26 February 2019 - Ordinary

Ordinary meeting of Council for the 26th of February 2019. I'd like to firstly acknowledge the traditional owners, custodians of this land on which we meet and pay my respects to Elders both past and present. I'll now hand over to the General Manager for some procedural matters.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Members of the public attending the meeting are advised that in the event of an emergency, you will be asked to proceed in an orderly manner to the nearest exit, following the guidance of our wardens. I would also like to advise members of the public that in accordance with Clause 6.3.1 of the Code of Meeting Practice, meetings of Council are recorded. In the terms of the Privacy and Personal Information Protection Act, this may involve the recording of personal information provided at the time of the meeting. The recordings are made to assist staff in compiling the minutes of the meeting and to enable the podcasting of Council meetings. The provision of any meeting that is recorded is voluntary.

If any person does not wish to be recorded, they should not address or request to address the meeting. The recordings may be made available to other persons where such access is in accordance with the relevant regulations, and the recordings are stored on Council's record management system. For the benefit of those persons who will be addressing the Council tonight, it is expected that you will refrain from making any insult, allegation or personal reflection against any person present or not at this meeting. This request relates both to your address to Council and any answers given in response to questions from Councillors. Finally, it is also requested that if any person in the council chambers have a mobile phone, that they either turn it off or turn it to silent.

Thank you, Mr Mayor

Thank you, Mr Conroy. Do we have any apologies, please? Councillor Tree, she's the only one missing.

Someone like to move we accept the apologies? Councillor Conolly, Councillor Kotlash, all those in favour say aye. Are there any declarations of interest, please? Councillor Garrow.

Item number 017, non-significant non-pecuniary interest.

017?

Councillor Reynolds.

Um, yeah, item 018, significant pecuniary interest.

So you'll be leaving the room for that. Okay. Any other declarations of interest? Nope. Confirmation of minutes from the last meeting. Would someone like to move that? Councillor Rasmussen, seconded Councillor Conolly. All those in favour say aye. Declared carried. Agenda items subject to public address, we have two items, item 18 and item 31, but for item 18, I think Councillor Reynolds is declaring an interest. The pecuniary.

The pecuniary interest is my home is within the area being studied.

So it's a significant pecuniary interest. Thank you. Our first speaker is Graham Edds, please.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor, Councillors, General Manager and Council staff. I address Council on the subject of the Thompson Square Conservation Management Plan. And as a conservation architect who has prepared many of these documents for federal and state governments, local government and privately owned heritage places, and precincts, I am well aware of the importance and benefit of such guiding documents, providing invaluable information and detail for the retention of cultural significance of historic places. I don't think anybody would disagree that Thompson Square is such a historic place. Although I personally do not agree with the Windsor Bridge replacement project, the destruction of this historic place with a new bridge, but the likelihood that construction will continue, my attention now transfers to the periphery of the Thompson Square area and the value of such a detailed and well-defined management document to Hawkesbury City Council.

I am sure that Council has previously acknowledged the benefit of this conservation management plan as they have sanctioned its preparation. I have spoken to this chamber at the CMP's draft stage in August of 2018, highlighting the immense value of such documents, with this well-defined conservation recommendations and policies, so I will not elaborate any further tonight. I also address councillors on behalf of my colleague Ian Jack, who was unable to attend this meeting tonight. He asked me to relay to this chamber his concerns in that the RMS are already planning the details of a new Thompson Square, which will be created beside a new bridge. It is essential then that the detailed policies enunciated in the new Conservation Management Plan are adopted by Council tonight and passed on to the New South Wales Heritage Council so that they are in place before the RMS plans for Thompson Square are implemented.

This extremely impressive CMP contains arguing power for Council and all interested parties over the potential details of the RMS plans. This Conservation Management Plan provides powerful ammunition, particularly for the area from Macquarie Arms Hotel to the Doctor's House. Hawkesbury City Council, in the 14th of August 2018, made resolutions about the Thompson Square CMP, then in draft. These resolutions are reprinted in the business paper. These resolutions are vitally relevant, particularly Resolution Number Two and Number Six, in which the Council agreed to contact relevant state government bodies to discuss the draft, while Resolution Number Five committed Council to making a draft CMP a public document accessible on Council's website.

Ian Jack feels that this is imperative that Council— has a fully approved and endorsed CMP in the hands of the New South Wales Heritage Council before the RMS plans reach the final stage, and these six resolutions all have been fully actioned. Both Ian Jack and I, as members of the— sorry, as the Council's Heritage Advisory Committee, recommend to this Chamber that they formally endorse the final conservation plan for Thompson Square. We commend the recommendation for this Chamber's formal adoption tonight, and thank you for the opportunity of speaking.

Thank you, Mr. Head. Are you happy to answer any questions, should there be any?

Yes, happy to.

Are there any questions, please? Doesn't look like it. Thank you very much. That was our one and only speaker on this matter. I want to ask the General Manager to give us a short introduction before we continue.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

The relevant staff who would normally speak tonight either ill or have other responsibilities this evening, so I'm speaking on their behalf. The conservation management plan has been prepared for Thompson Square. It's been prepared in accordance with the Office of Environment and Heritage guidelines. Essentially, there are five parts to the document: the introduction at the beginning and the appendices at the end. In between are three important sections: the evidence, the analysis and the resulting policies. So sections two and three contain the evidence. That's a review of historical information, physical and otherwise, that is relevant to the site. The analysis of the evidence occurs in sections four, five and six, and it is from that evidence and analysis that the resulting policies, the conservation policies, in section seven flow.

The document was placed on exhibition, and a total of five submissions were received, and all of those submissions have been reviewed by both the consultants, the Council's Heritage Committee, and Council staff. So the document that we have in front of us tonight is a culmination of feedback, input, considerations of those three entities. And I think importantly, attachment six details the submissions and how they were responded and what changes were made. I think that's all I'd like to say at the outset, Mr Mayor.

Thank you, Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. I'd like to move the recommendation in the business paper, but with an additional clause which I can now give to the staff. So the first recommendation will be that Council adopt the final Thompson Square Conservation Management Plan attached as Attachment 7 to the report, and point 2, liaise with the Reconciliation Action Plan Working Group to ensure that Aboriginal heritage is properly represented in the Thompson Square CMP.

I understand that— I'll second it.

Deputy Mayor is seconding it. Thank you. Councillor Wheeler.

I understand that the staff have made some additions to the, or some changes to the CMP relating in particular to information contained in submission 4, I think it is— 2, sorry. It's 3. Submission 3. But I think it's important that we don't sign off on this, that in fact the representatives of the Aboriginal community are given carriage of that task . I think the comments made by the author of that submission are valid. I think we have traditionally viewed Thompson Square as a European place, and it's very clear that its heritage goes back much, much further than that. And in order for this document to be complete and to do its job effectively, it needs to reflect that. There are some additional points in submission three that I think we also need to deal with that are outside the scope of this recommendation, particularly around the acknowledgement of country, which is in page 32 of the business paper, and perhaps the chair of the RAPS committee, or the RAPS working group, could take note of those .

But I think there's some useful information that's been presented in each of these submissions. I am quite concerned about the RMS's submission. They appear to be putting the cart before the horse and have assumed that the Windsor Bridge replacement project has primacy, and this is indicative of their treatment of the whole precinct. The intention of this CMP was never to compliment the Windsor Bridge replacement project interpretation plan, but to accurately document the significance of the square, recommend best practice treatment of all the heritage items in it and the site as a whole, and thus minimise the damage done by the interpretation plan. I note that the RMS state that they're consulting with the Office of Environment and Heritage Council and stakeholders.

Now, those of us who've been privy to that consultation know well what it looks like. We're not actually that impressed. I want to draw people's attention to the sheer arrogance of points 4 and 8 of the RMS submission, that policies 41 and 88 will not apply to the Windsor Bridge replacement project; that, in fact, they will ignore the bulk of any recommendations of the CMP that don't agree with their preconceived notions of what should be done to Thompson Square

That our document should be updated to reflect the Strategic Conservation Management Plan. Now, to put that in context, the Strategic Conservation Management Plan is a document that no heritage expert has ever heard of before. It seems to have been invented entirely for this project to justify the destruction of Thompson Square and the consequent papering over of that shambles. The idea that conservation experts of the calibre of Lucas Stapleton and Johnson would amend their document in order to satisfy the RMS is extraordinary, and I don't think that Council should be going down that path at all. I do concur with Graham Eds that it's really important that this document be be made available to the public, but also sent on to the heritage office so that we have a better document in which to base our submissions to the Strategic Conservation Management Plan and the subsequent plans for Thompson Square as we try to repair the damage and give our community something to work with.

This is also a really important document for the livability funding and will have quite a lot of use in what we plan for Windsor in the precinct moving towards Thompson Square as well. So this document is really valuable, incredibly useful. It's very well written, and I also agree with Mr. Eds that it belongs on Council's website. Copies of it will be placed in the library. People will have access to it. But to have a document of this calibre readily searchable by people who are interested in heritage, who own heritage items, much of the information here is relevant to other heritage items across the Hawkesbury. This is extraordinarily valuable, and I want to thank the staff who've helped get this document firstly on the table and secondly completed and in front of Council.

I think it's an excellent body of work and long overdue.

Councillor Wheeler, a question before we proceed , so that I can understand this. Point one appears to say we adopt the policy, and point two seems to say we conduct further work on it. Have I misunderstood that? No

I think this is problematic. I agree that it's difficult, but I think we need to get this document endorsed and working for Thompson Square and also for Windsor. But I also think that it's not— It's not out of the question that the Reconciliation Action Plan working group look at this document and have some input to make sure that they're not huge changes. They are largely changes to wording. Some of it's been addressed already, but there is a criticism there. I think it's valid that we haven't liaised actively with the local Indigenous population, and I think we should do that.

I agree with you. I'm just trying to clarify the apparent conflict between one and two, but you don't see a conflict.

Do you want me to delegate the general— do you want me to change that to delegate the general manager?

I don't want you to do anything. I'm just asking a question.

Is it more workable if I amend that? I'm happy to take

Advice on it. I'll ask the general manager. General manager, do you have a comment on that?

I think we've taken on board the sentiments that have been expressed, that we want to liaise with the Reconciliation Action Plan working group, and if an issue does come up that warrants further consideration, we can bring that back to Council. But that will be a process that does take some time. Okay. You're happy to

Leave it as is? It sounds like I'm happy to leave it as it is. Okay.

Councillor Conolly. Thanks, Mr Mayor. Just a question to start off with. In regards to the RMS submission, in particular points five and six, my understanding is that the Windsor Bridge Replacement Project has been approved as per their submission, and the RMS is stating that the approval that's already been granted is inconsistent with the recommended treatment in the CMP. I just wanted to find out from the staff's point of view if that's the correct summation of the situation? Mr Conolly.

Not 100%. So there are two key conditions in the consent. One relates to the strategic conservation management plan. And the other relates to the interpretation plan. The interpretation plan is actually being started again. So there is a plan that's been developed. I think it's fair to say that RMS think that it's worthy of reviewing, and so they're going back to start that process again. So if you've got it, the interpretation plan that's about to be reactivated, I think it's useful to have this as a reference tool to that piece of work.

Just a short follow-up question. I guess what I'm getting at, in particular in point five of the submission, and point six actually both, is it feasible that there could be such an adjustment to the Windsor Bridge replacement project that it will only have light traffic on that road, and that the entirety of Thompson Square will be returned to its pre-existing condition? I couldn't see how that's feasible.

We're still in discussions with relevant parties about the possibility of keeping the original bridge for light traffic. The government have just constructed a bridge over the river at Penrith. This would serve a similar function, and so those discussions are ongoing at the moment. So they're with another area of RMS though, so it could be that it's reflective of perhaps not the whole organisation being across all of the issues.

Councillor Conolly.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. I don't think I'm going to support the adoption of the plan. I don't see how, with respect to the General Manager, I disagree that it's feasible that... That Bridge Street could be restricted to light traffic without a major rework to the current plans. Bridge Street is now not restricted to light traffic. If we're going to put a bridge through with extra capacity, I don't see how it's feasible that it's going to be reworked to an extent that there's not going to be only light traffic, that there will only be light traffic on Bridge Street. Similarly, I don't think, I think this whole protest that's going on in Thompson Square is to the point of 0.5, which is that Thompson Square is going to change because of Windsor Bridge.

