queensland Council of Mayors that already have catchments. That's in place, and that's where the funding is starting to flow. So the earlier that we can be prepared with this, it not just sets us up for Resilient Rivers funding, it sets us up for other funding. So, thanks, yeah. Councillor Wilkie: So, the point you're making, Officer Kimber, is that the sooner we have an endorsed Noosa River catchment management plan, the sooner you can prepare those submissions. That's correct, for a whole raft of catchments. Yeah. Catchments. Councillor Finzel: Yeah, thank you, through the Chair. One of the consequences, if we don't get this on time, given that we would like to further discuss

01:03:00 going out to community for their, say, to support open transparency engagement, what are the consequences of this deadline, say, if we miss it because we go back to community to engage with them a little further to clarify what they needed? Speaker 2: So, we're not going to miss this deadline, because we're going to provide a submission on the strategy as officers into the process. We've been at workshops, we've been given opportunity, and now we've been given a draft, so we're not going to miss the Monday deadline around that process. Speaker 1: The difference is, we will be providing that response without an endorsed plan from Council, so it will be subject to officer impressions about what the priority should be. Speaker 2: And we'll be saying that, you know, the consequence will be, we'll be saying that we've got a draft plan that is still subject to consideration by Council and community, and that, you know, once and if that's endorsed, you know, then we'll probably seek another opportunity to have, provide further submission once that's endorsed.

01:04:00 Councillor Jurisevic: Further question, based on what I've heard from the Mayor, Mayor's response from Scott Smith, is that the first course of action to be undertaken for funding would be to create a river catchment plan. Does that sound like that would, is what the response was reiterating? Speaker 1: Yeah, that's correct. And I just want to say through the Chair to the Mayor that we can provide the reference, which actually states that a cap is required as part of the Resilient Rivers Initiative. Admittedly, it's not on their website, it's actually on the Wetlands Info website, but it talks about quite a structured process that Councils need to go through in order to develop a cap. And luckily, because we've been doing this for so long, we're at the point where we can develop a cap.

01:05:00 Speaker 2: Just to add to that, there are some catchments, other than ours, in the South East, they don't have catchment action plans. So some do, as Amy mentioned, and they've been able to input into the strategy because they've got catchment action plans. Some are in development, like us, and some don't. So there are different, you know, we are all in different places. I guess our point is saying the sooner we've got a plan in place, the better positioned we are. Councillor Wilkie: Sarah, have you got a hand up? Mayor Stewart. Mayor Stewart: Jo, just to clarify. From the text message I've got, look, there's always the element of misunderstanding, unless it's, you know, verbatim. But the text message from Scott, he said, these are his words, we would do a catchment action plan as part of our program, so it doesn't have to be done by you before. Now, that may be beneficial for us to do it before. I'm not sure, but it doesn't have to be done. That was the words of him. He may not be au fait with the specifics, but I'm just reiterating what the information, that's the information that I've been provided with just for your clarification.

01:06:00 Councillor Jurisevic: Thank you, Mia. My interpretation of what was there, though, is that the Catchment Action Management Plan is the first course of action to be undertaken. Mayor Stewart: Yes, and his answer to that is that they would do it as part of their program, so we necessarily didn't have to have it done by us beforehand. This is just a text message, and I'm just reiterating what I'm reading, being read out from what I read out before. Councillor Wilkie: Okay. Thank you. Councilors, we have a motion before us. Tom? Councillor Wegener: I'd like to speak to it. Councillor Wilkie: Yes, speak to the motion. Thank you. Councillor Wegener: I support the motion. The community... The community has asked us, no, demanded that we take action. We cannot kick the can down the road on this one. The deadline was years ago, a long, long time ago.

01:07:00 I was going to read something from Ruth Thurston's report about how much life the river had in it 100 years ago, but the actual point that Ruth Thurston wrote in her report was, we have to consider a timeframe of reference of what it was like then and what it's like now and where we can go. But she says the problem is that we forget, generationally, forget what it was like. Now, when I moved here in 1998, you could go down and put a little net out and get some bronze. That stopped around 1999, 2000 with the big floods, I believe. And my daughter, who's 21 years old, would not have a living memory of catching prawns in the river, so that we have a generation now that doesn't have a memory, a reference point to that.

01:08:00 So, talking about missing a month, it's emergency. We have got to act now. Let's not kick the can down the road. Let's listen to the residents. Let's finalize this. Get it done tonight, get the funding happening, stop the silt from getting in the river. We need to start moving. We cannot delay any longer. Thank you, Councillor Whitmer. Councillor Lorentson: I have some questions, just a couple of questions in regard to consultation, community consultation and support. Mentioned today through Councillor Stockwell was the 20 years of consultation, including the 2004 River Plan, the Anchoring and Mawring Strategy in 2008, River Community Jury in 2016, the rounds of consultation as part of the 2019 River Plan and the formation of the NSERAP between 2021 and 2023.

01:09:00 My question is, at what point did we raise the discussion around conservation park? And how many people in the community had that discussion? Have you consulted about the conservation part? Speaker 2: It's interesting because over many years, the issue of management of the river and what mechanisms might be suitable for management of the river have been looked at through various models and various times through those different groups. Council have no involvement in the river. It's a state responsibility to know there's no action, there's no investment. Council must, it's an important lifeblood for the Shire. Council should have management and some jurisdiction in the river.

