Whilst in theory it is uplifting to see the City of Stirling’s recent rumblings to support scrapping of DAP’s, it would be far more useful to ratepayers if they then actually practised what they preached.
The planning and approvals team at the City of Stirling have bent over backwards and actually blessed the dirt for an opt-in JDAP approval at Ozone Parade in Trigg. The 4 storey one day , 3 the next chameleon like development of 20 multiple dwellings on an R40 infill/battleaxe site is the perfect example of stealth planning on the part of the applicant (a professional applicant well known to several DAP members) and apparent collusion by the City.
The development encroaches an easement to which no consent has been given nor requested by the beneficiaries. This encroachment will contravene both the Land Administration Act and the Building Act.
This gives the City of Stirling all the fuel it requires to block the development (as the permit authority), as did the requirement for community consultation mandated by the deemed provisions of the P&D LPS3 Regulations, the last JDAP meeting was held 10 days before the substantial commencement deadline for the original approval, allowing the mandated consultation would have essentially halted the development, so the City …
…. or Greg Bowering to be precise, misdirected the JDAP on advice in relation to opening statements made by 3 of the residents, 2 of whom clearly pointed out the requirement for community consultation in the regulations. Mandated, not recommended.
The panel clearly had no understanding of the regulations taking Mr Bowering’s advice even though he was clearly giving advice on a different sub-clause to the one we were arguing.
Only Councillor David Michael presumably understood the sub-clause of the provisions and voted against the amendment, Councillor Boothman was perhaps unaware of the City’s stance or the community anger at this development, or amendment 32 which prohibits multiple dwellings on an R40 site (unless you count Mr Bowering’s semantics).
The planning and approval team at the City of Stirling also allowed siteworks without a building permit on site for several weeks despite community feedback, presumably to help towards the substantial commencement deadline.
To aid the application of Salt, the City then changed its stated definition of substantial commencement at the 11th hour to suit this development, apparently after strongly considering community concerns.
Oh, and the easement, well the Council did get the developer to alter the plans (and then granted a building permit based on unapproved plans which they are not allowed to do for a certified application) in regard to the easement, which they did, changing one form of encroachment for another, an encroachment by retaining is in the City of Stirling’s view different to encroachment by landscaping and changing levels.
The list of omissions and obfuscations from two of the City’s Responsible Authority Report’s to the JDAP is too big to list here, my point being that even if the DAP’s are scrapped for this type of development, ratepayers will still have to deal with the partisan attitude of the local Council to certain developers.
Trigg DAP Affected Community.
DAP affected communities 