It's not going to be possible to restore the lower section to exactly how it is right now after the completion of the archaeological work. So I don't think there's value in adopting a plan that we know cannot be followed. And I would take issue with Councillor Wheeler said it was the RMS having a preconceived notion that their project comes first. I would say it's not a preconceived notion; it's an approved plan. You know, very hotly contested, very contentious, but it's been approved. There is this project happening. If you look over there now, it's being built. It's not some preconceived notion that Windsor Bridge is going ahead; it's happening. And some of these things, and maybe it's not all the RMS submission, but certainly those points are just not possible to be followed.

And this was always the danger of us doing our own separate CMP when a CMP was already being done by the state government in terms of the project, was that we would end up in this situation. I also, you know, the staff comment in regards to the RMS submission that we wouldn't change the document because it just addresses the condition and configuration of the conservation area at the site inspections. Well, that might be true, but it's not very useful. And we did have a slight idea that maybe that site would change. And so what is the point of adopting a document that is already outdated and instead of just maybe looking at this and saying, okay, maybe we need to make some changes given that the site has changed significantly in the time that report was prepared.

So without significant change, I wouldn't be willing. I wouldn't be willing to vote to adopt the plan. I also don't think it's extraordinary for the RMS to suggest that the CMP should not apply to them if the CMP is being adopted by Council before a state election, where this is a major issue, with the point of making it impossible for the RMS to comply.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Councillor Rayson. Thank you, Mr Mayor. Question first, please. Could I just get some understanding of the standing of this CMP? And secondly, how is Council intending to use this CMP, or what would be the effect of it as far as Thompson Square is concerned, as far as Council is concerned?

So the CMP, once it's adopted, has a number of uses. Firstly, it is a statutory document when its contents relate to a matter that is the subject of a development application. So if the document makes a recommendation in relation to the area around Thompson Square that's potentially in the area of the livability plan, and we need a development application for that work, then the CMP becomes a statutory consideration. In terms of its non-statutory applicability, it will be used to inform the ongoing care and maintenance of the general conservation area, so again when we're looking at work practices and things like that, when we're looking at maintenance and repairs. It also will be used as a negotiation point with the RMS regarding the review of the interpretation strategy that I referred to earlier.

It will also be used as a discussion point with the Office of Environment and Heritage in our upcoming review of our heritage matters, and it will also, as I just mentioned, inform the livability project for the town centre in Windsor. So it has a number of immediate— Applicabilities . It also will become, if it's adopted by Council, it will be referred to the Office of Environment and Heritage and it'll become a document that they will use as a reference point as well.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. So can I take it from that that there is no legal impact arising as a result of this CMP on the Windsor Bridge project?

There's no legal impact on the current approval, that's correct. Thank you.

Deputy Mayor. Just a couple of questions. Just with regard to the Strategic Conservation Management Plan that was prepared by the RMS, was, I understand that was not prepared within the OEH guidelines. Is that correct?

That's correct.

Thank you. And the second question was regarding Policy 67 that Councillor Conolly just referred to about the light traffic.

I would think, I thought the restriction was to having B doubles traffic on it, and that local traffic, light traffic is its current use. Can that just be clarified, that is its current use?

So Bridge Street extends from the western side of the river, across the bridge, up through Thompson Square and down towards where the toll house is. And what this talks about is lighter traffic on that section. Now, one interpretation is no B doubles on the main thoroughfare, and another interpretation is to have, if the bridge is retained and that section of Bridge Street is retained, to have again lighter traffic, pedestrian traffic, active transport on the bridge.

Thank you

Councillor Richards.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Just a question to start with, maybe to the General Manager. Can you clarify if we have two CMPs sitting side by side? One is adopted by Council, one is the State Government's CMP for Thompson Square, and there is an issue or something being upgraded within the square. Which CMP is going to have precedence or dominance in operating when there's a discrepancy?

Mr Conroy. We don't have two CMPs. We have a document that's called a Strategic Conservation Management Plan, which is a one-off just for this particular project, and it's not a document that's been prepared in accordance with the normal practices and guidelines for a conservation management plan. It's been prepared just for this project, and it relates primarily to this project. It doesn't really have the same statutory effect that a conservation management plan does. That's a plan that's been prepared in accordance with the Office of Environment and Heritage guidelines. So it's not to say that both documents wouldn't be considered, but if an application was lodged and it referred to something that was mentioned in both documents, it would be a consideration in terms of the Strategic Conservation Management Plan, but it would be a statutory consideration.

It would have to be specifically addressed as part of the assessment under the Conservation Management Plan. So I hope that assists.

So, yeah, well, can I ask an example just to clarify? So the RMS letter is saying here that about, it references the— I'll just find it— the lower section of Thompson Square to be restored to its pre-existing condition. So the Council CMP is saying that that's what it wants done, and if adopted tonight, that's Council's position on that. What happens when the State Government, through the Windsor Bridge Replacement Project, starts to do work on that area that's inconsistent with this CMP?

So if it's already been approved, there's nothing that—

This can't override that. This date, Government's approval. No. Okay.

Any further discussion? Councillor Sam Profen.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. This conservation management plan represents really good work. And I want to say that we need a conservation management plan for this highly historically significant part of Windsor. That said, I do agree with Councillor Conolly when he says that this document is weakened, even prior to its adoption, by the inclusion of things that simply cannot be granted. They fly in the face of the actual reality that we're seeing in Thompson Square. And therefore, as we move forward, if we adopt this, if it already has those defects, those defects form a weakness that could allow other parts of the document to be ignored for much the same reason, and that's regrettable. Where Councillor Conolly and I differ in our opinion, however, is that those defects enough for us to want to not adopt this plan ?

Or can we acknowledge that this document is both practical and pragmatic about the management of our heritage in Thompson Square and aspirational in the sense that it says some things that can't be achieved, or in fact, in this particular season, are political, in the sense that they are aimed to express disapproval for something that is manifestly underway and drawing to its completion. I think both are true. So the dilemma that I face is whether I withhold my assent to see this document approved tonight, despite those defects. And I think I will. I think I will endorse the adoption of this document, but I do say along the way that it does have these defects, and that's regrettable.

Thank you, Councillor. Any further? Councillor Ross.

Thank you, Mayor. The two gentlemen whom have both spoken have missed some very cogent points .

The first is that the so-called SCMP, when presented to Council, was not accepted or endorsed by Council. In fact, I'm sure you will find resolutions to the contrary. And the reason those resolutions were passed in this August chamber

Were that the quality of the work and the status of the people who conducted that work using public money was less than one might describe as satisfactory. And indeed, Council's own heritage advisor informed us of that at the time, and that resulted in those different viewpoints being expressed by Council. Which will correct. It also brought along the need for a

Conservation management plan

Drafted

With recognised constraints,

And the quality of this document that we, as a council, have commissioned is far superior to what I would have to describe, unfortunately, as a very lacklustre performance coming from the state government bureaucracy.

Some of those monies were also expended, instead of doing these works, ended up preparing a report about sand mining, for goodness sake, upstream of the current bridge project. How amazing.

By the same consultant, probably out of the same pay packet. An

Absolute disgrace in that regard. The interpretation plan is a vile document in terms of what it does to the existing grassed area of Thompson Square and what it intends to do.

And frankly, it is unbefitting of an organisation of the state government's capabilities and presumably calibre somewhere, that they would dare put such a travesty in front of the people of the Hawkesbury.

Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Ross. Any further discussion, Deputy Mayor?

Thank you, Mr Mayor. If I could just clarify regarding something the General Manager said earlier, and which goes possibly to what Councillor San Bronio said about defects with regard to this document. The response from the RMS is dated 17th October. Is it correct that subsequent to that there has been further discussions about the review of the interpretation plan?

On the spot, I can't tell you if it was after that date or not. It'd be very close.

But that would explain why. I mean, that would override that concern then, if that's the case. If that's not finalised, that would not really be a defect as such if the interpretation plan isn't finalised.

Councillor Cottless.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. I'll be supporting this recommendation, although I have to say that I think that it's a bit disingenuous to say in point one to adopt the plan and then in point two to then liaise with the Aboriginal groups in the area. I think we have to make that clearer . And I was wondering whether — I'm not quite sure of the process — but could we adopt the plan in principle and follow through with the points that Councillor Whelan made, which I agree wholeheartedly with.

So could we endorse the general manager to adopt the plan once we've had that liaison? Because it just seems like we're saying, you know, yes, this is okay, but, oh, we'll listen to you sort of after the fact. It just doesn't seem right.

Would you like the general manager to have an

Answer?

Yes, please.

The work of the reconciliation action plan working group has been ongoing for some time, and it's not unusual for such matters to take time to come to a conclusion. I would suggest that we're better to proceed and adopt— The plan, it's not a static document. If new information comes to light, it can be amended. There's a process to go through to amend it. I don't think it weakens the plan, adopting it tonight and doing that further liaison , and if something comes to pass that's relevant, it can be then considered formally as a further piece of evidence and an amendment to the plan. And that does happen from time to time.

Councillor Kotlash.

Okay. Okay, I'll take that as an acceptable explanation, I suppose. Thank you.

Councillor Rasmussen.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I will too be supporting this draft CMP. I think it has great merit. I think it's clearly done by people who understand what they're doing, who have done it in accordance with state agency guidelines and rules. And if and when adopted, would have the standing of a legal document, which Council then needs to be applying to Thompson Square. And I think it is time that , long overdue in my book, that Thompson Square had this sort of a CMP overlay to guide its future and where development should occur, how it can occur, and so on. So that will be a very valuable reference and document and a legal one. For anybody who wishes to have a look at any development or contemplates any development within Thompson Square precinct, that I think is a great step forward.

Now, the defective term has been used, and I think wrongly so. It clearly is not defective. The CMP is not a defective plan. What it sets out to do is try, or sets out to say, well, Bridge Street, that part of Bridge Street, should be returned to light traffic and so on. That is a guidance for what it should be into the future, in the same way as the SMP has set forward guidance as to what should happen to the grassed area of Thompson Square. It is not there now. Something quite different is there now. And once the SMP is implemented, it will be quite different. So there is a future element to both of these. So neither of them, although I would argue SMP is defective because it hasn't been developed and constructed in accordance with the rules that the state agency has set down for these documents.

However, it does set forward a plan for the future and what should happen, and in the same way the CMP sets forward what should happen in the future. So it is really, really not constructive or helpful to call the CMP defective in those terms. And I will be supporting the CMP.

Thank you. Any further speakers? Councillor Richards.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. First, before I say a couple of words, I'll just ask another question. My concern keeps stemming from the fact that we're discussing and debating tonight that there are legal issues with— What's happening on a local level and what's happening on a state level. So first, my question is, if the state government planning approvals that they've already got in place overrules this anyway, but we still have this document in place that you say has statutory weight, could Council resolve to take a legal action on the project and the RMS because its CMP and its statutory weight has some sort of legal effect?

No, the current approval is already in place, so it can't retrospectively influence an existing—

No, but I just wanted to clarify so everyone's aware, thank you. I believe that tonight the two positions that are up on the board, I don't— I mean, I've seen before where we've had positions like that up on the board and people moving or seconding or recommending these positions have actually said, Why would you adopt something when there's still work to be done on it? Point two shows there is still work to be done on it. So why, as a Council, as a body of decision makers, would we adopt something that by its own admission in the recommendation says there's still work to be done on it? So in that respect, I won't be supporting it. There seems to still be inconsistencies with the whole area down there moving forward.

That's not to say that there is great work or work of merit in that document, but I honestly can't support a recommendation where it still says that it's still not in a complete position, so I won't be supporting that.

Thank you. Any further speakers? Councillor Kotlash.

Can I just ask a question about the policies?

Yes.

I know you probably all think I'm fixated on policies, but how are all of these policies that are in this plan, are they going to be put together and form one policy that we have on our policy register, or will they always be attached to this report?