01:10:00 And it's been the whole spectrum to be frank, Councillor Lorentson. Different models have been looked at, so marine parks have been looked at, regional management governance models have been looked at, river trusts have been looked at, foreshore reserves have been looked at over the time. It's only been in the last couple of months myself and the property officer were looking at the idea of reserves and what a reserve state is because we have reserves all around the Shire. What, how that could maybe be applied to, so Council has got some jurisdiction in the river over some aspects. So it's only a fairly new concept. It hasn't been widely discussed. It hasn't been consulted through that process. That's why in the plan it says consider, consider this as a mechanism and explore it with stakeholders to see whether it's something that might be suitable.

01:11:00 We as officers from our assessment have said, have looked at it and gone, it provides, it's the best mechanism we've found so far that provides the balance of both conservation, preservation, a seat at the table and some jurisdiction for Council and coexistence and enabling equally in the principles, commercial operations and commercial fishing. So it's, we thought it was a nice balanced mechanism that actually is worth exploring. And that's why we said, consider and do a proper and engaged process through the plan. Councillor Wegener: Councillor Weyman. It seems to me that we, exactly what you said, it's going to be a conversation about the conservation park and yes, isn't it redundant that C here to say that we're going to have a consultation about having a consultation about the conservation park,

01:12:00 have consultation. I mean, to me, C is not really required because it's already a consult. We're having, we're proposing a consultation about the consultation, about the conservation park. Speaker 2: So what I would say is A, very clearly says, adopt the plan for ongoing implementation, noting that implementation action plans will require further stakeholder engagement. So that action, consider the implementation or the exploring the option for the conservation park would need, would be done in consultation. There's about 60 actions in the plan. About 80 actions. 80 actions, well done, thank you. Each of them identifies partners. So if, I don't think there's one of them that doesn't require some level of collaboration, engagement, stakeholder, I believe state agency, across council, with community groups, with commercial operators.

01:13:00 So the whole plan really is founded on a collaborative governance model. And the plan talks very much about collaborative governance and ongoing stakeholder engagement. So it's a fundamental tenet that runs through all of the actions, not just this one. I'm not sure I've directly answered whether C was redundant, but maybe. Councillor Wegener: I think in generally you did, yeah. Councillor Wilkie: Kim, when you brought the feedback from the consultation on the river plan to a council workshop in June this year, and you drew our attention particularly to the conservation park, there's some pretty robust discussion. The council has interrogated you about what it actually means. There's since been a question from a really interested stakeholder, believing that this would give the council sole power, believing that this would give the council the sole power over the current fish habitat areas. Could you just clarify really, that's the base on that question.

01:14:00 Speaker 2: You're correct. We had a workshop about it, and we specifically spent some time and went over this twice. And there was lots of, you know, questioning of it. This, the conservation park wouldn't, to establish a conservation park needs agreement from Department of Environment and Science, KPWS, first and foremost, that that would be something they would be happy to establish a trustee arrangement with council. To get to that point, we would need to develop a management plan that is collaborative, and representative of all issues, and sets up a set of principles, and management structures about how the conservation park would be established. We have indicated, the plan indicates that it's absolutely not the intention, nor our understanding, nor our advice, professional advice, that the remit for approvals,

01:15:00 or any kind of remittances, or any kind of remittances, regulation of things like fisheries, would then come to council. That would not happen. It would continue to sit with the state, and is ministered under the head of the Fisheries Act. So, that's our current understanding of how the framework would work. Obviously, in terms of its management objectives, that's to be explored when, if we get a chance to consider it through the process. Yeah. Yeah. Councillor Wilkie: And so, with the current wording of the motion before us, it would be, staff would meet with these interested stakeholders, who are interested in the conservation park, have all the questions answered, get feedback about that, before moving to the point where we consider implementing it. Councillor Lorentson: Yes. Councillor Wilkie: Yeah. So, it's consultation before even considering implementing this.

01:16:00 This plan doesn't say implement the conservation park, it says consider it, and further consultation with the stakeholders is a key aspect of that. Speaker 2: I think it's actually a requirement of it, you know, to actually go through that process, and that's our absolute intention. Thank you. Councillor Lorentson: I'll speak to it. Yes, a couple of words. I'm not going to support the amendment in front of us. To me, I think the issue we have in front of us is an issue of public trust, and compromising public trust. Yeah. I feel, and then there's, you know, there's broad support for the Noosa River Plan, broad support in council, broad support in community, and there's possibly broad support for a conservation park, but the fact is that the community don't know about it, and to introduce it right now,

01:17:00 we run the risk of compromising public trust. Okay. And, you know, Councillor Wegener had a quote, I'm going to throw a quote in as well, which I think is really apt. Leadership is not a licence to do less, leadership is a responsibility to do more. And I ask today that we do more and allow the deferral of the matter so that, you know, either to the next meeting or possibly to a special meeting, we don't need to wait four weeks, we may be able to have a special meeting in two weeks. But what that does is allow stakeholders. The NSERAC, we had 14 members there who represented 14 community groups. And I received an email where eight of those members, and without naming them,

01:18:00 I'll just throw some quotes, said, no, it blindsided me. Never knew about the Noosa River Conservation Park. I'm disappointed that, you know, as a member of NSERAC, you know, not being involved, had never seen this draft before me. Absolutely the first I've heard of it. No, we were never given any indication than anything other. So I can keep rattling on, but the issue is they're not eight people. They're not eight people. They're eight groups of people. And some of these groups represent thousands of recreational community members. My kids, you know, my kids fish, my friends fish. So I just think that we need to allow every player to have a say in this policy

