Report published in TWT 21.12.22, page 5
The controversial proposed Boronia Park Sport and Community Centre received the support of the majority of Hunter's Hill Councillors during Monday night's (19.12.22) council meeting.
The two storey centre to be located next to Oval One is designed to be used for a range of council, community and sports groups and will be leased as a clubhouse to the Hunters Hill Rugby Club during winter.
Councillors voted five to one in favour of it - with Cir Ross Williams (Independent) voting against it and Cir Jim Sanderson (Independent) abstaining - with councillor endorsement to spend around $1.7 million dollars in ratepayers’ money on it despite previous assurances by councillors it wouldn't cost the community a cent.
Community speakers opposed the use of public money on a so-called "rugby clubhouse" which will be financed from the council's Unrestricted Reserve fund of around ten million dollars.
Ratepayer Heather Armstrong described the proposed expenditure as "a disgrace" and told councillors it is a "completely irresponsible" misuse of community money at a time when the council has raised rates to afford to repair roads and footpaths.
"The licence agreement gives the rugby club exclusive rights and privilege and it doesn't sound like a community facility," she said.
Rugby Club spokesman Glen Sanford said the centre needs to be built straight away to meet the conditions of more than a million dollars in government grants while Gladesville Ravens Club spokesperson Cathy Inglis stressed her members would use the facility for training.
The Hunters Hill Trust unsuccessfully proposed the building be reduced to one storey.
Some ratepayers have previously questioned whether or not an option to spend their money on the project had been decided during a recent "secret session" of council although General Manager Mitchell Murphy and Mayor Zac Miles stressed that no expenditure had been approved at a confidential meeting and the council had acted with openness, transparency and due process at all times.
Councillor Williams said council funding in the Unrestricted Reserve had come from the sale of the Gladesville car park and the council had a duty to invest that money on other revenue raising opportunities.
Independent Cir Richard Quinn voted in favour of the Centre. "I was always uncomfortable that this council was building a facility we weren't contributing towards," he said.
"We're now spending money on and for our community and that is what we have reserves for."
Deputy Mayor Elizabeth Krassoi said she would have preferred to have the Centre built without cost to ratepayers but argued that building cost increases had made this option unrealistic.
"In five years’ time people will wonder why there has been such a furore about this," she said.
Work could be completed next year.
Pidding Park
At its meeting on Tuesday 13 December 2022, the City of Ryde Council resolved to expand the designated Dog Off-Leash Area in Pidding Park to include the senior and junior sport fields in compliance with the Companion Animal Act 1998. The off leash area will remain an off-leash area when not in use for organized sporting activities booked by Council.
Funding to implement the original recommended changes to the off leash area at Pidding Park will be considered for inclusion in future iterations of Council’s Four Year Delivery Plan.
There will be a 12 month trial of unfenced, off leash dog areas in three parks in the City of Ryde.
Councillors Penny Pedersen, Bernard Purcell and Charles Song voted against the trial but are not opposed to the safe use of off leash dog areas. The trials will be held in Warrawong Reserve in Eastwood, Brereton Park in East Ryde and Fontenoy Park in Macquarie Park.
Councillor Pedersen expressed concern about dog attacks on children and wants to see the playground at Fontenoy Park fenced off.
Council staff are currently reviewing the feasibility of six other proposed dog off leash areas.
There is a petition calling for the establishment of this park and the logging within the park to be halted. If 20,000 signatures are secured, the petition can be tabled for debate in the
NSW parliament. Text of the petition is:
“To the Speaker and Members of the Legislative Assembly,
“We draw your attention to the significant decline in the NSW Koala population. There were an estimated 54,000 wild koalas in NSW in 2012, by 2016 the NSW Chief Scientist estimated only 36,000 were left. The 2019/20 bushfires destroyed over a quarter of remaining prime Koala habitat in northeast NSW and killed approximately 10,000 koalas in NSW. Many koala populations are now on the verge of collapse.
“The 2020 NSW Upper House Koala inquiry found that NSW koalas will become extinct before 2050 without urgent government intervention. Habitat loss and fragmentation through logging, land clearing and bushfires, are the primary cause of the koala’s decline. Koalas in NSW are now listed as Endangered. The only way to prevent their predicted extinction is to stop the loss of koala habitat by protecting it in perpetuity.
“The Great Koala National Park (GKNP) would protect an estimated 20% of NSW’s remaining koalas. It would also generate significant regional economic benefits through nature-based tourism and is well supported by the community. Current industrial scale logging in State Forests within the proposed GKNP is destroying the very habitat critical to ensuring Koala survival. We respectfully request that:
1. A moratorium be placed on all logging of public native forest within the National Parks Association of NSW’s proposed Great Koala National Park.
2. That koalas be protected for future generations by immediately creating The Great Koala National Park as proposed by the National Parks Association of NSW.”
Sign this petition.
Closing date is 11 April 2023.