So the Conservation Management Plan relates to an area. So it's a set of policy statements that relate to a specific geographic area. And at times, policies run parallel with each other, but at times they can intersect with each other, and then during the merit assessment process, that intersection needs to be managed. That's what the merit assessment is all about. So these are a group of policies that relate to a whole range of conservation issues relevant to that geographic area. And when officers are assessing applications, they need to manage that configuration of policies. And likewise, when we're preparing the plans, for example, for the livability project, we'll have to review those policies and apply them on their merits as we see fit. And that's just the normal process. Councillor Sam Prolling, you have a question.

Well, I've already spoken, so this is only a question, in fact it's a request. It's that we deal with the two dot points in Syriata.

I'll ask the mover of the motion.

I'm happy with that. I can't really see the point, but why not? Mover is

Happy, the seconder happy with that.

Yes, I'm happy with that.

Okay. Any further speakers? Deputy

Mayor. I haven't spoken yet, despite asking quite a few questions. Thank you, Mr Mayor. I'll support this. I echo Councillor Wheeler's sentiments that it's an incredibly well-prepared document, and it's certainly something that enhances our commitment to heritage and so on. I think the concerns about any conflict with the current approvals are not warranted because we can't go back and deal with any of that, but we can still work, as has been said, on the interpretation plan. And I think that they are quite minor in the whole scheme of things, which the management plan is for the whole area. And it was unfortunate that the RMS didn't do a proper CMP in the first place, which would have enhanced the works that were occurring there, no doubt.

So I'll be supporting it, and I think that the point two is not really doing more work. From what I understand, it's just really ensuring that any terminology referring to the Aboriginal significance and those portions are just referring to getting that correct. So I don't think it's something that would change the content or the direction of the CMP, merely enhance it to ensure that any sensitive language is correctly used and included. Thank you.

Thank you. Any further speakers? Councillor Rich. Sorry, just

Another question, yes please. Is there any chance to give Council an estimation on how much it's cost to put this document together overall, everything involved?

My recollection is that the budget was about $105,000, and we got a contribution, I think, of $10,000 from the Office of Environment and Heritage towards that total cost.

Any further questions or discussion? Councillor Wheeler, would you like your right of reply?

Thanks, Mr Mayor. I think some of this discussion has really been generated because there's a lack of understanding of what a conservation management plan is and what it does. And with the wisdom of hindsight, perhaps it would have been helpful for this to have come to a briefing before it came to the chamber. Council should have—the cold hard truth of this is that it's the owner's responsibility to prepare a conservation management plan for a state heritage listed document. This council should have prepared this document years ago. Had it done so, we may not find ourselves in the sorry situation that we currently do. The policies that are causing concern don't just relate to the small bit of Thompson Square that's impacted directly by the bridge, and those policies make reference to things that should happen in the square regardless of whether the Windsor Bridge replacement project goes ahead or not.

So I reject the idea that they're a waste of time or that there's some sort of defect in the plan. Policy 56 refers to the lower reserve, built structures, garbage bins, tables, benches, car parking provisions and hard surfacing, and tree planting. This is an extraordinarily practical document. This isn't a high-level overview document like the strategic conservation management plan. This is a deeply practical document that drills right down to the colour that you paint or the colour that you purchase a garbage bin in. And I think there's a lack of understanding by many people displayed around this table of what the purpose of this document actually is. The RMS has an approved plan. The project is happening, but it's happening because the heritage protections of Thompson Square have been turned off.

And that's a really important thing. People are able to whip themselves up into a fluster over this document because the heritage protections of Thompson Square have been turned off, and that is disgraceful. That's not a political statement. The Heritage Advisory— this is not a political document. The Heritage Advisory Committee requested that this document be prepared more than 18 months ago. The people who have written this document, who've made recommendations about heavy vehicle traffic, are noted heritage experts internationally . They are not making political statements about the New South Wales Liberal government. They are making expert heritage recommendations about the oldest public square in the country, mentioned as being of exceptional significance for its rarity.

That's the context that this document should be looked at in. We shouldn't be throwing out the whole document because of a few points. This will not be sitting side by side with the Strategic Conservation Management Plan. The Strategic Conservation Management Plan fails to do the majority of the work that this document does. If any concerns about the budget really should be put back on the state government and the RMS. The fact that this council has had to shell out $95,000 of its own money is due to the fact that the state government and the RMS have been deeply irresponsible with this piece of national significant heritage.

Does this fly in the face of what's happening? Well, yes, of course it does. But you can't. It doesn't weaken the CMP that the RMS and the state government is ignoring the heritage significance of this site. It weakens the heritage significance of Thompson Square, but that's not the CMP's fault, and it's not a reason to reject this document. I hear Councillor Kotlash's concerns about point two, and I think they're valid. But I think we have to consider the fact that this document needs to be activated with some urgency, and we also need to appreciate that a conservation management plan is a living document, and that new information and new evidence comes forward all the time, and they can be reviewed and updated.

And if the reconciliation action plan working group suggests that, then we can act on that. So I think this is probably the best balance of attempting to do both of those things. This document will require some review following the RMS actions as well, because we're going to have to work out how we deal with that space once it's handed back to us in its new and not very improved condition.

This is long overdue for Thompson Square, and it's long overdue for Windsor. There is information in this document that's relevant to all of the Macquarie towns and all of our colonial heritage and streetscapes. I'm pleased that many of my fellow councillors are willing to support it. It's a vital document, and I think the Heritage Advisory Committee will be very pleased to see it endorsed.

Thank you, Councillor Whelan. We're going to consider these two points separately, so I'll move point one first. All those in favour say aye. Those against, declare it carried. Now move point two. All those in favour say aye. Those against, declare it carried. Thank you very much.

We now move to the...

Second item subject to public address, which is item number 31, and our first speaker is Harry Terry.

Mayor, councillors, council staff, and my fellow eight gallery members.

Trust is the foundation of every healthy relationship . It is merit-based. It can't be given freely. It must be earned through consistency, honesty, integrity, and dependability. Whenever trust is broken, we have a choice: either to proceed with caution to hopefully allow trust to be rebuilt, or step aside. One of the saddest consequences of the Windsor Bridge Replacement Project is that I have lost trust, not only in our government, but more significantly in the RMS. For most of my life, there was a public service. The public service appears to have morphed into a government service. Can we trust the RMS to protect our heritage, our townships, our way of living? Roads and bridges should meet our needs, not dictate our lifestyle.

To have another bridge project deliberately funneling traffic into another of our Macquarie towns. is unconscionable. We should not be the victim of poor asset management and poor planning and another third-rate band-aid solution of a river crossing. How can the RMS be trusted when it claims the Windsor Bridge is likely to fall in flood, yet the Chairman of the Legislative Council inquiry , after hearing extensive evidence both publicly and in camera from the RMS, stated there is no reason for it to be demolished. We call bovine excreta, or words to that effect. How can the RMS be trusted when the cost of the Windsor Bridge replacement project has increased from 25 million to 137 million? How can the RMS be trusted when it claimed the Windsor Bridge peak traffic queue in the morning is 810 metres from the bridge, and in the afternoon 420 metres, when we know it is far greater than that?

How can it be trusted when, in a written reply to the inquiry, when they asked what will the impact be on the traffic exiting Macquarie Street to cross the bridge, their answer was there's unlikely to be any negative consequence, unlikely to be any improvement after spending 137 million. How can the RMS be trusted when it claimed the new bridge would achieve a one in five flood immunity, when a one in five flood immunity is 11 metres and the bridge at the lower point is 9. 8? But it's worse than that, because under current rules the bridge is closed when the water, the floodwater, reaches half a metre below the soffit of the bridge, the underneath of the bridge. In a written reply to the inquiry, they said that would be 7.

5 metres. Now, if they're claiming that the bridge is based on the principle that it matches the approach roads at 9.8 and they're going to close it at 7.5, you can't trust them.

Can the RMS be trusted to have a consultation process that demonstrates consistency, honesty, integrity and dependability? Can the RMS be trusted not to run a fine-tuned replica of the Windsor Bridge replacement project consultation process? Can the RMS be trusted not to devise impractical options as for the Windsor Bridge? Can the RMS be trusted to respect and conserve our heritage? Can the RMS be trusted to respect and conserve our environment? Can the RMS be trusted to respect and foster our communities? Can the RMS be trusted to have an overarching strategic plan of river crossings of the Hawkesbury? Can the RMS be trusted to plan and design a bypass that meets those needs? Can the RMS be trusted to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

I think not. But I'm putting my trust in you, both councillors and council staff, to do what you can to stand up and be counted for the residents of the Hawkesbury, to protect us from the RMS and to fight for a well-developed and effective plan for river crossings of the Hawkesbury. Our community deserves no less.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr Terry. Are you happy to answer any questions?

Yes, Mr Mayor.

Councillor Conolly. Thanks, Mr Terry. I just wonder, we didn't quite get to it. What's your position on the motion in front of us?

I am supporting the motion. If it has the extension of extending the project area to look at the whole of the Hawkesbury Basin, as I call it, from Richmond to Windsor, and if they're looking at extending that to look at a bypass, they look for the very best place for a bypass that matches the traffic information that the council has already developed . And so, if that included an extension rather than just at North Richmond to Richmond, I'm very much in favour of council having a position on this important piece of infrastructure. We've got one chance to get it right. We've lost one chance. We've got one more chance.

Thank you. Any further questions? No. Thank you, Mr Terry. Thank you.

Mr Mayor, just a moment, sorry.

Sorry, Mr Terry. No

No, it's not a question. Sorry. I've sat here reading the business paper prior, believing to be no conflict of interest in the matter, but I think upon, before we go into any discussion, debate or any vote on the matter, I'm considering that I'll leave the room on this one. Sorry for the late notice, but upon further consideration, I think that I'll declare a significant non-pecuniary interest in the matter based on my federal preselection. Sorry, federal candidacy. Thank you. Our

Second speaker is

Kate McInnes. Thank you, Mr Mayor. Deputy Mayor. Councillors, for this opportunity to speak. It seems extraordinary that tonight, of all nights, these two bookends come together for us to talk about the SCMP and the Richmond Bridge, the SCMP for Windsor Bridge and Richmond Bridge.

At no point in the history of the Hawkesbury has this community needed the support of the Council the way it does today. We have seen a devastatingly destructive project inflicted upon this community, and we have seen the way the RMS has prosecuted that project in the face of stalwart resistance and protest. The disempowerment of this community over the last five years has been palpable and disgraceful, and it's time for it to stop.

I want to just take you through—I've been to two meetings with the RMS about this project, and before you vote, I think it's only fair to let you know some of my concerns about that discussion that was had with the RMS. Because, quite frankly, if we think we've finished with bad projects from the Roads and Maritime Services, we have another thing coming. This community is facing a devastating problem, possibly worse than what has happened in Windsor because the traffic volumes are already

Considerably greater. Excuse me, Kate, can you move the microphone down a bit?

Sorry, is that better? Yes. Apologies. So I don't know what anyone here thinks about where we're up to with this Richmond Bridge process, and perhaps you have a better understanding than I do. I joined the group confident that I was going to be Helping to inform best practice, that we as a group were going to be given the opportunity to put some input into this project to make sure it reflected the needs and aspirations of the Hawkesbury community. And on that note, I would suggest, and suggested in the meeting last night that I attended, that the objective of this project is to move traffic safely and efficiently across the floodplain.

I think that's just a self-evident truth: safely and efficiently move traffic across the floodplain.

If you put traffic through Georgian townships, you do not move them safely or efficiently. That's fairly self-evident as well.

For some reason that escapes me, every other community in New South Wales gets a bypass whether they want it or not. The RMS is very keen on moving interurban transport out of communities. But in the Hawkesbury, we have to fight to get that simple functionality that is granted to everyone else. So if I just go back to what I was saying earlier about my understanding of this process, I, like many others engaged in it, thinking we were going to make a real contribution to this process. Two meetings later, I know there is no chance, and I'll tell you why. I'm sorry for the scribbled page, but we were handed out this document last night, and I just want everybody in this room to understand that the options have already been developed.

So the RMS know exactly what they're going to do. That has been made abundantly clear. I'm also going to stick my neck out and say, as a former bureaucrat, one of those grey cardiganed people who loyally serve the state of New South Wales, who go in every day and do the right thing by the community, as one of those people, I find it extremely offensive to have an RMS employee tell me how lucky the Hawkesbury is to have a special person looking after them and getting them funding for a project. I just cannot tell you how offensive I found that. Now, please don't get me wrong. The Hawkesbury has needed a bridge crossing, both of these bridge crossings, well, has needed bridge crossings for a very long time.