01:19:00 if we want it to succeed. So for that reason, I'm not going to support this and hope that everyone would just run with the 4-3 decision from the general meeting, which helps build public trust and reinforces, you know, what we keep saying as a council that, you know, public policy should be transparent, consultative, and should allow every player to have a say. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: I've got a question to the director. As I've mentioned in my open address, that one of the reasons council set up the advisory committee was to get a broad review of the Noosa River plan. My recollection is over a couple of the acting environment managers did endeavour to consult with the group on issues other than the ones focused on MSQ. Can you give me, the councilors, a bit of an update about how we endeavoured to involve ESRAC

01:20:00 in the wider river plan discussions and what the results of that endeavours were? Speaker 1: So, yes, through the chair, I guess there were a few staff changeovers which made things a little bit difficult and I think a bit stilted for the committee. Yeah, I can't hear. Mayor Stewart: Sorry, can you hear me now? Sorry, I need, sorry, just completed the QP department. Thank you. Speaker 1: So there were, I guess, a whole range of issues brought to the committee which have fed into this plan. There were issues relating to Frying Pan Track, for example, which ultimately, through our Eastern Beaches plan, led to an encroachments policy. This group has had a huge impact, I think, on council's policies along the way throughout the development of the plan and other plans. And in terms of specific consideration around the river plan, there was a dedicated subcommittee meeting that was held to discuss the river plan.

01:21:00 Unfortunately, we only had about half of the members come to that meeting and it sort of, it wasn't, it didn't bear much fruit. And I think that the feeling amongst the group was that they were very aligned on the issue of anchoring and mooring and given that we had MSQ as the co-chair at the table, that was the issue we really need to drive towards, along with anchoring and mooring, also sedimentation. So I think they were the really highlighted issues. But they wanted to see addressed in the river plan, which is why we've given them so much profile. Councillor Wilkie: The alternative motion that was raised on Monday was mentioned just by Councillor Wiles. What would it require in terms of staff resourcing to conduct public consultation over a month? And how long may that delay the plan?

01:22:00 What are the implications for staff resourcing? Speaker 2: Yeah, so through the Chair, it's not a planned program in our current plan of consultation. So we don't have resources allocated to it. There'll need to be some reshuffling and reprioritisation. And I guess it depends on the extent of consultation and what that looks like. If it's receiving information from externally and responding to questions, that's one thing. If it's actually doing a community consultation process, then I would suggest we don't have the resources or the budget to do that, Councillor Wilkie. We would have to have another conversation with council about how that should be resourced and funded. If it's just responding to questions, then that can be managed. So it really is going to depend on what the expectations are about what happens in that next month.

01:23:00 Councillor Jurisevic: Well, that was along the lines of where I was going with that. As far as resourcing goes and the expectation of councils at that meeting, what was the understanding of staff with regards to what 30 days would enable you or what one month would enable you to do with regard to feedback from the community on the plan? Speaker 2: I'm not sure that's a good question. Because the motion was put forward by a councillor in terms of what their expectations were. Councillor Jurisevic: I'm trying to look at all the minutes and what the minutes actually said in that regard. I don't think it specified anything in terms of what that would be like. It wasn't specific, so you didn't have any expectations in that regard. Mayor Stewart: Did you have any direction on that? Councillor Wilkie: Councillor Stewart, have you got your hand up? Mayor Stewart: Yes, thank you. Amy, just a question. Based on the fact that I had similar correspondence from Ms. Councillor Lorentson that eight out of eight NSERAC people who had been contacted

01:24:00 hadn't had any input to the River Plan, I guess, and I'm just wanting clarification from you, the main focus, wasn't it, was, the main concern was, as you said, around the liveaboards, the moorings and the anchorage, wasn't it, for that group? That was the focus. Speaker 1: Through the Chair, yes, but there were other issues that were brought to the group and commented on, including water quality objectives, a whole range of issues that they had input to. But in terms of understanding what the key issues that they wanted to address during their term, anchoring and mooring and liveaboards was number one, followed by sediment. And I just want to respond to something that was said earlier because I do really value the fact of the relationship that we've developed with the River Committee members. I think highly of them all for giving up their time over two long years, which was quite a painful process, I think, at times. And in terms of why we didn't bring

01:25:00 the conservation park concept to them, it's because it's very, very new and the committee had completed its term in March. So we did attempt to engage with our partner organisations about it, but because the committee had concluded its term, that's why they weren't specifically consulted on this. Speaker 2: And to add to that, Claire, the agenda for the NSRAC committee was very much driven by the members too. So the terms of reference and the scope of the NSRAC was much broader. But as we got into the process, it was really clear that there were some topics that they all were aligned on. And then the other more broader topics around the more broad river plan topics, only some of them were interested in. So they weren't getting the same sort of momentum as the issues that they were all aligned on, which ended up kind of driving the agenda

01:26:00 because they were really important issues. And the fact that we had a lot of people interested in getting momentum on it, we went with that momentum and they had great impact. Councillor Wilkie: Is it true that NSRAC is not the only source of feedback for this plan? They weren't the definitive authority on the direction this plan might take? Speaker 2: No, no, no, they weren't. And you can see the long list of... Councillor Wilkie: They can't be across everything. Speaker 2: No, they absolutely can't. Clearly they were very important stakeholders because they are representative of most of the issues in the catchment. But there's been a lot of individual meetings with community members, bush care groups, environment groups, all the state agencies, the voting alliance who weren't on NSRAC. So there's a raft of people being involved. Councillor Wilkie: And just to park back to the motion that was proposed on Monday, passed on Monday, about going out to public consultation before the plan is ratified.

