Bass Coast calls for urgent action to protect Western Port woodlands
Bass Coast Shire Council is calling for the Victorian State Government to urgently act on interim planning controls for the Western Port Woodlands.
Bass Coast Shire Council is calling for the Victorian State Government to urgently act on interim planning controls for the Western Port Woodlands after submitting a comprehensive response to the government's request for further information.
In June, Council requested the Minister for Planning introduce interim Environmental Significance Overlay controls through Amendment C181 to provide immediate protection for the Western Port Woodlands while longer term planning work is completed.
The proposed controls would operate until 2028 and are intended to safeguard one of Victoria's most significant areas of remnant biodiversity.
After more than three months considering Council's request, the Department of Transport and Planning wrote to Council on September 14 seeking additional information and requiring a response within 14 days.
The Western Port Woodlands are one of Bass Coast's most significant environmental assets. Stretching across public and private land between Lang Lang and Bass, they contain Bass Coast's largest area of remnant native vegetation and provide critical habitat and wildlife corridors for threatened species, including the Southern Brown Bandicoot, Powerful Owl and critically endangered Strzelecki Gum.
Bass Coast Shire Mayor, Cr Brett Tessari, said Council had provided a comprehensive response and urged the State Government to act now before caretaker provisions start on November 3.
"The significance of these woodlands is well established. The need for protection has been recognised through extensive strategic planning work, advocacy from our community and recommendations of independent planning processes.
"Council has completed the work, funded the investigations, responded to every request and advocated consistently for these woodlands. The next step is for the State Government to act."
Significance
Council said its response includes further information requested by the Department regarding biodiversity values, mapping methodologies, strategic planning work and stakeholder engagement.
The Bass Coast Statement of Planning Policy identifies the Western Port Woodlands as an area of environmental significance, while independent ecology experts commissioned for the Standing Advisory Committee process by the minister, Council and conservation groups agreed the Woodlands are nationally significant and irreplaceable, with cumulative impacts from extractive industries posing a significant conservation threat.
Council has committed $500,000 towards biodiversity investigations and strategic planning work that will help establish long term protections for the area.
Council is also calling on the newly appointed Minister for Resources and Energy, Jaclyn Symes, to reconsider the Extractive Industry Interest Areas (EIIAs) that leaves the Western Port Woodlands exposed to potential for future sand mining.
The Strategic Extractive Resource Area (SERA) project identified strategic sand resources in nearby Nyora West, Lang Lang and Trafalgar and council is urging the State Government to consider these sites rather than the Western Port Woodlands.
These areas are now exposed as the Minister for Planning gazetted Amendment VC313 last week and exempted herself from any public consultation on the changes.
The amendment changes all planning schemes in Victoria to require councils to facilitate resource extraction in EIIAs and avoid the establishment of land uses in them that the minister has deemed incompatible.
Previously, councils were only required to notify Resources Victoria of applications in these areas.
Cr Tessari said the next action was squarely with the State Government.
"Last year the Minister for Planning described the Statement of Planning Policy as a shared responsibility. Council has done everything it can, and we now want the Carroll Government to join us in decisive action.
"There is a clear pathway available to provide interim protection while longer-term planning investigations continue. The Minister for Planning must act to introduce interim controls, and the Minister for Resources and Energy must remove the remaining extractive industry interest areas from the woodlands.
"The woodlands cannot afford further uncertainty. Every month without adequate safeguards in place increases the risk that its environmental values could be lost forever."
Success
Meanwhile, an online forum has heard that one of the major sand mining companies in the woodlands has promised to protect a section of their quarry land that is of high conservation value.
The Victorian National Parks Association online forum heard from the Save Western Port Woodlands (SWPW) group that sand miner Holcim had promised to preserve 67ha of land in the Adams Creek Conservation Reserve, which was set aside for future quarry mining.
SWPW's Catherine Watson told the forum they had written to Holcim saying the mining of the land would be a public relations disaster for the company and called for them to protect it.
Catherine said Holcim had subsequently replied to SWPW that they had taken the group's concerns very seriously, vowing to preserve local biodiversity and protect the 67ha, effectively prohibiting mining of the site.
"I think the sand companies are thinking twice about clearing woodlands, they're starting to take notice," Catherine told the forum, adding they initially thought their request to Holcim had "Buckley's chance" of success.