They are entitled to those bridge crossings on their merits, not because somebody has prioritised them, because they've got some power that no other communities have.

It's presumably because other communities got their bridges out of priority order that the Hawkesbury has had to wait this long to get the bridges that we're getting now. And I say that offering you this thought.

Richmond Bridge carries more traffic than Windsor Bridge, and only slightly less than the largest inter-capital city route in Australia, and considerably more than the second largest inter-urban route in Australia. And yet we are told in meetings that

There is not funding available to do this job properly. There are three major routes that go through this LGA. One north, that's the Putty Road across the Windsor Bridge. One west, Bells Line of Road across the Richmond Bridge, and to the southwest. is the bridge across Yarramundi, which is a state-maintained road taking you to the Great Western Highway. Three routes going through this LGA, and we have to go on bended knees for funding? Unbelievable. So I think that this notice of motion is incredibly important at this stage because what needs to happen is we need to set some principles in place to stop the game playing that's going on with the Hawkesbury. We used to jokingly say, ‘Don't know what Windsor did to deserve this.’

Now I'm starting to say, ‘I don't know what we did to deserve it,’ right across the Hawkesbury, because as surely as the Windsor Bridge has destroyed a significant heritage asset that the entire Hawkesbury community is— sorry, a heritage asset that belongs to all of us, just so is the amenity and quality of life in Richmond going to be destroyed all over again by the RMS. They have learnt nothing in the last five years.

If you just forgive me for a minute.

So I was really perturbed about some of the comments earlier, and I think one of the things that is most frustrating about the situation in Windsor, with all due respect is — Yes, I will do. With all due respect is, and this will be my final and a fairly important point, is there was a bad decision at the start. And ever since then, every time there's a new decision, we are referred back to the initial bad decision. And we're told we can't unpick it because the last decision's been made, so we have to keep moving forward. And at some stage we have to say, no, we won't do that anymore. And the earlier the better, and I'd suggest now is the time to do it with the Richmond Bridge, because the RMS knows what they're going to do. They're going to duplicate. Duplicate Richmond Bridge and put a four-lane highway through Richmond. Thank you.

Thank you. Are you happy to answer questions? Certainly am. Any questions, Councillor Conolly? Thanks, Mr Mayor. Thanks, Ms McInerney. I was interested in your comment that you've been told in the meetings that there's not funding available to do this properly. No, no

No, no. Please, I'd like to be very explicit about what we were told. We were told not that there wasn't money to do it properly, but when we have suggested that it should be done, that it should be done properly, people whistle through their teeth. Very expensive, you know. That's the reaction we get.

Is that not— I'm sorry, with respect, is that not different to what you said earlier? Because you said, I wrote down your words, that you've been told in meetings that there's not funding available to do this job properly

Okay. So how would you interpret, when we ask for a decent solution and they say it costs a lot of money? Well

Without getting into debate, because this is questions, I probably wouldn't go around misquoting them if I wanted them to work constructively. Thank you. Any further questions? No. Thank you, Ms McInerney. Thank you. Our third and final speaker is Mr Michael Wont.

Thanks. Thanks, Chair and Councillors. The NRDCAA supports the two previous speakers and their comments, and we're working together hopefully to get a better outcome. Councillors, the traffic congestion is the most talked about issue in the Hawkesbury. It used to be the previous council, led by Councillor Bassett and Ford, due to their deafness to the community needs. The notice of motion is another step by the progressive councillors to right the wrongs of the past, in particular development without infrastructure, poor planning, and listening not to the community. The NRDCW would like to suggest a couple of additions to the notice of motion, and I think Mr Terry made comments about those issues.

The first one we'd like to suggest is that the paragraph one, we add Windsor to the paragraph. It currently has just Richmond and North Richmond. And the reason we suggest that is that some could read it as only concentrating on Richmond and North Richmond. I understand that's not the case, but if we include Windsor, that will clear it up.

If our suggestion is acceptable, it feeds into and totally supports B, which is a detailed strategic transport plan of the Hawkesbury Basin. The NRDCW believes further words could be added, possibly, to ensure public transport is part of that plan. I know that B says strategic transport plan and doesn't mention any particular area, but no doubt if we put extra words in there to bring in public transport, I think that would help also. And we're suggesting

That something along the lines that Council requests the State Government, the RMS and Transport for New South Wales to investigate the extension of public transport within the Hawkesbury Local Government Area to ease traffic congestion and assist residents to move within and beyond the Hawkesbury Local Government Area

These words mirror a resolution of Council 24 April 2012, moved by Councillor Lee Williams and seconded by Councillor Christine Payne. It was carried. I spoke at that meeting. A proposed motion, which was moved by Councillor Bassett and Councillor Tree, re the Northwest Rail Line project, and we asked councillors to add that particular words. Surprisingly, Councillor Bassett was very reluctant. Lee Williams persisted. Councillor Kevin Conolly had left the chamber. Councillor Bassett wasn't sure he had the numbers, so relented on the condition that it was a standalone motion. Heavens only knows what happened to the resolution. There were no reports back, so we don't even know whether it was considered or not.

Current councillors Rasmussen, Calvert and Tree were in attendance and supported the standalone motion. So we think it would add value to the motion if those words were also inserted.

Councillors, I don't believe we would be in a situation today if the previous Council had been a more inclusive Council.

You've heard that CORP, with a couple of additions, and the NRDCAA likewise support the Notice

Of Motion. It's essential that Council and the community are on the same page. Let's not have another Windsor Bridge catastrophe where Council were on one page and the community was on another. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Want. Are you happy to answer any questions? Any questions? No . Oh,

Deputy Mayor. Sorry, Mr Want, I missed what the words were you said from 2012

I'll give it

To you. Is that possible

I'll just give her the document, Chair. Is that right

Yeah

That was our last speaker. Deputy Mayor, you'd like to move this?

Yes, I'll move the motion. Second

That. Councillor Rasmussen is seconding it. Okay, thank you. Is the motion as in the paper, or do you want to change it

Just for the moment, I'll leave it. What I would like to do, because I know it's somewhat irregular to have a motion that's come from a motion within the committee before the committee minutes come, but because of the delay in getting the minutes here, we voted at the Floodplain Risk Management Committee to bring it forward so that we could deal with it within the time frame of the consultation, which is generally taking place. So it is open to some alteration because obviously it's calling for Council to take a position, and that was raised in that committee partly within respect to flooding, which is one aspect that is being looked at, and because, of course, there is a wide belief that when there's such a significant infrastructure spend being done by the State Government, that it needs to deliver more than just one simple solution.

It needs to encompass and address as many of our issues that we face with the crossing of the river, and therefore it was brought in that respect. With regard to previous times when there was the issue with the Windsor Bridge, one of the points that repeatedly was made was that Council didn't have an existing position. Council had no resolution that said, We want Windsor bypassed, we want this to happen, we want that to happen. So this is seeking to give us some form of Council position. Where we are saying that this is a preferred or a priority, or we want this looked at in this way, because this is our area and we should have a position on it. I know we've got a traffic study going on, but we should also take a position that we can relay within this consultation process.

Perhaps before I go any further, I might just ask if the general manager, through you, Mr Mayor, if the general manager could give us some idea of what sort of position and what sort of parameters, when staff attend these meetings, what we're raising as points with regard to which planning and so on we're trying to fit in with, if that could be possible before we proceed any further with speaking, just so that we know, because we know there's meetings on various levels with different people. So that may assist us in moving forward. Mr

General Manager.

Mr Mayor, the types of positions that staff are putting forward are along the lines of the need for consistency. So the state government, in developing its floodplain management plan for the Hawkesbury-Nepean, is talking about a flood level anywhere between 1 in 100 to what is commonly known as the probable maximum flood. The consistency argument is that if it's okay to ask residents to build above the 1 in 100 flood level, then it's reasonable to consider any major piece of transport infrastructure should also be above that 1 in 100 level so that it's usable in the majority of situations. The other thing that we're talking about is the need for an integrated approach. So at the moment, there are several — projects underway within Transport and RMS, and we're asking that all of these projects be knitted together as a single cohesive consideration, rather than the current position where it appears that there are multiple projects operating on multiple levels and they're not speaking to each other.

Again, we're talking about the need for the RMS to consider whether it wants to just accept the current breakup of traffic movements within the local government area, particularly west of the Hawkesbury-Nepean River catchment, where over 90% of movements are motor vehicle related. And over time, do we want to try and address that through active transport and other public transport linkages whereby we move some of those vehicles off our road network? We also talk about the need to consider the Richmond town centre as a town centre. It's fair to say that it's perhaps not operating to its optimum at the moment, but Council is looking at opportunities to achieve a better outcome, and putting a road, a larger road through that Richmond town centre is not necessarily the best way forward.

So we're saying that that evidence needs to be collected and inform the considerations going forward. They're the sorts of things that staff are mentioning in meetings with RMS, and they were certainly some of the sentiments that were expressed to the RMS before they started this current round of of community engagement. Deputy Mayor.

Thank you. Thank you, General Manager. So that sort of is quite consistent with what was raised in the Flood Committee and the points sought in point two . I'm probably going to just say a couple of more things and then hear what the other councillors think of it, because it's to see if any additions or changes need to be made. I'll just skip to point three, and there's a very strong feeling that rather than just writing and sending off correspondence, and I know this doesn't fall within a very good time frame politically, although perhaps we could shift it to candidates perhaps or, you know, still try and get in contact with the ministers and the relevant people, but that we actually have a delegation go and speak to these people about our transport needs.

We need to really be able to speak to them about our unique and specific situation here, because when you know people are taking things off maps and statistics, it simply isn't the same as really understanding the dynamics within the Hawkesbury and the multiple layers of concerns that centre on traffic congestion, flood, but also on the competing interests that we have with our heritage and with our agricultural and other land uses that are within what could be potential routes of any bridge crossing. So I think that that's very important that we support a delegation going, and that then we perhaps have some discussion of who might wish to do that and how we think that can be organised and how that can be advanced a little further.

The current consultation. A number of us were in attendance at the meeting. There was a meeting last night. It is a bureaucratic exercise, but it's good that at least people are at the table and that we're starting to discuss something which is a really, really important thing for us to all get right, and for the people to, all the various stakeholders, to be able to have their say and to really input into the process. What we don't want is we don't just want some member of the public coming up with a document and saying, This is a route that we should have, and then trying to get the government to do that. Or we don't want the government just saying, Here's four options. You have to pick one of these, when it hasn't been based on these various wider strategic and integrated transport plans, because we know that once we get this, we are not going to get another big spend on infrastructure on an exit out of the city.

Again, we've got to make sure that it's not—we've had the reaction to the proposed corridors, and we don't want to be sending a message that we want that reinvigorated for some very large highway to be going through in that respect as well. So there's a lot of balancing to be done with what we are exactly putting forward and— I think that by prioritising a bypass, we’re at least saying that we don’t want something that’s going to simply funnel traffic into our townships where we know it can’t cope now. With any additional traffic, we know it would just be disastrous. Even if we’ve got some wider intersections here and there, we know that you can’t do that. And on top of that, there are the issues of heritage, and of course there are the flood issues.

With regard to flood, we know it’s very difficult to say that you would have a totally flood-free access, but I think the hope is that there could somehow be a crossing that would be around that one in one hundred, or in excess of one in one hundred level. We can’t— And then we have, again, the competing ideas of how something like that would actually look in our landscape. So there’s so much to be done, and we need to take a position of what we will pursue so that we can start inputting that and hopefully work with all the other stakeholders to move it forward and ensure that we don’t have another situation where the community feels sidelined and that the concerns that people have were largely ignored.

So I think that on that note, that’s all I’ll say for now, but I’m very interested in what people may wish to add, or change, or alter, or whatever.

Thanks. Any further speakers? Councillor Conolly. Thanks, Mr Mayor. Upon reading this, I was a little bit conflicted because I think point two is very appropriate. I think point three is very appropriate. I do think that point one of the motion... is seeking to take a position when point two and point three is seeking to communicate a position, whereas point two is listing the information we would need to come to that position. And so I originally read that and thought, Well, we can't really do that. But then, having thought it through a bit, looking less at the words and more at the outcome of passing this resolution would be that the RMS aren't going to say, Well, Council has said we need a bypass, so that's what they do.