01:27:00 Given that there's public consultation is part and parcel of the plan, once it's ratified, would that have been asking you to undertake a process of consultation about a process that engages, involves consultation? Consultation before we consult. Consultation about what we're going to consult on. Would that have been what you would have had to have done? Speaker 2: Let me ask a similar question. Yes, my understanding was that Monday's... decision, the motion on the table, was asking for another four weeks to consult on the plan, primarily on the concept of the conservation park from what, you know, what dominated the conversation. Because that's the newer element of the...

01:28:00 Councillor Jurisevic: Sorry, Mr Chair, can I just clarify? I've got the motion in front of me. And my understanding is it wasn't consultation. That is my understanding. Thank you. And the reason, the reason I state that is because what I agreed to was that item 6.1, the Noosa River Catchment Plan, be deferred to the next round of meetings to allow Councillors and other stakeholders an opportunity to consider the details and implications of the draft Noosa River Catchment Plan and provide feedback. Matthew Nofty: Thanks, Mr Chair. Councillor Jurisevic: It wasn't a forum. It was an opportunity for, for feedback to, to Council. Councillor Wilkie: It's not a form of consultation. Councillor Lorentson: Sorry. Because I moved the motion, that is correct, Councillor Joe Jurusevic. So, so the questions that I've been getting, and I'm asking yourself and Kim, you've probably been getting the same questions, are questions like what are the legal implications? So I think it was more the detail.

01:29:00 They wanted time to read the detail and provide a submission to Council about just their concerns and the issues that they needed clarity on. Speaker 3: Yeah. Councillor Lorentson: Look, I'll speak to the motion. Councillor Wilkie: Absolutely. Mayor Stewart: I've still got a question. Can I have a, can I, can I, will you speak, can I ask a question after that if you like? Councillor Wilkie: Yes, certainly. I'm going to support the motion because the alternate is really, after all these years and all the consultation that's gone on, it's untenable. Yes, it's about delaying the process to allow stakeholders to provide, get across the detail and provide their feedback, and that's been talked of in terms of consultation. Yes, the wording doesn't say consultation, but it's part of our discussion. We've been saying consultation, and that's consultation by another name. It's an absurdity to consent to delay a plan to have more consultation

01:30:00 before you implement a plan, that has consultation intrinsic to it before something like a conservation park is even considered to be implemented. It is paralysis by analysis. It's an absurdity. It's a yes minister situation. Consultation before we have the consultation. It's too much consultation. It requires, it requires a decision to be made, and I think because, as councillors have said, the main point of concern is the conservation park. But the plan says, consider implementing a consultation park. And the consultation is, sorry, a conservation park, a consultation is intrinsic to happen before that park is even considered to be implemented. Councillors, we were, had our attention brought to a conservation park.

01:31:00 The concept of a conservation park in June, a meeting in June 22nd. We've had, there was good discussion around the table at that meeting. It's not a surprise. We've had three months to ask questions of staff. The draft we've had in our hands since a week ago. There's been plenty of time for councillors to catch up with staff and have their questions, questions answered. I've received an email from the Boating and Fishing Alliance as well. They're really concerned that this will give council a, be the sole, have sole responsibility for a conservation park. It gives, as we know, as it says in the page 37 of the Noosa River Plan. He's, Councillor Wegener: excuse me, he's speaking to the motion. Councillor Wilkie: Sorry. Oh, sorry. A conservation park established in fish habitat areas of Noosa River under the Nature Conservation Act will provide the necessary statutory head of power for integrated river management. It will provide for council

01:32:00 to work in close alignment with state government under a trustee agreement, joint management plan and multi-agency coordination group. As the staff have said, it will give council a seat at the table, not be a passive observer. Otherwise, what we're looking at is a wish list. This will give council an opportunity to ensure a lot of these actions actually take place. And we, we can't just be focused on this one aspect of, which is quite timid, to consider the introduction of a conservation park. It's not, it's not bold. It's, it's not implement, it's not action a conservation park. It's consider that have it and there'll be consultation that have to take place before that. The alternate motion is tiptoeing away from that saying that we need to have consultation before we implement a process that will involve consultation before we even consider. It's a bit timid

01:33:00 so I can't support it. We've had plenty of time to get our heads around this. It is one of 80 actions. It's not even an action. It's considering an action. It's an absurdity to want more consultation and feedback about that. And yes, there are, no one can be across everything. The Noors Rack did a fantastic job in narrowing their focus down to anchoring and mooring which has been a grievance, a thorn in the side of this, the community about this river for two decades. They've done excellent work in getting some leverage with MSQ to finally take action on this very important issue. So there's a lot to like about this plan. I just don't think any more further delays at the final hour are justified. The motion we have before us, the last line,

01:34:00 there's two, part A and part C. Have further consultation with relevant stakeholders. Part C makes it specific about those that may be concerned about a conservation park. We'll get that feedback before we consider implementing a conservation park and that feedback will be integral to the direction we take regarding a conservation park. The motion on Monday is basically part C but that happens before we even implement something. So I just think it's paralysis, to go, the alternative motion is paralysis by analysis. That, the motion as it, so the plan as it pertains to the conservation park is very tame. I appreciate that everyone around this table wants to do a great job and implement good decision making on behalf of this community. But I think

