Council staff recommend Peninsula land be kept
Central Coast Council staff have recommended the council "discontinue the consideration for sale" of all but one of its proposed land sales on the Peninsula.
The recommendation will go to tomorrow night's council meeting (Tuesday, July 27) for adoption.
The exception is the sale of part of the Austin Butler reserve in Woy Woy to Peninsula Plaza.
Staff have recommended that Council reclassify part of the reserve from community to operational land and to sell it for not less than the market value.
Removed from the sale list are the Bullion St carpark in Umina and the manufactured home park land in Fassifern St, Ettalong.
Also removed are the "pocket parks" at Memorial Ave, Brisbane Ave and Angler St.
The staff recommendation does not provide the rationale from removing these properties from the list.
A community consultation report noted arguments put by respondents included loss of green space, loss of parking and over-development.
It quoted examples:
"Loss of these natural areas in our local area would be loss of habitat for many of our fauna species and of samples of remaining vegetation species and have a negative effect on the well-being of community and individuals.
"Loss of these well-loved spaces, as proven by the past (2015-16) reaction to proposed sell-offs, and the current concern, indicates their value to the community."
"The sale of community land is actually a sale of amenity land.
"This land has attributes and values that make a positive contribution to people's quality of life."
"These small parcels of green space are so important in high density housing areas such as the Peninsula.
"The small gain achieved from the sale is far outweighed by the benefit to local families by having a small relief from concrete and gives the opportunity to plant shade."
"The community will be impacted by the loss of community and green space in favour of development and short-term financial gains.
"We can never get these spaces back again and we do not consent to the sell off of our assets."
It also reported that a petition of 875 people opposed the sale of the Bullion St carpark and another petition of 96 people opposed the sale of the Brisbane Ave reserve.
The consultation report included a council staff response to the themes of the submissions.
However, the responses seemed to justify the inclusion of the properties in the list, rather than any explanation of the ultimate recommendation to exclude particular properties.
Member for Gosford Ms Liesl Tesch put it down to weight of numbers opposing the sales and "people power".
SOURCE:
Central Coast Council agenda 2.1, 27 Jul 2021