The RMS is going to look at it and say, Okay, well, that's something we have to be aware of, is that there is a push in the community for a bypass of Richmond-North Richmond, and that's a perfectly fine outcome by me. I'm also aware that whilst there's community consultation going on, I'd always prefer to let that run its course. I haven't met anybody yet who said we should go through Richmond and not bypass it. So I don't feel like we're jumping ahead there and speaking too much out of turn.

So whilst I don't think it's perfect, I am going to support it to move it along. I think it's good to get in at a very early stage. The government's obviously investing a lot of money here, and the experience of Windsor Bridge was that the consultation clearly missed, even though it was a consultation process, it clearly missed a lot of people. And I think the lesson to be learnt is to make sure that we engage with the RMS to make sure the consultation is not missed by anyone.

I would sort of, I just want to make a short comment about some of the speech we heard earlier from the Corb members here. The idea that this project is, we've already decided that Richmond's amenity is about to be destroyed by this project, is a dangerous concept. It's just, it's whipping up hysteria over nothing. The government announces funding to start the planning, in a serious funding to start proper planning for this bypass. Our response should be constructive and engage with the government and try and get the best outcome. We shouldn't be out there already deciding that the project is bad, that Richmond's amenity is ruined, and that there's no hope for any of us. I think that's a ridiculous notion.

I think we just got to, you know, we're a responsible organisation, we're community representatives. Let's stay positive. Until such time as there's something to be upset about, let's not be upset and hysterical.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Councillor Connelly made a similar point that I was going to make, and that is that point one seeks to explicitly take a particular option off the table, and point two says, but we need certain kinds of data to even decide what we want. And it suffers from that imperfection, but for the same reason, I'm happy to endorse the notice of motion tonight. But what I wanted to say along the way is, I mean, there have been proposals for new crossings of the river that range all the way from Punt Road at Pitt Town, the so-called Linwood option, which is still downstream from the current Windsor Bridge, through to crossings at Cornwallis, a duplication of the North Richmond Bridge, and then, of course, the proposed crossing of the river associated with the M9 west of Agnes Banks.

Now, last year, or possibly even before, we decided that we were going to spend some serious money on a regional traffic study. And if we were drawing up a list of the purposes for which that regional study would have utility, surely informing the process of where a new bridge should be located would be at the top of that list. Surely it would be its raison d'être, and that would be based on detailed modelling of current traffic numbers and origin-destination information. So I wanted to ask Council staff, if I may, for a summary of how the regional traffic study may suggest, as an emergent property, a likely or Optimal location for an extra crossing.

I'm sorry, answer to

That question. Basically, what we're producing is what I call the traffic model. So it is regional wide, excluding probably the very northern part of our city, the very northern areas. The use of that model is able to take that, certainly develop a scenario, or you can develop a scenario and then test that in the model and see what the impact is. So any of those things are certainly possible. The level of accuracy obviously depends on how much data you actually put into some of those. So in the core of the Windsor, Richmond, North Richmond area, we'll have very good data on that. May need to be supplemented in the future, depending if it's a more remote location. So yes, the model is used for that.

I can just probably give a bit of an update where that's at at the moment, because as always, it pains to point out that what we need to do is engage the RMS and have them as endorsing that model so that anything that we did put forward, any option was accepted by them. So at the moment that's sitting with RMS. So the modelling's been completed, the base model, and that's with RMS for their verification. So we're expecting that to be in the next couple of weeks. RMS have also engaged or carried out additional traffic studies, and as indicated, I think in the handout that was given at the meeting last night, they'll be certainly doing more work on that from their perspective. But I think I'm answering the question, but yeah, we can certainly use the model for those purposes, depending on the location and what's required.

So if we're very wisely seeking to have the RMS as true partners in this exercise, not merely so that we can present them with a contrarian report that goes completely against modelling that they may be doing and disagree with, but actually to have them on board, is that a reasonable assurance, in your opinion, that when the RMS do begin to formulate a short list of options, is that they have been suitably heedful of our work in developing this regional traffic study?

Through you, Mr Mayor, that's the intent and I think that in the actions that we've had from RMS at the moment, and not putting too much of a spin on that, is that they've provided us with additional information, we've provided them with additional information. So at the moment, the way things are going, our modelling is correlating and they will use our model and our data. If they don't, then I guess we're in a very strong position to be able to call them out and say, You're not using it. We can test that ourselves and say it's not giving you the results that we would get. So I think at the moment, it's a very positive relationship in developing that. If in the future there was something that is at odds, then we can certainly be able to go back and see why that's occurring and say, Well, yes, we've got a model that you've endorsed and it's not giving us the same results as you are.

Well, I'll conclude my remarks by saying that I'm satisfied by that answer. And when this was first announced, I think we should be very positive about the fact that we've been given a pledge of significant funding to begin and advance the planning process for this. I think we do have a need to be collaborative and upbeat. About this, I think it was a misstep to ever portray this at the outset as simply a duplication of the North Richmond Bridge. Perhaps that came as a signal to those commuters who are caught at that particular bottleneck that help is on the way. But I really want this process to be driven by the data. And what Mr. Organ has said convinces me that that process will be data-driven, and I'm happy to endorse the sentiment behind the notice of motion.

Thank you. Further speakers? Councillor Ross.

Thank you.

Firstly, colleague Conolly, I think, has missed the point.

In relation to the township of Richmond, you only have to look at March Street now.

RMS constructed a ruddy great sign there right alongside our park. They've also

Purloined two buildings at the corner of Bosworth Street, which are in a state of disrepair.

They've got the whole thing jolly well planned. They couldn't care less about us.

Go further down March Street to get to West Market,

And we've got an absolute mess. In the area adjacent to the railway station,

It's to funnel growth probably running at about 6% compound per annum through that area now, when you look at peak hours and even weekends these days, is a very flawed proposition at the best, without sitting down with statistics or anything else.

Come up and I'll buy you a cup of tea or pot of tea, and we can sit down and look at it on a weekend. It's entirely visible now that there is a problem in March Street.

And apart from that, the

Historic precinct , which is March Street and the whole of Richmond,

Surely deserves the same degree of respect

And appreciation by the state government as we afford.

And I'm even crankier that they want to jolly well rip out the, no doubt, rip out all of the beautiful floral growth down alongside March Street. They're quite splendidiferous

In travelling through the town, and it gives the town character. It's also cooling, not like this great suburban concrete. Monolith that we all seem to be wanting to strive to obtain, just disgraceful. And the difficulty is with the RMS

Is that in the breezes that I've been smelling,

As much as my colleague, Sam Pornio, fancies a collegiate approach, we'll have to have one. Can you tell us where you get that with the RMS? Or Mr. Konotski and his mob? I can tell you, you don't. We've seen that at the Upper House inquiry. Just not there.

The so-called planning arm of the RMS are there. They're like the Education Department was a few years ago, when they suddenly worked out that they had all the wrong statistics and birth rates and all the rest of it to plan the location of new schools. And all of a sudden the whole of the north and area of Sydney was going to be out of school accommodation, and it was going to cost billions. And then they start talking about high-rise. Well, sorry—

Point of order, Mr Mayor. I'm just drawing an analogy. The motion is about whether or not we should send a delegation to convey a position on North Richmond Bridge. I don't believe any of this is relevant. There is a parallel. I think Councillor Ross is drawing an analogy with other government departments.

Yes.

But please try and stick to the topic.

I shall. Yes, yes, yes.

The analogy is that

There is manifestly bad planning in regard to transport. We've already seen it. We saw it last March, and then we saw them back down after causing a devilishly lot of discontent and even ill health and mental health difficulties within our own community. All of a sudden they come racing out with bits of paper saying, Ah, well, you know, we're here, we're taking over. Ha ha.

No, that's not good planning. It's not even sensibly thought. And then Councillor Zanperonio pointed out quite literally that it ended up in the middle of the national park, another part of the great plan they had. It was supposed to head towards the central coast, but they were heading right for the most mountainous and ill-unsuitable terrain possible. They'd need a bridge every kilometre. No , these people are just not in contact with the reality of the statistics, and I suppose even though we're spending a lot of money getting a traffic study done on a comprehensive basis, frankly it should have been spent by the government of their own volition and not the council. That's the shame of it, and that's the disgrace of it.

That shows you how much interest they have in looking after communities. They don't. They've got this engineering idea, or some idea. I'm yet to ascertain what it might be, but it's not community-minded, and all of the points raised by our speakers are totally valid. We're here to protect the community, and we're here to protect heritage, and these are two great attributes of this area, and the social contract within the area. They are indispensable. No, that's not a laughing matter. It is not a laughing matter. This is absolutely serious. We've suffered this in Windsor. We're not going to surely want to cop it again, and we have to make it clear from every perspective. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Ross. Councillor Rasmussen.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor, I will be supporting this notice of motion, and thank Councillor Lyons-Buckett for constructing it and putting it forward in such a lucid fashion. I do also take on board the speaker. One of the speakers said that Windsor should be included, and I think that would enhance the standing of this motion. But more importantly, I think what we need to, in my book, take a very firm stand on what it is that we want for this particular bridge. Yes, we should be working very cooperatively with the state government of whatever persuasion, because it is going to take a significant amount of money to get this done. But I think it is right and proper for us as a council to say we need to have, at the very top of the planning process, the bit that's going to drive this is a bypass. Is a bypass. That's the option.

Now, where the bypass goes will clearly and needs to be informed by whatever data, whatever good data, traffic studies and whatever we can gather together to make sure that wherever the bypass goes, it is in the optimal position for the traffic flow, as far as we can tell from the data. I think these are very straightforward propositions. But we need to put our very clear position that we do not want, we do not want, a duplication of the current bridge. And if you look at, and I did attend the meeting last night, and, but I was there as a member of the, one of the members of the floodplain management risk management committee. But it seemed to me that the information that was panned out, and I too, like one of the speakers, took great umbrage at some of the information that was being, shouldn't use peddled, I suppose, but was being put before the group, and there was 25, I think I counted, people there last night.

But to me, the project scope of what the RMS has got in its planning on its— Desktop planning framework , the project scope has a red line which extends sort of around, takes in the bulk of North Richmond, a lot of Richmond, the Driftway, and a lot of the Yarramundi lowlands. Now I looked at that particular project scope and the red line, and if the RMS is developing options within that polyhex and whatever it is diagram, if I was at North Richmond and we've heard a lot about Richmond, and so we should, absolutely we should, but if I was at North Richmond and I owned a house south of the current Bells Line of Road, looking at that project scope, I would be seriously worried. Seriously worried, both from where the option might land and the impact of the value of my house.

Because if you can believe the red line, and that is really the project scope and not just some airy-fairy nothing, then there could well be a substantial road going through a very large section of the urban part of North Richmond.

So if you take that, and if you do not put a very clear line in the sand that no, that project scope is not good enough because it is going to cause a huge amount of damage to Richmond, it is going to cause a ginormous Amount of anxiety in the people owning houses in North Richmond. What we need to do is we need to be very clear from this council that we need a bypass. And so let's just get that working right up front. Some of the other things that I noted from the meeting last night, well, there are some significant, in my book anyway, some significant omissions of people there. The infrastructure committee of this council, there was no official representation of the infrastructure committee at the meeting.

Now there may well be people, staff who work on infrastructure on private conversations or meetings with the RMS, and therefore some of that would be injected into whatever they do. But in terms of the community groups that were there, the infrastructure committee wasn't there. The floodplain risk management committee finally got there. The farmers group wasn't there. And if you look at any of the option likely, it's going to have a significant impact on a significant number of farmers. They weren't there.

They are doing their own, we were told, they're doing their own flood study. But we all know that there is a significant flood study happening because of the raising of the Warragamba Dam. But they're doing their own. So if you put all this bag of tricks together, I'm not sure that unless we'll get a decent outcome that isn't going to cause havoc. In North Richmond and Richmond, and the sooner we clear that up for people in North Richmond and Richmond, the better it is for this council. And I think we owe it to this, to the residents of North Richmond and Richmond, that we clear that up pretty darn quickly, and we say to the community out there, no, we want a bypass. Where that bypass should go, that needs to be informed, as I've said, and I'm going to repeat all that.