01:35:00 this motion more than covers it. It's over-consulting. And there's plenty of wriggle room for those, there's plenty of opportunity within the process that will fall out of this motion before us for those that have concerns about the conservation park to have their say and their say will be respected. So please councillors, I implore you, support this motion so Noosa Council can finally have an endorsed Noosa management river catchment plan and get up to speed. We're back to where we should be. Councillor Lorentson: Thank you. I have a question through the chair. Yes, councillor. My question is, we're focusing a lot on the conservation park. To staff, have stakeholders contacted you regarding any other details in the Noosa river plan outside the conservation park and you know, I've got other issues

01:36:00 outside the conservation park such as construction of a pontoon. So is there other details that you're concerned about? Speaker 2: Yeah, we have had some other issues raised, most of which have been raised previously that we've known about through the process so that, you know, there's voting alliance of raised issues that, there's issues about the PWCs and, so they've also been raised in the last week. Like I said, most of them we've known about. Conservation park, it's the new concept, it's the new piece of the river plan that's probably been the main issue. Yeah, who did not contact us. Mayor Stewart, Councillor Wilkie: you've been very patient. Thank you. Mayor Stewart. Mayor Stewart: Thank you. Amy, just a question for you. Just on, I know you mentioned the Noosa Bodie Fishing Alliance and I know we've all received as have you, an email outlining their concerns and saying they had no knowledge

01:37:00 of the conservation park. If we were to, and I'm just coming back to the question about NSERAC, shouldn't be the only ones engaged, but if we were to send this plan out to all the stakeholders that you've mentioned in the back of the report, including Noosa Bodie Fishing Alliance, all the conservation groups, the Noosa River Stakeholder Advisory, I know it's defunct now, but the previous members representing a lot of the river users and thousands of people. If we were to send out the draft river plan to them via email, sorry, the river plan and ask for feedback within a couple of weeks, how is that, is that an impost on staff if it's that one email going out and I understand there'll be a collation of information coming back, but how would that look if you were to, within this timeframe, do that? So every stakeholder or person of interest that's been cited in here has an opportunity to actually read the finer detail of the river plan.

01:38:00 Speaker 2: Just in response to that question, we have emailed the river plan out to all of those stakeholders. That was emailed out last Friday. As soon as the river plan was made public, the agenda was made public, Amy said about emailing to everybody, so all the Noosa advisory committee, all the stakeholders, all the state agencies, all the partner organisations. So that first action's been done. Councillor Stewart? Mayor Stewart: So the feed, I guess, I'm guessing, Kim, and the response to that is, this is the first we've seen of it, so if we gave them the time to enable their feedback on it, what would that impost be to staff? Speaker 2: So the first action's been done, so there's no impost there. We could just do a follow-up email to say, you received the plan last Friday, you've got until this date to provide feedback. And then the resource implication will obviously depend on the amount of feedback that came back, Councillor Stewart. So in terms

01:39:00 of getting the plan out and getting an email to all those, that's an easy process and can be done very easily. Like I said, it'll just depend on whether we get 200 responses, five responses. So that's a little bit hard to predict. But yeah, I mean, based on who's contacted us, we've probably had half a dozen maybe, contacts. So if that was the number, then that would be manageable. Yeah, if that, if we can use who's been in contact with us this week as a sort of indication of who might provide a written response, then that would be a manageable process. Sorry, Speaker 1: through the chair just very quickly, Mayor, I guess the issue is with each of the actions, we're going to consult on them anyway. So for example, the River Marine Zone, which is not

01:40:00 a small process. So each of these actions that are going to be requested, I guess, are going to be consulted anyway. Councillor Jurisevic: That's my understanding within the 80 odd actions within the plan. Let's take that one as an example. There is an action in there that addresses that very matter. Is that correct? Yeah. Thank you. Councillor Wilkie: Any other councillors wish to speak to the motion before Councillor Stockwell closes? Councillor Jurisevic: Yeah, I will. Councillor Stockwell, I don't believe I'm saying this, but I won't be supporting the motion before us. Only because on Monday I gave the community assurance through the request by Councillor Lorentson and her motion to allow another 30 days for that feedback. I have no issues with what's before us and I want to make that clear. I have no problems

01:41:00 with the plan before us because what's clearly understood is that every one of these actions goes out for proper and due process. So I commend the staff for their time and effort in producing a well documented, a well articulated document. Although, as I've discovered, there are still things that haven't been covered. And one of the reasons that I support allowing that 30 days is because even I have discovered something in reading this that's missing. And that is, I don't see a lot of mentioning of anchoring. Anchoring and mooring was the thing that we just talked about, NSERAC being involved in, mooring specifically mentioned, but there's no, very little mention of anchoring. So I think there's scope here to still tweak this and improve it in the next 30 days to make sure that we cover those elements. And I do so on the basis of the, page seven, our regional government partners, I'll read you the paragraph that I think is relevant to make sure that this goes forward and goes forward with everybody's understanding

01:42:00 and cooperation and collaboration. That's for catchment management to be effective. There needs to be a concerted and coordinated approach, genuine commitment from all stakeholders and a willingness to invest. If we can get that as best as we can, I'm happy. That's it. I don't have any issues with the plan, but as I said, I gave a commitment last Monday and I intend to honour that commitment to allow that 30 days for any more or that period before the next meeting and a period to give staff time to collate and understand that information. And that's the way that read. It wasn't an open consultation process. It was merely an opportunity for feedback that may just come out of that feedback. Thank you. Councillor Wilkie: Feedback is collated. How is that going

01:43:00 to be put to council if we're requesting things to be cut out of this plan? It's taken years to collate. How is this feedback going to be presented to council and will that have to be thrashed out in a public forum? What's in? What's out? Speaker 2: I think I would suggest that like with any submissions and any information officers would assess that and form a position on it. We would then put that to council. We would possibly do a workshop with council as we do when we get feedback and consultation and say here's the findings. This is our analysis. This is the officer recommendation and these are the recommended changes we suggest to the report. We would then put that report to council and for your consideration. Councillor Wilkie: Or no changes? Speaker 2: Or no changes depending on what the feedback is. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you. Councillor Finzel. Councillor Finzel: Yeah, okay. Thank you everyone for the discussion around the table.

