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24 June 2005

"Pressures on a Community - Redfern Waterloo" ANTaR Forum 25th June 2005 2-4.30 PM Redfern Town Hall / REDWatch Monthly Meeting 2pm Sunday 26th June 2005 at Redfern Community Centre / Consultation on Lawson Street Health Centre / RWA Act Amendments / Minister Sartor’s SBS Interviews / Redfern Oval

Follow the links below to go direct to the story of interest:

"Pressures on a Community - Redfern Waterloo" ANTaR Forum 25th June 2005 2-4.30 PM Redfern Town Hall

REDWatch Monthly Meeting 2pm Sunday 26th June 2005 at Redfern Community Centre

Consultation on Lawson Street Health Centre

RWA Act Amendments

Minister Sartor’s SBS Interviews

Redfern Oval


“Pressures on a Community – Redfern Waterloo” ANTaR Forum 25th June 2005 2-4.30 PM Redfern Town Hall

This ANTar forum entitled “Pressures on a Community – Redfern Waterloo” is aimed at informing ANTaR members and the community about what is happening Redfern Waterloo. Speakers will include representatives from the Aboriginal Housing Company, The metropolitan Land Council and REDWatch. For further info phone 95556138.

REDWatch Monthly Meeting 2pm Sunday 26th June 2005 at Redfern Community Centre

REDWatch has its monthly meeting this Sunday. Kristina Keneally ALP MP for Heffron will be guest speaker on recent RWA developments. Anyone with an interest in what is happening in the area is welcome to attend. Information about REDWatch can be found at www.redwatch.org.au

Consultation on Lawson Street Health Centre

The Miller Group has been appointed to do the consultation on the proposed Lawson Street Centre. They expect to start the consultation in the beginning of July and plan to talk to individuals and groups about their comments on the proposal. We have been in contact with the consultants and as soon as there is information about the consultation we will pass them on in an email update.

Rev Fred Nile has been asking questions in Parliament of John Della Bosca about the needle van http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/hansart.nsf/V3Key/LC20050622025 .You may also recall a few weeks ago we provided the detail of Greens MLC Sylvia Hale’s question on notice to the Premier. We thought you might like to see Premier’s few considered words in response.

PREMIER—REDFERN HEALTH FACILITY—Ms Hale asked the Special Minister of State, Minister for Commerce, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Disability Services, Assistant Treasurer, and Vice-President of the Executive Council representing the Premier, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Citizenship—

(1)            In regards to the Government’s response of 22 February 2005 to the Legislative Council Inquiry into Redfern Waterloo, which stated that “The Redfern Waterloo Partnership Project will facilitate community consultation on the services to be provided by the Community health facility in April 2005” (p.12), and which also noted that “the creation of the community health facility will be complemented by a community based education campaign on the rationale for harm minimisation”; and the development proposal submitted to the City of Sydney Council for the Lawson Street Health Centre (D05/00520, 120-122 Lawson Street) on 29 April 2005 to convert the building into a community health service:

(a)            Was community consultation undertaken prior to the submission of the development application?

(i)    If not, why not?

(b)            Was a harm minimisation education campaign undertaken in advance of the development application?

(i)    If not, why not?

(c)            Was the undertaking to “facilitate community consultation on the services to be provided by the community health facility in April 2005” honoured?

(i)    If not, why not?

(ii)   When will the community consultation and education campaign occur?

Answer—

(1) (a) to (c)  I am advised that:

The Lawson Street community health centre was proposed in response to previous community concerns about the mobile needle and syringe service and evidence provided at the Upper House inquiry into Redfern and Waterloo.

Consideration by the City of Sydney Council of the development application for the health centre has been deferred until a community consultation has taken place. This will commence in June 2005.


RWA Act Amendments

As part of the EPA Act amendment there were changes made to the RWA Act to bring it into line with the changes. These amendments are attached so you do not need to go through the EPA amendments to find that which relates directly to the RWA. We are still waiting for planners to digest the recent EPA changes and advise us specifically on how this may impact on the RWA and the Minister Sartor’s powers in Redfern Waterloo. We have earlier covered some of the EPA changes in our updates but you may also be interested in a recent article about the changes by Elizabeth Farrelly http://www.smh.com.au/news/elizabeth-farrelly/new-planning-code-trust-us-were-the-experts/2005/06/21/1119321721713.html

Minister Sartor’s SBS Interviews

In our last email we provided a link to the SBS Radio site for the interview with Minister Sartor about the Block. The SBS site only carries the most recent interviews and the Minister’s audio disappeared from their site a short time later. Hopefully the interview will be put up on the SBS web site soon so people can hear the Ministers views on this important topic. If not, we have a recording and we will look at putting a 4.3 MB MP3 version up on the REDWatch site. In the meantime if you have broadband and want us to email you the recording please email us. SBS TV Living Black did an interview with the Mick Mundine and the AHC in this weeks show in response to the Ministers comments and this can be found at http://news.sbs.com.au/livingblack/ and then click on the “Watch a clip from last weeks episode” which will give you a transcript of the interview.

Redfern Oval

The month delay by the City of Sydney in making a recommendation on the Oval has been extended. Yesterday the CFMEU reiterated their Green Ban on the site and veteran Green Ban campaigner Jack Mundy has also entered the fray http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story.jsp?sectionid=1260&storyid=3332819 . The Daily Telegraph reported that ‘The ban means no construction work will be done on the site until Sydney City Council "properly consults the community and accommodates the reasonable needs and expectations of the Rabbitohs football club and the local indigenous community", CFMEU NSW president Peter McClelland said.’

OUR Park, the community group campaigning through last years consultation for the Oval to be opened up to community use were happy with the Council’s initial report but have been unable to get any information about what is currently being discussed between Council, the ILC and the football club. They are keen to ensure that the residents who oppose the Oval being locked up are involved in the discussions as early as possible otherwise there is a risk that Council will come to an accommodation with the Football Club which is then opposed by the residents who have not been consulted over the changed proposal.

If the CFMEU is to maintain their credibility in its Green Ban over the oval it needs to also talk OUR Park and understand that there is substantial community opposition to George’s dream of Redfern Oval being an NRL ground once again. These people are not necessarily opposed to some of the other uses being discussed provided the community can have access to the area and use it for sporting and recreational activities. The CFMEU has to ensure that community opposition is listened to and not just the Football Club. Otherwise the hard fought battles that bought together residents’ groups and people like Jack Mundy in the “Green Bans” to oppose inappropriate developments will be bought into question in the way they have been in Clover Moore’s response to the Green Ban.