But yeah, I had very little — in fact, just one other point. There were, yeah, as I said, 25-odd people there. There were community groups from many places, which is good. But there were two groups, at least, yeah, or one in particular group, that were absolutely adamant that we shouldn't have a bypass. We shouldn't have a bypass. And the only issue that really, really held up the traffic flow across the bridge was the intersection at

Terrace Road, Grassway Road and Bells Line Road. So fix up the traffic lights there and bingo, you've got it sorted. They did not want a bypass because clearly they were concerned that the bypass might end up south, very significantly south of the current North Richmond Bridge, and therefore end up somewhere near the corridor that nobody wanted through Grassway Road. So the sooner we start talking with our community, and we need to engage our community on this, otherwise it's going to be another, another shambles. Like we had with the corridor, we do need to engage. So, what am I saying? I think we need to endorse this notice of motion. I think it takes the right approach. It takes a strategic policy approach, and then hopefully we can form a delegation and we can go and make those points very clearly to ministers, whoever they might be, and whatever time we can get to see the ministers.

Difficult time now because I think their government is going into caretaker mode within a few days, I suspect, and so it's going to be difficult to get anybody to talk to you about anything significant. But we do still need to have it on our books, and as soon as we know who the government is going to be and form up, we should be in there knocking on their door.

Further speakers? Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. I think it's important for councillors to note that this recommendation is put forward as a recommendation of the Floodplain Risk Management Advisory Committee, not necessarily of the four councillors who've raised this notice of motion. Council uses advisory committees to provide us with additional information that we wouldn't normally be aware of, and on this committee we have representatives of residents, community members, the other floodplain committee, the SES. We have frequent briefings and visits from Infrastructure New South Wales and the Office of Environment and Heritage. So this is a well-informed, well-intentioned committee that's not seeking to put things up purely to make political statements.

This is a committee whose remit is to advise council about how best to manage living with the floodplain that we find ourselves on. The Heritage Advisory Committee has serious concerns about any plan to go through Richmond in particular, or any of the Macquarie towns. A through road simply isn't tenable through Richmond. The Floodplain Committee and the other floodplain committee are extremely concerned about flood immunity, evacuation, and access for services like the SES and the ambulance in times of flood. So

Representing clearly to the RMS that flood immunity is, and flood evacuation capacity is really important, is essential for this to progress. And I note that last night in the meeting, when we talked about flood immunity with them, they did in fact whistle through their teeth and make noises about the scale of the bridge required to do that and the funds required to provide that. So here, I think we're already looking at an intention to give us something that isn't a one in a hundred immunity. And as the general manager says, if we expect residents to build above the one in a hundred, I'm not quite sure why we don't expect a state service provider to do the same.

We're unlikely to achieve any of the flood concerns if we travel through Richmond. And I also want to echo the general manager's concerns about the impact on Richmond itself. Richmond is quite vulnerable as a working township. We've already seen one of our flagship Macquarie towns devastated by an RMS project. We simply cannot afford, if we are to continue to rely on tourism as part of our local economy, we cannot afford to have Richmond treated in the same cavalier fashion. Nor can the heritage of the region cope with that sort of treatment of these very important, highly significant Macquarie towns. And that's why the Heritage Advisory Committee has been invited to send two representatives to consultations.

There are concerns about the scale of the bridge. The Heritage Advisory Committee has concerns about the scale of the bridge and the impact on the landscape, in particular the way the Macquarie towns sit within the landscape. They're not separate. They don't exist separately to the landscape. They exist and were planned as part of the landscape, and their planning significance relates to their relationship with the landscape. And the RMS need to be aware of this and the heritage concerns involved .

My concern about this project is that we are currently being given an interim solution, and that's intersection upgrades, which is being funded to the tune of around $18 million. I think it would be really detrimental to the future of this crossing project if those interim solutions drove the long-term solution. If spending that money on these interim solutions then resulted in a poor long-term solution because the state government didn't want to advance further funding to give us a decent long-term solution. Therefore, it's essential that the points in point two are considered because I don't think that they can be done simply by a bit of widening around Bells Line of Road between North Richmond and Richmond.

It's simply not possible to cover the flood evacuation capacity in particular, but also the traffic and heritage concerns. The RMS has repeatedly mentioned additional growth in this corridor, and also the impact of unplanned piecemeal subdivision and development without addressing traffic impact up to this point. And I think there's a salutary lesson for Council involved in that as well. But I think Council really need, I think Council and the community need to be aware that this can be a double-edged sword for us, so that if we do get a bypass and a bigger crossing over the river, we are looking at more development west of the river. And I think we, and one of the things that we need to be conscious of is that this plan needs to fit in with not only Council's plans, but also the Greater Sydney Commission's plans for wider Sydney, and that notion that development shouldn't occur outside major transport routes, and North Richmond is not a major transport route, nor is anything on the floodplain.

I agree with Councillor Rasmussen that it is extremely concerning that farmers aren't represented in this, and I think that's something we need to address further with the RMS. But this motion as it stands comes from the floodplain committee. I don't think that we need to amend it further at this point. We can take the additional concerns to the discussion meetings that we're having. But we do need a position. We need to have something that staff can engage with the RMS with some basis to, and Council needs to come to a decision about what we expect from the state government in providing. Not only timely travel within the Hawkesbury, but safe travel in the event of a natural disaster, which is inevitable given where we live.

Further speakers? Can I just add my two cents worth?

Thank you.

I'm supporting

This notice of motion, although I do think it is not strongly or clearly worded, particularly point one. What I think we should be saying there is that Council supports a bypass, and that duplication of the Richmond Bridge is not a bypass. And if we adopt it in that way, then there's no conflict with point two. A bypass takes traffic away from the main centres of Richmond and Windsor, and duplication of Richmond Bridge does not do that. So it's not a bypass. Secondly, point one doesn't mention Windsor, but in my opinion, any bypass north of Windsor, for example between Pitt Town and Wilberforce, if it's connected back through roads such as Terrace Road and Kurmond Road, will reduce traffic at North Richmond as well.

So we don't need to, I don't think we need to specify Windsor, but maybe we need to make it a third crossing in there, rather than actually only mentioning Richmond and North Richmond. So they're just some words that I'd like to put up to the Deputy Mayor. Maybe she's happy with it the way it is, but just to strengthen it a bit. But otherwise, I have no problems in supporting this motion. Any further speakers? Otherwise, Deputy Mayor, right of reply. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes, I'm happy to put that round

As you suggested, to reword it that way, unless, of course, it causes any issue with the wording of what the consultation is actually directed at, which is actually called early consultation on Richmond Bridge duplication project, because it arises from the 2012 study specifically. So I am happy to put it, but because we know there can be lots of pedantic little things that go on, I wouldn't like it to not be given as much weight as if we were to leave it. But I am, I'm really—I've brought it from the committee as it was given within the committee, and I'm happy if everyone's happy to turn it round. I do think the wording council supports a bypass is stronger than perhaps putting prioritise.

I think the word prioritise was there because we were fearful a number of options would come, and as before there was an option for a bypass and there was no priority within the council to say that would be a— if we didn't have a position, then we could not say that's our priority. But I'm happy to go with that wording if nobody else has any issues with that, and to reword point one. I think the idea was to say to prioritise a bypass, and then the second point is that in doing that bypass, this is what should be looked at. So I guess that was just referring information on to the RMS. But I'm happy for that to be changed around if Michael got that, or if the Mayor will repeat that.

Councillor Rasmussen, and you're the seconder, I believe. Are you happy? Support.

So

I think—

Council supports.

I think point one was also meant to say because a duplication of Richmond Bridge is not a bypass, or words to that effect.

Which is why the value of having a delegation to actually go and tell these people, in a political sense, that by saying that, it doesn't mean we don't want a duplication of the bridge, because we know how there's all this either/or. So I just wouldn't like to see us fall into a position where it could be thrown back at us and saying, You didn't want the bridge duplicated, therefore you get nothing. That would be my concern. But I'm happy with that—

Mr Werner, are you changing

Wording? Happy with those changes, and I'll just continue on while that's being changed, unless anybody has an objection to the changes that are there.

It's really just a reword, and I do think it strengthens it, so I think that's better. As I just said, with response to Councillor Zamproni, who I think was wondering why it came up to be said duplication and so on, that was because the 2012 study did the short, medium and long-term studying of it, and the duplication was what they decided was the most advantageous thing at the time to look for into the future. Of course, a lot's changed from then, and a lot will change again with this. So I think that with us putting forward a position, I would expect we can probably, after we've been to speak to more people, or after time goes on, we can actually revisit it in line with how the consultation's going, because at the meeting last night the time frame was given out, and it's actually quite lengthy.

It's not like this is going to be done quickly. So things may change in the interim, you know, governments or other things like that, and then we could have to relook at it in another light. But I think— The trouble is the RMS are very loath to put in an exclusion zone. They won't take out Richmond on their study area, even though it's been asked, because they insist that it needs to be in there for a comparative look at where you would put the traffic and so on. So I think that if we've got a very strong position that we don't want anything going through there, then that gives us a lot more backing to actually push them to exclude the townships from their actual areas or go skirt around the outside of the townships.

So I think that we all seem to agree that now is the time that we've really got to be involved in the process, and that's why it's very important to have a stance, because this is a major, major piece of infrastructure that we will hopefully get, and we're not going to get it soon. We all know it won't be an immediate thing, and that is why the RMS continuing with the intersection upgrades and so on, because they do say this bridge would, you know, be probably close to 10 years off or so, 8 to 10 years. I can understand people going to the meetings and having the concerns that they have. We all have that when we're given the bureaucratic spiels that go on. But I'm hopeful that if we can improve the process by being a unified front in here and giving a position that we all agree on, then that gives us a lot more fighting power than we've had in the past, where we didn't have a position and where we couldn't move on with anything.

Expanding, looking, I think on top of the consultation, which is what this motion relates to, I do think we need to push on more with our whole strategic transport planning , and particularly with public transport, because I read today a statistic that only 5.86% of people in the Hawkesbury commute by public transport, and I think that that is way, way below the state average, and I think that's a really unfortunate statistic. So I think that we continue the push for that as well.

I think the next process, I guess what we haven't addressed here is how we would select a delegation. Should we be doing that as part of this process, or should we leave that for the general manager and the mayor to decide? Or do we bring that back because we've identified that it's quite a difficult time to be giving such a delegation? But I certainly would think that most definitely this position, if we support this resolution tonight, should be conveyed as soon as possible to, and it says in point two, to do that. So that we should convey that position as soon as possible to the people holding the consultation so they know council has addressed this and come up with a position that they're agreed upon.

So thank you for the contributions, and thank you to the floodplain committee for bringing this up. Just one other thing, in the first meeting that we had with the RMS, I asked them were they considering the connectivity to the flood evacuation routes, and they said they weren't necessarily. And we also thought that that's really, really essential because as the city grows and there's a lot of that development, you know, from Bligh Park downward, and people are all having to get across to the M4 and wherever the evacuation routes go, it's incredibly important that any new infrastructure be built as flood resistant as possible and that it connects to those evacuation routes to enhance the safety of the people that have to evacuate in flood.

So thank you.

Thank you. That was right of reply, so I'll put the motion. All those in favour say aye. Those against, declare it carried. If someone could ask—

Councillor Richards to come back, please.

Do we need to discuss that point three, or?

No, we'll see if we can get... This was the delegation. We'll get a date and then we'll see. So

Just leave it

While we're waiting, would someone like to move the items on block, items 21, 22, 27, 28 and 29. Councillor Sam Brogno, Councillor Garrow. All those in favour say aye. Declare it carried.

We now move to item 16, which is conference. Any discussion, please? Councillor Wheeler.

I'll move the recommendation.

Thank you. Seconded Deputy Mayor. Any discussion?

Councillor Wheeler.

This fits in nicely with both Council's Liveability Program through the Town Centres Working Group, and also the Sustainability Advisory Committee's consideration, and a previous notice of motion to consider increasing tree canopy within the LGA, so I think it's relevant.

Okay. Any further speakers?

No. I suggest you don't need a right of reply for that. All those in favour say aye. Those against? Declared carried. Item 17, Councillor Garrett.