01:44:00 As always it's been robust. I thank the staff and I appreciate the amount of work that's gone on. I won't be supporting this tonight. I was supporting that amendment the other day. I feel that it has taken a long time. I don't think there can ever be too much opportunities for our community to have a say. Given this has been so long in the making I think that surely we can afford our community 30 days if there's something that's been missed or they would like another say. For outward facing engagement with our community, transparency and openness I think we owe it to our community to give them 30 days. The extent of the community concern by the people that contacted us after this came out is relevant

01:45:00 and is worthy of consideration. Purposeful leadership is about flexibility. It is about acknowledging where there's been things that could have been done better in the past and as we look forward to the future envisioning a future where every voice matters, where every concern is brought to the table and given a voice. Yeah, I understand the process. We've been told there was a deadline. There's this deadline. Speaker 2: Yeah, I get there's a deadline Councillor Finzel: but I have been voted here by my community on the proviso that I was outward facing and there was transparency and I would be their voice. If I don't give them representation at this point at this table based on my values which inform my leadership and that I

01:46:00 have to be able to sleep at night, I'm standing by my word to give my community an opportunity if they have concerns to be listened to if it's 30 days given 30 days. I think that's reasonable. I think we have a commitment to our community to work hard at engendering trust with a community who at some points of time has been satisfied around process and things that have happened. We even heard people come tonight and take the time and the effort to bring deputations before us around communication and engagement with the community. I'm not prepared to disregard people's concerns and efforts. It is about bringing our community with us through the journey and valuing their voice

01:47:00 at the table. Thank you. Mr Stockwell, Mr Price. Mayor Stewart: I have a question that's Shire Council Wilkie. Sorry, Councillor Wilkie: Ms Stewart, my apologies. Mayor Stewart: Thank you. Gone but long enough. I will not be supporting this either. From the information that we've all received, when eight out of eight people say they haven't had a chance or input or they were blindsided by the plan, it raises concerns. I acknowledge that there has been a tremendous amount of work done and the plan is a good one, but there are aspects that need to be done. As Jo said, we need their willingness to invest. That can only be done through continued consultation. This has not been an easy task. For many, many years, this has been an issue. Councillor Stockwell highlighted the timelines. So, an extra

01:48:00 or additional 30 days for community buy-in, for community support, for their willingness to get on board is not much to ask. Now, the words we do use are consider. We say those words in a lot of our strategies. We did it in our housing strategy, but we still put it out for a consultation. We still ask for feedback on those words, such as consider. When there wasn't a definite, we still mentioned those words and where the point was. There is only 30 days we are asking for in Councillor Lorentz's original amendment on Monday. I, like Councillor Drusevich, has said and Councillor Finzel, gave my word to the community that I would honour that commitment to that 30 days. I won't be deviating

01:49:00 today. It's good governance. It creates confidence and it's the right thing to do. So I won't be supporting Councillor Stockwell's motion. Thank you. Speaker 3: Thank you, Councillor Wilkie: Ms. Gillian. Councillor, sorry, Speaker 3: Mr. City Council. Just to clarify, sorry, we are talking, people are using the term 30 days. What we've talked about is the feedback. We'll have to establish a time for that. So we've got time to collate that feedback. So just to clarify that for us. Councillor Jurisevic: And the clarification that can occur through the email response from staff to the stakeholders. Absolutely. Councillor Stockwell. Sorry, the process being 30 days. Yes. Deputy Mayor Stockwell: We've heard a lot about what we owe the community. We owe the community good quality consultation and meaningful engagement.

01:50:00 That's what we've had over the last six years on and off. There have been big gaps. Suggestion to get to the next round of meetings is not good quality consultation. Be very mindful. Appearing to do the right thing is not doing the right We've had huge input on the river over many years. And the values are really well known. And this plan that our professional staff have recommended reflect the vast majority of the Noosa community. Getting alternative views from some people over the next couple of weeks to get into the next is not good community consultation. It's appearing to do the right thing. What this motion says is we'll consult on each issue in a meaningful way. Not in

01:51:00 tell us what you think. Because tell us what you think is actually contrary to our policy on community engagement. It seemed to be doing the right thing. There's no person who's put more time in trying to get good community engaged in this Noosa River plan than me over the last six years. I've probably spent hundreds of hours talking to staff, doing submissions, trying to get this to this point. And I know the consultation hasn't been We should be conserving and present the areas, the rivers cultural and natural resources and their values and should we provide for the permanent conservation of the rivers natural resources to the greatest possible extent, should we be providing opportunities for the river educational and recreational activities in a way that is consistent with the areas natural and cultural resources and values and should we be ensuring that commercial use of the river is ecologically sustainable.

