Friday, 25 June, 2021
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Riding a wave of change
Hot seat with Richard Stephens
The big wide world of Costa
36-page liftout Property Guide
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INSIDE
PR OP ER TY
CHAP roundtable By Margaret Maccoll
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Noosa Mayor Clare Stewart instigated a stakeholder roundtable discussion this week “to find a set of suitable solutions for Noosa’s Coastal Hazard Adaptation Plan (CHAP)”. “It’s important that we listen to the views of all stakeholders as well as provide detailed information on the overarching reasons for such a plan,” Cr Stewart said. The meeting comes almost three months after the Eastern Beaches Protection Association (EBPA) say they have waited for answers to questions about a “secret pre-emptive letter to the State asking for unjustified adverse planning restrictions before consultation had even occurred”. Peregian Family and Friends said they were disappointed by the information discovered by EBPA through a Right to Information (RTI) request. “On 29th July last year, Noosa Council staff covertly told the State Government it planned to amend the town planning scheme via reference to the draft Coastal Hazard Adaptation Plan (CHAP) - nearly six months prior to the community consultation process began,” Peregian Family and Friends vice-president Leigh McCready said. “The community expects and deserves transparency from its council,” she said. Council has invited to the roundtable delegates from seven groups: Hastings St Association, Eastern Beaches Protection Association, Eastern Beaches Bushcare Collaborative, Noosa North Shore Residents Association, Noosaville Business Association, Peregian Family and Friends Association, Peregian Beach Community Association. EBPA spokeswoman Minna Knight said their group had accepted council’s invitation to the meetings and would put forward “workable fixes based on science, actual risk probability and the lessons of CHAP in other Queensland coastal council areas”. Those include ensuring the CHAP focuses more on practical beach and waterway erosion control and inundation management, invests in scientifically robust monitoring of areas like dunes to better quantify dune movement, puts more resources into community and volunteer dune and waterway vegetation and management and removes unjustified and costly prescriptions harming homes based on rare risks admitted by the model of “less than 1 per cent” in 50 to 80 years’ time. “We have been working constructively with local decision makers in our effort to promote practical solutions to the serious problems of the current draft CHAP, including the Mayor, Councillors, State MP Sandy Bolton and Federal Member Llew O’Brien,” Ms Knight said. Continued page 12
Noosa’s Olympic hopeful Kareena Lee is farewelled at Noosa Heads Surf Club on Sunday.
Cheering Kareena in Olympic send-off Olympic hopeful Kareena Lee will train for her 10km ocean swim at the 2020 Tokyo Games at the University of the Sunshine Coast.
The 31 degree pool will mirror the muggy conditions expected at the Olympics. Following her month at USC she will spend a week in Darwin before a quick trip
to Japan to compete in her event and leave. She was farewelled by Olympians Dawn Fraser and Benny Pike at the Noosa Surf Club. See full story on page 6