I suggest deputy wants going. Oh, you want people to go to it. Sorry. Do we have volunteers for that? Councillor Wheeler. Just Councillor Wheeler, going by yourself. Okay.

Yep. Sorry about that. Yep, thank you.

So we move that Councillor Wheeler be our delegate to the conference. Councillor Rasmussen. No, you're moving it. You can go . You're moving, and Councillor Cotterlash is seconding. All those in favour say aye. Declare it carried. Item 17, Councillor Garry.

Declare an interest in this.

Less than significant non-pecuniary interest. One of the sister city attendees is a close associate of mine.

So you'll be staying here.

Would someone like to move the—? I move it , Mr Mayor. Seconded. Seconded, Councillor Conolly. Any discussion? If not, I'll put the motion. All those in favour say aye. Declare it carried.

Item 19, I believe.

Delivery program. Someone like to move that? Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Conolly. Any discussion? If not, I'll move that. Well done. Page 43.

Okay, I'll move that. All those in favour say aye. Carried.

Item 20, the December 2018 quarterly budget review. Do we have a mover for that? Move that one. Councillor Rasmussen, Deputy Mayor. Any discussion? Councillor Ross.

I'd like to move an amendment.

Yes, please.

That the report be rejected on the following grounds.

Point one, the report is not compliant with the State Government IPR legislation,

Despite a delayed implementation. Council was first alerted to the legislation in 2009 and was due to implement it from the 1st of July 2012. And in that regard, second point is that there is a resolution passed by this Council, number 12 of the meeting of the 1st of February 2011, moved by Councillor Rasmussen, seconded by Councillor Williams, which acknowledged the commencement of the reporting regime that attended the IPR.

Point three.

Deputy Mayor , yes.

Mr Mayor, was this— An amendment.

Yep

I

Would just request if it's— Yeah.

I see what you mean. Yep. It's not an amendment, it's a rejection. Rejection. So what you'd need to do is wait and see, speak against it, and then have a foreshadowed motion to reject it. Okay. Sorry about that. Yes, Deputy Mayor is absolutely correct in this case. So is there any further speakers on the matter?

I would speak. You want to speak against it, please.

Is that in order?

Yes.

Thank you.

As I indicated out of course, it's not compliant with the legislation. It's not compliant with a resolution of Council which has been passed,

And there are no secrets about the IPR. I mean, the IPR was quoted in the quarterly budget review statement, I believe, at the front of it as being relevant. Now,

Another point to

Which I wish

To draw attention is that I think there are

Deficiencies within the report.

I also believe that the report fails to adequately match costs and revenue. There are timing, apparently timing discrepancies that I could cite,

And I believe that some sections of the report fail to— Comply with accounting standards.

May I go on, or? Yes

You're speaking against the motion. Thank you. Please limit it to five minutes.

Thank you very much. Yes, I'll probably need an hour.

The projections,

As I read the report, is a mixture which is unintelligible in the form that is presented to us. The IPR requirement ,

Which has a specific quarterly budget review statement outline

Produced by Premier and Cabinet in 2010, with minimum standard reporting requirements nominated and laid out, would enable me to conduct myself in the role of councillor in an appropriate fashion,

In terms of being able to review what the activities of this council are and how well we are serving the ratepayers. The way this report has been put together, it is not possible. It confuses expenditure with funding and keeps on continuously doing so, and we end up with a hodgepodge.

As I understand it, the report indicates that there's a projected loss at June 30 of 8.8 million.

But that's not the situation. There are at least three references on pages four, six and seven where there are equivocal statements made which would indicate that further

Adverse variances will be

Potentially on

The horizon. In fact, maybe rather more than potential, I would posit as well.

The report, because it's non-compliant, deals in a consolidated fashion with the council's operations. It's not satisfactory.

There ought to be

Segregation of the main operations of councils with the waste , both liquid and solid , separated, including a separation of the Windsor and South Windsor operations themselves individually, so that we know exactly what is going on in each of those, shall I say, cost centres. There has also been reference made

In looking at some of the reasons. Reported by the staff as to there being deficiencies in personnel, and I think they even cite a savings on it. It's a rather peculiar savings on it when what in fact is happening is that there is revenue being lost by there being savings.

Yeah, one minute to go, Councillor Ross.

Thank you very much.

The other potentiality there, of course, which has not been recognised is that there has been fleetingly recognised is that the apparent remediation is by way of employing agency people, who no doubt attract significantly higher than a regular rate of payment because of the fact that they are agency people. It's quite apparent that there is reactive maintenance

Ad nauseam going on, that the maintenance

Plan and so on that we've been told is going to be improved just is not occurring. In terms of actual capital works which are to be undertaken by Council— Your

Time's up, Councillor Ross . Can you round up now, please? I

Shall. There is a grave underspend in capital works taking place. There's

A project cost of about just under 27 million. And we're not even at the 25 percent mark, I don't believe, so that there are severe difficulties with the

Delivery of the program as was budgeted, and that there are also

Apparent deficiencies within the organisation which surpass the difficulties with unexpected cost increases.

Thank you, Councillor Ross, and you are also foreshadowing a motion should this motion be lost. Correct. Any further speakers? Councillor Conolly.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. Just speaking in favour of the recommendation to adopt the report. Just to a couple of those points, and I guess I wanted to summarise my understanding of the purpose of the quarterly budget review, which is to update the financial position of the Council to the best knowledge at the end of that quarter and re-forecast what the end result is going to be. That's the purpose. And I think a couple of the things mentioned by Councillor Ross, you know , that we're reporting savings of not having staff. It's not about— this report is not about promoting a saving. It's about saying this is a fact, we haven't filled that position, we haven't had that expense. Therefore we're reporting it to you as a positive adjustment.

And the negative adjustment is also reported in the lack of revenue, so both sides are there. I don't think it's any less transparent to report it as both sides. I note that Councillor Ross has raised a long list of issues. We had a briefing where we went through each of these points, and none of this came up. No material has been circulated. There's been a lot of sort of claims with absolutely no evidence provided to us as a Council to make a decision on. So my recommendation would be that we move forward, adopt the report, and if there's issues that need to be rectified, we can always come back and adjust it when there's actually some evidence in front of us that will suggest we need to do that.

Any further speakers?

Councillor Ross, you've got your light on. You want to ask a question? No. Deputy Mayor, did you move this?

I don't think I did.

Councillor Rasmussen, you moved this. Would you like right of reply?

No. Mr Mayor, no, I don't think it's required, thank you. Okay. We're moving item 20. All those in favour say aye. Those against? Declared carried.

Move to item 23, Hawkesbury Civics and Citizenship Advisory Committee. Would someone who is part of the committee, such as Councillor Richards or Councillor Sam Probyn, like to give us a quick brief on the committee report?

Not necessary if you don't want to. Page 71,

Particularly on the recommendation.

You've caught me on the spot, Mr Mayor. I would be prepared to give a report on the activities of that committee, but I haven't prepared anything

I'd prefer to prepare my remarks. My colleague, Councillor Richards, is also on that committee. I don't know if she's willing to.

I did mention Councillor Richards.

It's not compulsory, just giving you the opportunity. Yep. Councillor, the Deputy Mayor called it up. Yep. Okay

I'm happy to say that the report just lets everybody know that we elected a new chairperson and that we selected our winners of the awards that were presented on Australia Day. Okay

I'll give notice that for the next three reports I'm going to ask again, so if you're involved in any of those. Councillor Wheeler. No one's moved this yet, so— I move that, Mr Mayor. Moved, Councillor. Seconded, Councillor Wheeler. Councillor

Wheeler, you wished to speak? Just to highlight that we, and I think we were aware of this before this report came to us, that we really have a paucity of nominations for these awards, and I think that's a real shame. So we did, on the night when it became clear that some of the awards weren't even going to be given out because we were short of nominations, we kicked around, a few of us over a sausage, kicked around ideas for possible— I'm really wishing I didn't say that on record now. We can't erase the podcast, can we? Never mind. We kicked around some ideas of possible ways to get more nominations. One idea that I thought had merit was that we put nomination forms and perhaps a box people can put them in in obvious locations like the tent at the show.

And I know that happens before we normally start collecting info, but the problem with something like this is that if someone does something fabulous early in the year, we tend to have forgotten all about it by the time we get to September or October and we're calling for nominations. So I think everybody does their good, you know, if you do a good thing past September, you might be on the list, but otherwise, you know, you can probably just rest in the first nine months of the year. So that would harvest that pool. Also both libraries and maybe the tourist info, some other council places, downstairs at the front desk. Not everybody's online, not everybody thinks of these things. Sometimes we need to wave stuff in people's faces, I think, to get more nominations, and we might get a different sample of people as well, rather than just those that are in the know, which I think would be nice.

The other thing that we've also discussed, which I think would be good to consider, is that when we do present the awards, that the nominees are read out as well. It would give a bit more pomp to the ceremony, but it also acknowledges that there can only be one winner, but other people have done good things as well.

Deputy Mayor .

Sorry, I did call this up because I had sent everyone a thing about what we could do. Yes, too slow. No, but Councillor Wheeler has just raised those various things, but perhaps if they could go back via the committee for discussion, and then I would imagine that we'd have some sort of wider council discussion on it. But aside from the points about increasing the nominations and maybe having something at the show tent, which is very well attended and so on, and the nominating the— People who have been nominated, but not won. And also I wondered if we could involve the Citizen of the Year to pass it over to the next Citizen of the Year and things like that. So I had sent in a whole range of things, but I would hope they go alongside to the committee for consideration.

I guess that would be the starting point, although I don't think that committee meets very often. It's only twice a year or something. Yeah. So perhaps we can tack on a briefing or something, or a briefing item where we have a general discussion amongst ourselves about what to do about increasing the nominations and so on.

Well, the recommendation says a workshop to be convened. Would that be adequate?

I would expect so.

Okay. Any further discussion? Moved by Councillor Conolly, seconded by Councillor Wheeler. All those in favour say aye. Declared carried.

Item 24, the Audit Committee 5th of December. Moved the

Recommendation,

Mr Mayor, by Councillor Conolly.

Does anyone from the Audit Committee want to give us a two-minute introduction to this? Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Conolly.

Not on the Audit Committee, Mr Mayor, but these minutes were obviously already aired at the last meeting of Council. So to give an update, I guess, is what you're after. A meeting was conducted between the Mayor, Councillor Ross, Councillor Rasmussen, the Deputy Mayor and myself, where we went through these issues one by one that were issues raised as to be addressed before these were adopted. I'm quite comfortable that all these issues have been addressed and I would recommend to Council that we proceed with adopting the minutes.

Okay. Any further discussion? If not, I'll move the motion. All those in favour say aye. Those against? Declare it carried.

Item 25, the Floodplain Risk Management Advisory. Deputy Mayor, did you want to give a short

Yes, I'll move the minutes and I'll give a summary. I'm just seeing which minutes they are, 6th of December.

Just checking I was there. Yes, I was. The Floodplain Risk Management Committee addresses quite a number of things, but regularly at every meeting we have an update from Infrastructure New South Wales on what they're working on and where they're up to with things like the evacuation signage. We're still waiting on something which was requested some time ago, which was to have the Office of Water and the Department of Planning come to address us about potential inconsistencies between some of the various agencies and departments. So we're still waiting on that in terms of the flood risk . Because we just recently had one, I'm just checking which was on here. We had updates on the various programs going on, Get Ready West of the River is a resilience project which is being undertaken, and I can update just generally on that because I'm on that.

It's going very well, thank you. And I've gone into the sustainability thing and that's not me. The dashboard, yes, we are still awaiting that we're moving forward with investigating the possibility of a disaster and emergency dashboard, which will be a really, really good tool if we can utilise that because, as we know, getting information out to people regarding flood and who to contact and so on. And we're also waiting on the emergency management brochure. And I think we had the insurance council come and not come and speak because they spoke at— did they? I remember them coming. They didn't. They went to the heritage because

They couldn't make it.

But maybe we discussed. Yes. I think if anyone's confused by that, I think we had a discussion about what they said at the heritage. They didn't actually come in person, but they were there in spirit through the Heritage Committee members.

So with regards to that, I don't think there were any particular recommendations drawn to attention, as there were the previous time.

