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Collapse Issue 433 - 27 Nov 2017Issue 433 - 27 Nov 2017
Collapse  NEWS NEWS
Nursing home refusal to be reviewed
Woy Woy police station may get officer-in-charge
Sporties' plan attracts 30 submissions so far
Council abandons Australia Day celebrations
Wicks claims achievements
'Dire need' to monitor oyster leases, says Tesch
Ferry service disruptions continue
Charity ball exceeds fund-raising target
MP to hold youth forum
Blaze burns in national park
New interview room at Mary Mac's Place
Mary Mac's collects for Christmas hampers
Guide issued for objectors to Sporties' proposal
Club plans to raise funds through to Christmas
Night work on Rip Bridge
Council agrees to meeting about Umina oval
Group starts to promote shade trees
First fair for the Bays
Call to control cotoneaster
Local charity appoints new chief
Bays' committee members step down
Information walk about bushfire hazard reduction
Collapse  FORUM FORUM
What is the future of the Peninsula?
Loss of iconic club would be huge
Unanswered questions show need for transparency
Creeks are the best form of drainage we have
Lions Park entrance is a major asset
Good public performance venues needed
Clubhouse is not abandoned
They will not supply a dredge - stop asking
We need sharply-focussed and sophisticated plans
Collapse  HEALTH HEALTH
Aged care provider was awards finalist
Collapse  ARTS ARTS
Jazz played in arboretum
Choir performs for Mary Mac's
Rotary plans Opera in the Arboretum
History book about The Bays
Collapse  EDUCATION EDUCATION
School raises issue of 'inappropriate cyber interactions'
Students help collect soil for memorial
Orchard Hills girls help clean up the Peninsula
School celebrates 90th birthday
New furniture and equipment
Learning about dogs
Students write for Christmas exchange
Celebration
School musical praised
Students sing at shopping centre
Ball games carnival
Collapse  SPORT SPORT
New equipment brings pool to Olympic standard
Umina boxer set for the Commonwealth Games
Killcare surf club rookies go to camp
Charity bowls at Sporties
Fitness program awaits funding approval

We need sharply-focussed and sophisticated plans

?, PN, November 13, 2017) echoes my own letter of October 16 in which I commended Mayor Smith's comment that the future of the Peninsula required "thought" and suggested how that thought might be fleshed out.

However, Mayor Smith's "thought" for the Peninsula doesn't seem to have gone any further than that one paragraph in the newspaper, and we are still being faced with proposals, such as the Sporties project, that have no rational framework for assessment.

Mayor Smith has to do more than just think (vide the Kangy Angy catastrophe and the Gosford CBD snafu) to get Central Coast development on track and to justify her full-time salary.

We expect more than weekly anodyne paragraphs in the local throw-away for our money, but what evidence is there that the Council has taken a single active step towards resolving the crucial issues facing the region?

Much is being made of the upcoming Community Strategic Plan, as it makes its way through the turgid waters of the preparation process.

However, both Gosford and Wyong had a Community Strategic Plan, and what concrete results have we seen emerging from these plans?

My hope is that the independently-produced Community Plan for the Central Coast (CPCC) can be given a more action-oriented format and used as a template for policy identification at the next Council election.

However, this will still not provide the detailed technical structure required for day-to-day management of housing/infrastructure/environmental co-ordination in specific neighbourhoods: these structure plans require comprehensive studies (not evident in the Gosford CBD planning now supposedly underway) and analysis in their preparation.

The pathetic lack of factual underpinning for the so-called Regional Plan underlines the weakness of the instruments on which we currently rely.

We don't need bigger plans: the Gosford Development Control Plan alone runs to 123 pages, and what good has that done us?

We need sharply-focussed and sophisticated plans that we can rely on over a reasonable period of time, not cumbersome documents that invite frequent spot rezoning and variations with no long-term goal.

It would be even better if the Council took an active development role, instead of sitting passively by and merely reacting to initiatives from outside parties, but that is probably asking too much of the limited imagination of our councillors.





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