01:52:00 Because don't be confused about what this is about. It's about challenging that as the principle because that's what the conservation park principles are. So when you vote, think about whether that's what we should be going to the community with and saying we want you to consider it because this is what we think is right for the river. Councillor Wilkie: Councillor Stockwell, put the motion those in favour. That's Councillor Swegner, Stockwell and Wilkie against. Councillor Gerisaville. Finzel, Stewart and Lawrenson, the motion's lost. We have another motion here. Someone care to move that? Councillor Lorentson. I'll second. Seconded by Councillor Stewart, Councillor Lorentson. Councillor Lorentson: That item 6.1 Noosa River Catchment Management Plan be deferred to the next round of meetings to allow councillors and other stakeholders an opportunity to consider the details and implications of the draft

01:53:00 Noosa River Catchment Plan. and provide feedback. Councillor Wilkie: Can the Councillor speak to this motion? Councillor Weiner. Councillor Wegener: No, Councillor Strong. I think your language is at hock. It's senseless. As Brian said, it's given the opportunity consider the details and willy-nilly to send this document since in reason that it is without Gustyn's nodig to do it, we would certainly choose to get it under control. No. Councillor Wegener: Information back that we will have to consider. It's not systematic. It's not process. It's not the way things should be. And I think it's going to just backfire tremendously upon us. And we will be looking at the council that kicked stuff down the road, didn't get it done.

01:54:00 So I just couldn't couldn't have the competency to actually get something done like this. Councillor Wilkie: Ms Wegener, any councillors wish to speak to the motion? No. Councillor Lorentson: Do you wish to close? I will close just in response to what Councillor Wegener just said. Over the last 20 years, there has been a lot of community consultation. We've gone through it. The 2004 River Plan, 2008 Anchoring and Law and Strategy. The River Community Jury in 2008. 2016, two rounds of community consultation as part of the updated 2019 Noosa River Plan and the NSERAC between 20 and 20, 2021 and 2023. Over the last 20 years, the notion of a conservation park was raised two months ago. The NSERAC, which represent 14 of all, most of the water users and land users of the Noosa River.

01:55:00 Um, eight of those water users and land users of the Noosa River. Sporting members said they knew nothing about a conservation park, um, nor about some of the other matters in the Noosa River plan. Again, the broad objectives of the Noosa River catchment plan are supported and possibly the, the, and not possibly, I'm sure that the, um, the conservation park will also be supported. The issue is the devil in the detail and what this motion does is request that the conservation park be supported. Understanding the implications, the legal implications of the issues and actions in the river plan. What are the reasons for a conservation park? What are the legal applications? What are the outcomes that council seeks to achieve? Clarity, articulating, coming clean

01:56:00 with what are the objectives. Again, I raise the issue of public trust and public policy. It must be transparent, consultative and allow all place to have a say. This is not kicking the can down the road. It's about just doing the right thing by our community. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you. I'll put the motion to the vote. Those in favour? Councillor Jarusevic, Finzel, Stewart and Lorentson. Those against? Councillor Wegener, Stockwell and Wilkie. The motion is carried. And now up to item 8.1, board and risk committee. Councillor Stewart. Mayor Stewart: Yes, thank you. I have to leave. Thank you. I've got, I call commitments. I beg your pardon. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you Councillor Stewart. Mayor Stewart: Yes, thank you. Thank you everyone. Thank you. Thanks. Councillor Wilkie: Okay, you've got to go too. Yes. Okay. Item 8.1, Councillor Stockwell is leaving the meeting as well. Board and risk

01:57:00 report. Item 5, audit, internal audit, payroll. Item 6, 2023 Audit and Risk Committee briefing paper. Item 7, risk management, BCP update. Item 8, internal audit, actions update. Item 9, ICT, cyber risk update. Item 12, confidential matter about insurance management update. Item 13, confidential matter regarding fraud, corruption and PID update. Can I have a move and a seconder that the report of the Audit and Risk Committee dated 22nd of August 2023 to be received. So moved, Chair. Recommendation. So moved, Chair. I beg your second. Thank you. Moved, Councillor Joucevic. Seconded, Councillor Lorentson. All in favour? That's unanimous. We now move on to the Planning and Environment Committee report. Flying Fox State and the management intent. 5.2, application for reconfiguring a lot, one into two lots at 28 Sandow Drive, Tewantin, which was referred to the General Committee. Item 5.4, application for a hospital and healthcare service, day surgery and associated

8.1 AUDIT & RISK COMMITTEE REPORT- 22 AUGUST 2023 ¶

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Nothing was transcribed under this heading — a stretch of the recording with no speech the model could make out.

8.2 PLANNING & ENVIRONMENT COMMITTEE REPORT - 12 SEPTEMBER 2023 ¶

▶ 01:57:51

01:58:00 facilities, 47 Goodchap Street, Tewantin. Item 6.1, planning applications decided by delegated authority. Councillor Finzel. Oh. The COI for the delegated authority item. Councillor Finzel: What was that? Is that one that you're reading out? Yeah. Councillor Lorentson: Page 8 of the report count. Page 8 of the report count. Councillor Finzel: Thank you. I, Councillor Finzel, inform the meeting I have a declarable conflict of interest in this matter. As on March 5, 2020, Mr Peter Butt, who is an applicant listed on the delegated report, applicant number one, donated $1,666.66 to my 2020 election campaign. I was one of three candidates that ran as a group known as Future Noosa, which is no longer an entity. Although I have a declarable conflict of interest, I do not believe a reasonable person could have a perception of bias because the decision has already been made under delegated authority

01:59:00 and the report is for noting only. Therefore, I will choose to remain in the meeting room. However, I will respect the decision of the meeting on whether I can remain and participate in the decision. Councillor Wilkie: I'll move. I'll move. I'll move. Councillor Finzel. We note the report, declarable conflict of interest by Councillor Finzel, determinants in the public interest. Councillor Finzel remains and participates and votes on this matter because the decision has already been made under delegated authority and the report is for noting only. I'll second that. Thank you, Councillor Jeliciewicz. Any further discussion? Councillor Jurisevic: Only the fact that as the report is for noting only, there is no decision-making process Councillor Wilkie: So the general committee recommendation is carried. That's, sorry, Councillor Lorentson, seconded Councillor Finzel. Speaker 3: Yep. Councillor Wilkie: That's in favour. That's carried unanimously.