But we are getting— the flood committee is really, you know, moving forward, dealing with quite a few things. And from our most recent one, of course, the notice of motion tonight about the position of the bridge came up.

Councillor Cotlas, you seconding the report. Thank you. Any further discussion? No, I'll put the motion. All those in favour say aye. Those against? Declared carried.

Item 26, Environmental Sustainability Advisory Committee. Do we have someone to fill us in on that?

Councillor Rasmussen.

You're moving it, are you?

Yeah, I'm moving it. Do

We have someone from the committee to give us

According to me, the people on the committee are Councillor Cotterell, Councillor Wheeler and Councillor Rox. Not compulsory to tell

I'm sitting here patiently with my light on.

Well, I have now observed your light, Councillor Wheeler. Please tell us.

Wasn't that patient. No. Well, he was. Say we weren't saying anything. One of the key items of interest in— there's a lot of work that's come forward from the Sustainability Advisory Committee recently, and this is the meeting from last year, so there'll be further information about solar, some solar initiatives coming forward from the last meeting. Of particular note for Council in this report is the Urban Tree Canopy discussion, which I understand the report will come to Council shortly. I want to acknowledge the input from Penrith City Council. One of Penrith City Council's sustainability staff is a Hawkesbury resident and sits on that committee, and she's really generous with her time and knowledge and with information that comes across her desk at Penrith Council and sends it out to committee members.

It's really useful, given that we currently don't have that resource. It's really good to be able to tap into that. This is a really, the Urban Tree Canopy report is really important. I think to the Hawkesbury, it's increasingly noted that Western Sydney, particularly Penrith and Richmond, are bearing the brunt of climate change-induced heat, and we've seen that through January here. So there's plenty that we can do with urban tree canopy. It will also tap into the livability funding. We also discussed the use of applying for grant funding under the, I can't remember which level of government it is, One Million Trees Program, five million, sorry, Five Million Trees Program, and have applied for some pilot funding for a project in Bligh Park where the residents are already engaged in a local park wanting to do some bush regen and some planting work to increase their amenity and repair a bit of bush that's already there.

So we thought that using a small engaged group in a small confined area might be a good way to use this funding, given that we're not quite ready to roll it out at scale yet. So I think the staff were liaising with a couple of those community members, so that hopefully will be a useful partnership. It's worth noting that that grant funding will only be useful if we stop chopping down trees at a greater rate than we're planting them, because planting one new tree is not quite the same as removing an 80-year-old full tree canopy. And I think it's important to note that when we talk about tree canopy, we're not talking about tree numbers; we're talking about canopy coverage.

I'll assume that you're seconding this . Any further discussion? No, it's been moved by Councillor Rasmussen, seconded by Councillor Wheeler. All those in favour say aye. Those against, declare it carried.

We move to item 30, notice of motion one, Councillor Conolly. Move that, Mr Mayor. You move that. Do we have a seconder?

Councillor Richards, thank you. Councillor Conolly. Thanks, Mr Mayor.

I brought this forward because one thing I've heard, putting aside all the different opinions, but one thing I've heard a lot since the introduction of the SRV has been, for some reason people tend to focus on this matter a lot more than any other, even though it's not that big of a funding deal. But people are always saying to me, we only get one kerbside collection in Blacktown gets 12 and Penrith gets four and whatever else. And I know myself, living in a suburban area, it is actually very helpful and more than one would be better. I don't know what the cost is, and I understand we used to have more than one and we don't anymore, and perhaps that's why. I also had a suggestion that we add to the motion that the report also include what other methods of doing collections are available than just the current system where you call up and book for your property, whether that's zoning collections or something else.

I don't want to prescribe it, but if I could simply make it that Council investigate the costs of increasing the number of kerbside collections available to residents each year, and the report include other options for kerbside collections.

Councillor Richards, are you happy to second that?

Thanks.

Any further? Any other discussion? Councillor Wheeler.

Just briefly, I'm pleased to see the inclusion of other methods. It's one of the things that people frequently bring up is why can't we have the, you know, where everybody puts their stuff out and it often ends up turning out to be a bit of a swap meet. And I suspect that it actually reduces the amount of stuff that goes to landfill because everyone, you know, has swapped their dining chairs and their barbecues and their kids' toys and all the rest of it. Fruits of the Streets festival, the comedian Lex Marinos refers to it as. Apparently it's quite big on the entertainment calendar in the inner west. So anything that reduces the amount of landfill that we have, I think is a good thing, keeping in mind that we're also introducing some other methods like the tip shop and things as well.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Would you like right of reply, Councillor Conolly? I'll put the motion. All those in favour say aye. Those against? Declared carried.

Someone like to move that we move into confidential. Move Councillor Rasmussen and seconded Councillor Cotter.

That

Questions . Sorry. I'm ahead of myself again. I'm in an obvious hurry. Questions on questions, please. Any questions on questions? No.

No questions on questions. Yes, Councillor Wheeler.

The question one that relates to the Hypro Pet Care facility at Wilberforce relates to odour. Could we have some information also about noise and other conditions, including vehicle movements and hours, please?

Thank you. Any further questions? Councillor Garrow.

This is in relation to questions on questions from our last meeting on the 12th of February regarding the burnt-out car that's located on the beach at Macquarie Park. Council answered that they had removed the vehicle, but as of 7 o'clock this morning, that burnt-out vehicle is still sitting in place, and can we please find out when that's going to be addressed? The same vehicle.

Do you have any answers to those?

We'll be followed up.

Any more questions on questions? No. Questions for the next meeting. Councillor Richards, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Sam Prognosis.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Two brief questions. I've had some requests from residents in Pitt Town to inquire about the health of a row of conifers in Bonavista Park that are dead or dying. And they'd like some advice about whether this is, whether Council's arborist could confirm that they are dying because of some grub, or whether it's simply recent severe weather conditions, and if anything can be done to save the ones that maybe could still be saved. The second question relates to the marking of car parking spaces outside Pitt Town shops, outside the IGA, etc., in Pitt Town. The question is, is the marking of those spaces the responsibility of the private landowner there, or does Council carry responsibility for marking of those spaces? And if the latter, the spaces have faded almost to nothing, and could they be remarked as part of Council's works?

Thank you, Councillor Cutler. Deputy Mayor.

I just had two update requests. One was on a couple of, a few meetings, or quite a few meetings ago, we had asked for an update on the RMS doing the work on flood evacuation routes, if we could have an update on how that's going and which roads have still got to be done. And the other one is, has there been any responses to any of the correspondence sent regarding the resolution about the Warragamba Dam from the 30th of October 2018?

Councillor Wheeler.

Do we have any wildlife signs along the area bordered by Alexander Crescent or Road in Bligh Park, where it meets the bushland that comes from the back? of Windsor

Downs, where there's currently a lot of kangaroo activity. Do we have any signs alerting drivers to wildlife? If we don't, could we put some in? And if we do, could we update them to include numbers for rescue organisations and advising people to check the pouches of any animals that are hit?

Councillor Reynolds.

Yes, Mr Mayor, I've got three. The first one is from some residents. What instructions are given to council contractors when working near or on the sandstone gutters in Windsor? The last couple of days, council contractors have used track-driven excavators up the gutters and broken and damaged the sandstone gutters, and nothing's been done. Apparently in Sydney, great care is taken to, or some care is taken to put something there to protect the gutters. That's one question. Another question from people at Pitt Town: why is an apparent illegal fence still around a bush lot at Boodles Lane despite assurances from last year that it would be removed? And another one, the last one : at the Australia Day Awards, why was there no Heritage Award presented despite there being a nomination? Thank you.

Councillor Garrow.

Following on from Councillor Reynolds' question regarding the contractors in George Street, Windsor, can council please ensure the safety regulations are being met in regards to adequate traffic control and pedestrian access alternatives? It doesn't appear to be anything other than a couple of witches' hats put out randomly on the footpaths. Another question: there was a burnt-out bus motorhome reported and removed last week on Cornwallis, outside Deerubbin Park. The space is still littered with an extremely large amount of burnt-out debris. Can council please advise who is responsible for this clean-up and when it will occur? Please advise who's responsible for the care and upkeep of the trees planted on the McGrath Hill flats, and why have they been neglected and are now dead.

Who is responsible for their removal, and will they be replaced? Next question. The marking of street parking in Fitzgerald Street, Windsor is still in place accommodating for the previous fire station activities. Can we please have these amended where possible to allow for more parking space in our town centre?

Councillor Rasmussen. Councillor Ross

I've had a request for Roberts Creek Road to be graded. It's become very corrugated, I believe, in the unsealed section, and there are apparently also in the sealed section quite a number of washaway of shoulders on that element, that part of the road over the remainder of its length.

I've got a question in regard to Colo Soccer Club. I've been informed that they've received a grant of, I believe, $20,000 for sports lighting. I wasn't able to locate the DA on DA Tracker, even though I had a number from May.

I'd like to inquire whether there has been a DA submitted,

Which would be recent.

Would it be possible to also obtain some

Indication as to what permission is required for the operation of those lights at night, and what would be the hours of the operation at which they would have to be shut down, because there's apparently some thought, I believe, of them running night soccer games.

And if that wasn't permissible, would it be permissible, and under what circumstances, please?

I raised a question in regard to the September quarter budget review, which hasn't been answered in writing, and I'll ask it here. There was mention of a $100,000 grant

I believe it's the Richmond Preschool. I had sought to find out who the benefactor, the donor was or whatever. I would appreciate that being advised.

The other week at the Pitt Town political gathering, there was mention made about the sewerage operation at Pitt Town,

And apparently some suggestion that The operator, who is apparently in financial difficulties, was coming to another commercial arrangement. I'm just wondering if Council are aware of that or are able to update us as to what might be happening in that regard.

There was a complaint also in regard to the

Sealed surface of the roadway past the

Panthers Club in Beaumont Avenue, North Richmond, leading down into the car park. I believe the

Macadam is very broken and potholed . I'm just wondering if there's anything in Council's view to do anything in the way of works in that regard, please.

I've got a further question in relation to the Benson's Lane light rectification works. Can I be advised, please, if those lights have been now rectified, or if that is not the case, when will that be? Completed, please.

I've raised with

Management the aspects of the South Windsor granting of a place space there and made a suggestion or two. I'm just wondering if that matter, because I've not heard anything, has been or is under consideration. And further in that regard, I'm

Just trying to establish the funding source of that grant, as I was not able to establish anything in my

Searches on the internet to try and establish who would have done so.

Another matter came up over the weekend of apparently a burnt-out station wagon down on Londonderry Road between the University Eucalypt Experiment, or the Crane area, and the Driftway, on the same side as the Eucalyptus Experimental Farm, or whatever it is they've got there.

And

I'm just

Wondering if Council was aware of that or had been contacted by the police or somebody to take care of that.

That's about it. Thank you.

Thank you. Would someone now like to move we move into confidential? Councillor Rasmussen and Councillor Richards. All those in favour say aye. Carried.

Good afternoon.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. In regard to item 33, Council whilst in closed in confidential session resolved on the motion of Councillor Weal, seconded by Councillor Zembrogno, that Courtney McGregor be appointed as a community representative from a local environment network organisation on the Waste Management Advisory Committee. In regard to item 34, Council whilst in closed session resolved on the motion of Councillor Conolly, seconded by Councillor Rasmusson, that one, the information contained in the report on the expressions of interest for the provision of Code of Conduct Review Services be received. Two, Council establish a panel of Code of Conduct Reviewers as per Council's adopted procedures for the administration of the Code of Conduct for local councils in New South Wales, March 2013.

Three, the following applicants be placed on Hawkesbury City Council's Code of Conduct Review Panel for a period of up to four years : Graham

Evans

From O'Connell Workplace Relations Proprietary Limited, Adam Holstead from Goldbergs Lawyers, Peter Maroney from Nemesis Consulting Group, John Renshaw from O'Connor Marsden and Associates, Cath Roche from Sync Solutions Proprietary Limited, Wendy Skolthorp from O'Connor Marsden and Associates, Cathy Thane from Train Reaction Proprietary Limited, and Shane White from Pinnacle Integrity Proprietary Limited. Moved by Councillor Cotter, seconded by Councillor Richards that we accept the report from the confidential. All those in favour say aye. Carried. Is there any further business? If not, I'll declare the meeting closed at 9.28.