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14 JULY, 2021
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Apartment complex in lockdown
Protesters outside Hobson Bay council building last week, protesting against weekly bin collection. (Damjan Janevski) 243393_01
Weekly bins stay By Goya Dmytryshchak Four Hobsons Bay councillors who voted to restore weekly garbage collection doubled down on their position at an emergency meeting they called last Thursday. The meeting was called in response to a notice of rescission, or bid to overturn a June 29 decision to restore the weekly collection. The move to rescind was made by mayor Jonathon Marsden and councillors Peter Hemphill and Pamela Sutton-Legaud. Deputy mayor Daria Kellander and councillors Tony Briffa, Diana Grima and Matt Tyler on June 29 had voted to restore the weekly rubbish collection, cut the green bin collection from weekly to fortnightly and trial compostable paper bags for food organics and garden organics (FOGO) bins.
The bid to overturn the decision was lost by 4-3 votes. The first 45 minutes of last week’s meeting were spent arguing about why the emergency meeting was called on a Thursday night instead of being scheduled for the next ordinary meeting. Cr Hemphill said that “public transparency has gone by the wayside by holding a meeting like this”, his comment drawing angry interjections from other councillors of being “vexatious, offensive and absurd”. “The main point I am making is that the difference between this meeting and the normal meeting that would be held is that no petitions can be tabled, no questions from the public in advance, no questions from the public from the floor on the night,” Cr Hemphill said. A petition by Better West calling on the council to overturn the decision to reinstate
weekly garbage collection and reduce the FOGO collection to fortnightly could not be tabled at the emergency meeting. It had gained more than 1600 signatures in two days. Documents show that the cost of revising FOGO to fortnightly and introducing weekly garbage collections would cost $540,000 in operating costs and $300,000 in capital cost or $14 per household. Cr Matt Tyler said since the garbage collection was changed to fortnightly in 2019, “we’ve seen a doubling in the number of truckloads of recycling that are going straight to landfill”. “While I encourage each household to take responsibility for limiting their waste, and education certainly plays a part in reducing contamination, we won’t make progress by failing to meet the needs of at least 40 per cent of households,” he said.
A Maribyrnong apartment complex on Tuesday was in lockdown as authorities traced the movements of COVID-positive removalists from New South Wales. It comes as Victoria recorded three new infections as at Monday. Two parents and a child from a Craigieburn family of four tested positive after arriving from NSW. Three family members flew to Melbourne on July 4 and the fourth drove on July 8. Ariele Apartments at 7 Thomas Holmes Street, where the removalists collected furniture, was listed as a tier one exposure site on Monday night. Victoria’s COVID commander Jeroen Weimar said no one at the building, including the household which had the most exposure to the removalists, had tested positive as at Tuesday. “They [the removalists] dealt with one individual there – the owner or the tenant of the property,” he said. “That man has also tested negative, as has his family, but they are all in hotel quarantine.” Two of the three removalists had tested positive by Monday, NSW health authorities said. There are 78 dwellings in the apartment complex. Victoria’s Department of Health said anyone who was in the residential part of Ariele Apartments between 1pm and 11.59pm on Thursday, July 8 must get tested immediately and quarantine for 14 days from the exposure. Anyone who entered the building between Friday, July 9 and Monday, July 12 must get tested and isolate until they test negative. This includes anyone who accessed the residential foyer, stairwells, lift, residential floors and carpark. It excludes people whose only exposure to the building was to enter a commercial space on the ground floor and who did not enter any residential space. For up to date list of exposure sites, visit: https://www.coronavirus.vic.gov. au/exposure-sites
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