Abridged from a report by Matthew Agius, published by Cosmos 12 December 2022
Data analysis by world-renowned climate scientist Professor David Karoly shows a concerning trend. Australia appears to be already experiencing the worst-case climate scenarios that were projected to occur eight years from now.
Smoky sunrise over the Field of Mars Reserve, 21 November 2019… and Buffalo Creek in flood 19 March 2021:
David Karoly presented data titled “Evaluation of near-term climate change projections for selected Australian cities using recent observations” at the recent Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society conference.
It was an analysis of how closely projections released in 2015 by the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO align to actual temperatures and rainfall experienced by 12 major Australian cities.
According to Professor Karoly, things like temperature, and the decline in rainfall in southern Australia, were tracking at or above what was projected for the 2030s.
Climate models simulate plausible climate futures:
They are the most accurate and useful tools available to anticipate and estimate the Earth’s future climate, and extend the calculations used by meteorologists to predict short-term weather. So, climate projections look beyond this week, this month and even this year.
These models use complex data inputs and mathematical calculations to simulate possible climate outcomes. To give a sense of the effort to ensure accuracy, hundreds of scientists and substantial supporting resources are required to build a model.
Climate futures are uncertain, and scientists are quick to emphasise there are many variables that will influence the climate. But these uncertainties are small, and have become smaller and smaller as the reliability of climate models has improved.
Once models are verified, they’re then used to project forward scenarios.
In simple terms, this process is repeated by climate scientists around the world to inform decision-makers, businesses and individuals on what changes might look like years into the future.
“In the most recent decade, it’s hitting us faster and harder.”
Article by Matthew Agius, published by Cosmos, 29 November 2022
THE GREAT BARRIER REEF IS IN DANGER
That’s the expert recommendation from a Reactive Monitoring Mission to UNESCO – the United Nations Educational, Science and Cultural Organization – conducted in March 2022.
Multiple attempts to add the Reef to the world heritage ‘in danger’ list have been avoided previously, most recently in 2021 due to intense lobbying by the Australian government.
Despite avoiding a formal ‘inscription’ onto the List of World Heritage in Danger then, the findings outlined in this new joint report by scientists from the World Heritage Centre (WHC) and International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) points to a dire situation in a reef beset by regular coral bleaching event, ocean heatwaves and changes in biodiversity.
Broader climate change outlooks predict annual mass bleaching events within twenty years, as well as increasing ocean acidification, and the WHC/IUCN report makes 22 recommendations it believes could “ensure and advance the conservation [of the reef] and its outstanding universal value for future generations”.
Among high priority recommendations related to on-shore agricultural and water management practices, vegetation protection and water quality management, it calls for an end to gill net fishing in the reef, strengthening legal protections for land vegetation in nearby catchments, and the existing reef plan with clear commitments to cut carbon emissions “consistent with the efforts required to limit the global average temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels”.
UNESCO evaluation critical of Australia strategy
The decision to formally inscribe the reef on the world heritage “in danger” list can only be made by UNESCO’s world heritage committee, which is next due to convene in 2023.
The current environment minister Tanya Plibersek and special envoy for the Great Barrier Reef Nita Green emphasised this point in their joint statement addressing the report.
But while the report is not capable of enforcing a formal ‘in danger’ listing, it nevertheless is a confronting scientific assessment that effectively confirms the reef’s grim outlook.
The February 2022 report submitted to UNESCO by the former Australian government emphasised its commitments to improving water quality, and the focus of the responding to climate change, and helping communities, industries and ecosystems adapt to the climate challenge.
But the WHC/IUCN mission found that while state and federal governments had, at the time, ramped up climate mitigation efforts, plans lacked detail or clear pathways on how net zero targets would be achieved.
The mission report was prepared prior to the change of government that has since resulted in a legislated carbon reduction target. Even so, the report emphasises the need for accelerated implementation of measures in the existing plan.
“We’re barrelling towards warming scenarios that are going to be devastating for 99% of reefs worldwide, let alone our prized and iconic Great Barrier Reef,” James Cook University professor in marine biology Jodie Rummer told Cosmos.
… + Comment from The Greens:
The Morrison Liberal Government ferociously lobbied against scientific advice from UNESCO that the Great Barrier Reef be placed on the ‘in danger’ list because of the impact of climate change…
The question is now: will the Albanese Government do the same, or will it take the necessary climate action to meet UNESCO’s recommendations to avoid an ‘in danger’ listing?
It’s not going to be enough for the Albanese Government to merely accept scientific advice on whether the Great Barrier Reef should be declared in danger of climate change, it must urgently act to meet our Paris Agreement of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees.
Sadly the recent State of the Climate report shows Australia’s climate has almost reached this critical threshold set out by the Paris Agreement, and we know Labor’s emission reduction target of 43% by 2030 directly equates to 2 degrees of warming.
Labor is also pushing ahead with 114 new coal, oil and gas projects right around Australia, each of which is a nail in the coffin for the Reef.
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