On 23 April the Westlakes community ‘celebrated’ the second anniversary of the stalemate on Toronto’s foreshore.On 23 April 2018, without any public consultation, Council decided to go ahead with a 4-6 storey ‘mixed use development’ (= apartment tower) on the Toronto foreshore at Bath Street, next to the Yacht Club. All other options were immediately set aside and Council locked in.
Then on 23 September last year, after sustained community opposition, including a 5,000+-signature petition (which Council treated contemptuously), a well-attended public meeting, much letter writing, a tortuous freedom-of-information request and sustained lobbying, the Mayor and Council finally relented and agreed to defer the Bath Street development and incorporate the site into the Foreshore Masterplan.
Seven months later we are still waiting for tangible signs of progress from LMCC.
They were astounded to learn that the option of a commercial development, which Council had deferred in September last year, was still a live option for a Sustainability Review now under way.
To try and understand why LMCC was still spending money on consultants to review an option on which Council had already deferred ‘all work’, Howard and Nico wrote to Ms Kendall (cc. The Mayor and CEO) on April 8 and received a prompt reply (April 9).
Most of Ms Kendall’s reply, understandably, defends the position of Council staff in implementing Council’s September 2019 six-point resolution.
Two particular points, however, may well deserve community scrutiny.
First, “It would not be appropriate for me, or any other Council officer, to exclude specific options from the sustainability review based on political unpopularity.”
Second, “It is a complex resolution, with six parts that need to be implemented in a logical sequence. To do otherwise would likely create further uncertainty in the community in the medium and long term, and involve inefficient use of public resources.”
*Readers may best judge for themselves how to interpret these sentiments but on the face of it they suggest that LMCC has little commitment to democracy in local government.
To recap, in April 2018 Council took a very important decision affecting the community without any community consultation. In August 2019, Council responded to community opinion and the Mayor apologised. Now the commercial development option has been resurrected, contrary to Council’s decision, and notwithstanding that it is ‘politically unpopular’. And resurrection of this toxic ‘option’ is justified on grounds that responding to the Toronto community’s demand for recreational open space might create ‘uncertainty’!
Meanwhile, the community still awaits the draft Foreshore Masterplan, which seems to have been subordinated to a Sustainability Review. ‘Complex’ begins to seem like an excuse.
Strange times indeed.
Because local government elections have been postponed until September 2021, the current Council will be in place for the next 17 months. Plenty of time to assess who is running the show in Lake Macquarie and in whose interests.
Didn’t someone once say that the price of Liberty is eternal vigilance?
* The correspondence can be read in full on the TFPG website http://tfpg.org.au/
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