NEWS DESK
Shopping centre expansion considered LXRP to fund A DECISION on an eight storey building at Bayside Shopping Centre has been deferred by Frankston Council. Council deferred consideration of the permit application due to issues related to the provision of parking spaces. The complex, which would include a basement level carpark, shops, and office spaces, requires the provision of 3416 parking spaces from the existing Bayside Shopping Centre. Cr Colin Hampton said he “had a feeling [they] needed to double check how many spaces were actually part of the Bayside Shopping Centre (…) and they’ve come up very short”. Council officers found there to be only 3070 spaces available in the proposal. Had the council voted for the application, Cr Hampton said it would
have cost the area over 300 car spaces. With parking availability within the Frankston CBD already an issue, Cr Steve Toms was concerned about the further impact the proposal could have. “If there is this shortage going forward (…) it will be an absolute nightmare for residents and existing businesses in our CBD,” he said. Councillors have called for Vicinity Centers, the owner of the shopping centre, to work with them to find a solution. Cr Hampton said he “would love the development to go ahead” and asked Vicinity to “please come to the party”. A decision on the application was deferred to a future council meeting pending further investigation. The application was first put before council
on 20 July, making this is the second time it has been deferred. The issue may be taken out of council’s hands before it can be considered again. In a letter to the mayor dated 17 July, the planning minister wrote that he was considering preparation of a planning scheme amendment to directly enable the construction of the building. Frankston mayor Sandra Mayer said “if the [the state government] are going to take it out of our hands, these are our concerns”. Claudia Skubel
PLANS for an eight storey building at Bayside Shopping Centre.
new projects THE Level Crossing Removal Project will hand over $3.5 million to council if it agrees to take over the maintenance of multiple assets created through recent rail line works. Frankston Council officers have been directed by councillors to finalise negotiations with the LXRP over what assets will be handed over. They are expected to include shared use paths, drainage infrastructure, car parking, and public lighting. If a memorandum of understanding is signed and council takes on maintenance of the assets, the LXRP will contribute $3.5 million towards council projects. Among the projects council has nominated to be funded with the money include construction of a shared use path between Cricklewood Avenue and Beach Street along Dandenong Road East, delivery of the Kananook Creek Interpretative Trail, construction of shared use paths on Seaford Road and Skye Road, and construction of car parking and kerb works along Bardia Street. Frankston councillor Kris Bolam said that the funding would also “all but guarantee that the Kananook arboretum will proceed”. “We have worked really hard to get this outcome and now we have successfully gotten this funding win. The money council has initially earmarked for this project, $536,000, can be redirected to helping the community deal with the ongoing impact of the COVID crisis,” he said. “The task now is to ensure that the funding can cover everything that has been envisaged for the arboretum and proceeds on time and on budget”.
In February Frankston Council voted unanimously to spend $30,000 on a detailed concept design for the arboretum project. They also voted to “note the estimated total project cost is $672,500” and “authorise council officers to seek external funding for the entire project through the state government”. Work in Seaford undertaken by the LXRP earlier this year drew negative attention from long-time supporters for the arboretum project (“Fears for long held arboretum hopes”, The Times, 25/5/20) Council officers estimate that the annual cost to ratepayers for maintenance and depreciation of the LXRP assets is $345,700, including a seven per cent contingency. Brodie Cowburn
Election enrolment is closing soon LOCAL residents have just over a week left to enrol to vote in this year’s council elections. The electoral roll will close at 4pm on 28 August. The election is set to be held by post in October. Victorian Electoral Commissioner Warwick Gately said “if you’re an Australian citizen and you’ve recently turned 18 or moved, and haven’t enrolled or updated your address, or if you’ve just closed your post office box with Australia Post, you can enrol or update your details online at vec.vic. gov.au/enrolment,” he said. Non-Australian citizens who pay rates on a property or business in the Frankston municipality, as well as people who live outside the area but pay rates for a property they own in Frankston can call the council to enrol. Non-residents who were enrolled at the last election will be automatically enrolled. For more information call 131 832.
No buts to delaying no-smoking rules Keith Platt keith@baysidenews.com.au IN a strange twist of fate, Mornington Peninsula Shire’s efforts to combat one known source of death and illness is being hampered by another, totally unexpected threat. However, councillors last week voted against deferring the creation of nosmoking areas, telling CEO John Baker to “ensure that the smoke-free policy is implemented as soon as practical”.
In doing so they have rejected a recommendation by one of their own senior officers to delay implementing the Smoke Free Environment policy because of the COVID-19 pandemic. VicHealth says 4000 Victorians die of smoking-related preventable deaths each a year at an estimated cost of $5 billion. Data from 2018 shows that 10.7 per cent of Victorian adults regularly smoke, down from 13.5 per cent in 2015. Ailments attributable to tobacco smoking include lung cancer, heart
disease, stroke, asthma, premature, low birth weight babies and diabetes. Community safety coordinator Talana Cook in a report to council’s Tuesday 11 August meeting urged councillors to wait for an “action plan for the staged implementation” of the policy rather than bring forward the second stage to 21 December this year. “The impact of the COVID-19 global pandemic on resourcing availability, ability to engage stakeholders and implementation activities, further strengthens the argument for a pri-
oritised and staged approach to implementation,” Ms Cook stated. Cr David Gill told The Times that councillors had “got the delay [in implementing stage two of the anti-smoking policy] stopped”. “Nothing was done last year and nothing this year,” he said. “We’ve had the community onto us to do something, but as soon as it got a bit hard nothing was done.” The first stage of the smoke-free policy would be relatively easy as it aims at restricting smoking at council
properties and events. However, stage two involves stopping smoking in outdoor dining and drinking areas, on beaches, at foreshore camping areas and council reserves. Ms Cook’s report, supported by a 47-page summary co-authored by environment protection manager John Rankine and consultant Cindy Stubbs, said the Shire’s ability “to engage effectively with key stakeholders has been removed in the current ‘lockdown’ environment”.
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Frankston Times
18 August 2020
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