02:00:00 Can I have a mover and a seconder for the adoption of the Planning and Environment Committee recommendation, except where dealt with by separate resolution? Councillor Jurisevic: So moved. Councillor Wilkie: Councillor Siricity, seconded. Councillor Finzel in favour. Councillor Wegener: We're not at the 5.1 yet. No. Councillor Wilkie: No. Councillor Wegener: Okay. Just making sure. Councillor Wilkie: We're now up to item 8.3, Services and Organisation Report, which was a confidential matter regarding a not contract with the provision of concrete crushing services. Can I have a mover and a seconder for the adoption of those services? And that's Organisation Committee Recommendations, Councillor Siricity, seconded by Councillor Lawrence, and all in favour? That's unanimous. We're now up to item 8.4, the General Committee Meeting Report, Application for Other Change to Development Approval, Integrated Permaculture Design, Organic Orchard and Golf Course Complex, 18 Holes to Include Group Farmstay Accommodation and Associated Supporting Infrastructure at 59 Covey Road, Cootharaba.

8.3 SERVICES & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE REPORT - 12 SEPTEMBER 2023 ¶

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8.4 GENERAL COMMITTEE REPORT - 18 SEPTEMBER 2023 ¶

▶ 02:00:47

02:01:00 Councillor Wegener. This is me. Oh. This I am. Oh. My question. We have a motion though. Okay. We'll still go with this one. Conflict. Councillor Wegener. Councillor Wegener: I, Councillor Tom Wigener, inform the meeting that I have a declarable conflict of interest upon request to staff for permaculture. Upon a request to staff for the permaculture report which was mentioned in the applicant's submission, it was revealed that the permaculture report was written by Tom Kendall, a local permaculture expert. As the president of the community group Permaculture Noosa. I have learned from Tom Kendall and visited his permaculture property. However, he is not a personal friend and I do not socialize with him outside of our common interests of permaculture. I believe I can make a judgment in the public interest.

02:02:00 Therefore, I will choose to remain in the meeting room. However, I will respect the decision of the meeting on whether I can remain and participate in the decision. Councillor Jurisevic: Councillor Hussing. I'll move that. Council move the scribble in front. The council note the declarable conflict of interest by Councillor Wegener to determine that Councillor Wegener can participate and vote on this matter because council believes that as Mr. Kendall is not a close associate of Councillor Wegener and that a reasonable person would trust the final decision he's made in the public interest. Councillor Wilkie: We have a seconder to that please. Seconder, Councillor Lorentson. Councillor Jurisevic: I do so on the basis of consistency with previous decisions on this matter. Councillor Wilkie: Any other councillors? No. I'll put it to the vote. Those in favour? That's unanimous. Councillor Wegener did not vote. Now we have a motion that the council note the report by the acting coordinator planning assessment to the planning and environment committee meeting regarding application for another change to development approval, integrated permaculture design, organic orchard and golf

02:03:00 course complex to include group farm stay accommodation and associated supporting infrastructure situated. And note that the applicant has stopped the current period. Okay, so we have a move for that, please. I'll move. Councillor Jo, seconded by Councillor Finzel. Councillor Jurisevic: Any discussion? Just to clarify, question to staff in this regard. Just for those people that aren't familiar with what occurs when an applicant puts in a stop motion, can you just inform the community of what the current actions are? Yes, thank you. Through the Chair, the applicant has opted to stop. Nick Cook: What that means, essentially, Speaker 4: is it stops the decision-making period, so when able to make a decision at this point in time, they've requested a three-month deferral on the ability to make a decision, and there'll be further engagement with the applicant during this period, Nick Cook: and we'll bring back a further report, potentially, in the future. Councillor Wilkie: Thank you. Thank you.

02:04:00 Put it to the vote, those in favour? That's unanimous. 7.3, confidential not for public release, contract variation for project, management services for the 2022 flood recovery and reconstruction. Can I have a mover and a seconder for the adoption of the general committee recommendations, except it's dealt with separately. Sorry. Councillor Jurisevic: Sorry, there were two motions after the first one. You've only mentioned one, I believe. Councillor Wilkie: First one, 7.1, contract for cleaning of open space and public amenities, confidential planning and environment court appeal, application for multiple dwelling units, clearing of vegetation at 11 Seed Church Street, Pomona, and also the contract variation for project management services for 2022 flood recovery and reconstruction. We have a mover and a seconder for the adoption of the general committee recommendations. Happy to move. Moved by Councillor Lorentson,

02:05:00 a seconder by Councillor Wegener. All in favour? That is unanimous. There are no reports direct to the ordinary meeting. We have no new confidential items. We have no submissions for public question time. Brings us to the end of the agenda. The next ordinary meeting will be held at Council Chambers at nine, Pelican Street, on Thursday, 26th of October at 5pm. The meeting closed at 7.06pm. And I thank everyone for their attendance and patience. Thank you, Mr Chair. Thank you, Mr Chair. Thank you. Mr CEO.

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Council's recording ends before this item. Where a meeting resolved to close its doors, that is what the end of the recording means — see what council discussed in private.