25 February 2020 - Ordinary

Good evening, everyone.

Welcome to Council's ordinary meeting of 25 February 2020. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of this land, the Dharug people, paying respect to Elders both past and present. I'll call on the General Manager to go through some procedural matters, please.

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 the Code of Meeting Practice, meetings of the 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 information 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 to both your address to the Council and any answers given in response to questions from councillors. Finally, it is also requested that if any person in the Council chambers has a mobile phone, that they are either turn it off or turn it to silent.

Thank you, Mr Mayor.

Thank you. Do we have any apologies?

Councillor Tree. Someone like to move we accept the apologies? Councillor Conolly, Councillor Rasmussen, all those in favour say aye. Carried.

Any declarations of interest?

Councillor Reynolds. Yes, Mr Mayor. Item 30, less than significant non-pecuniary interest. Councillor Wheeler.

Item 034, pecuniary interest.

Any more? Is that it? No.

Are there any minutes to look at? I didn't think so. The first thing is items subject to public address. The first item subject... Mr Mayor,

Could I raise a notice of urgency,

Please? I'm sorry, I wrote that down here too. Thank you.

An urgency motion?

Please do.

Thank you. I did circulate to the staff and to the other councillors a motion of urgency regarding the request to commence rubbish removal immediately for the flood-affected areas, particularly Colo, for those residents who've already requested assistance. There's a number of piles. A number of people have asked for the assistance, and there's people with piles of rubbish that are both public health hazards and safety risks. I know that some people have had snakes in their rubbish and things like that. Just before I go on, I'll remove point two if I can have it confirmed that the mandatory fees payable to the EPA, we have an exemption from those already. Is that correct? Yes

We have not yet established whether this is urgent or not.

Oh, okay. Well, you said go ahead, sorry.

No, go ahead and—

So the reason it would be urgent is because it is very urgent.

Health

And safety risks associated.

I accept the urgency of the matter. Thank you. Now, the general procedure is that it goes to the end of the meeting.

Oh, is it?

Yes. That's the general procedure. You can ask that it move forward.

Well, it will be very brief. Could I move it forward so it is done?

Moved by Deputy Mayor, seconded by Councillor Rasmussen. Yes. Does anyone wish to speak against that? No. All those in favour, raise your hand. Carried.

Okay. We'll hear

It now.

Okay , hear it now. Okay, this is regarding the request from the residents of flood-affected areas for assistance with rubbish removal. I'm aware that there has been an initiative that's being undertaken, which involves going out and speaking to residents and putting out flyers and so on. But it's now been several weeks since the floods, and many of these people who've been affected have been affected by fire and flood. And the consequence of that is that they really, really need some assistance right now to enable them to be able to have this stuff taken off their property. I'm well aware that there needs to be a bigger job done overall, and that that would continue being done. But we really need something to happen immediately, which is why in point five I have asked that this start straight away, not wait for minutes.

I had some notes here about specific things, but in all the excitement of the night I seem to have lost those somewhere. Okay, so I'll go without them. So I'm aware we have a contingency fund. Would this be available to fund the cleanup, not the cleanup of properties, but the rubbish collection component of the cleanup? Can I please have that confirmed?

Mr. Conroy. Mr. Mayor, it's Council's discretion how it uses the contingency fund. It would need a resolution of Council. I think that's all I need to say on that matter. Okay,

Thank you. So I'm asking Councillors then to support that the funding of the rubbish collection, which I will ask for an approximate, I know we can't say because we don't know, but I'm guessing it would be around $10,000 or something. Would that be correct?

This is a real difficult thing to ask. There's an issue with the authenticity of some of the rubbish. So we've had some people approach us with waste that's not flood related, but trying to have it as flood related. So there's some work to do on managing those expectations. And then there's the cost of actually disposing of the stuff at the tip. So half the cost is the government fee, and the other half is our fee. It's probably going to be more than $10,000. I don't know how much, but it depends on just the quantity that we end up collecting, which is why we were doing the work to try and gauge that.

That's right. So, well, for example, people who already have piles of rubbish, do Colo get curbside rubbish collection?

Sorry,

Thank you.

People in Colo have a red bin, some of them, and some of them get the cleanaway—

Where they book for the council to come and pick up. Some of them get

That service as well.

Okay. I'm trying to find a way around this because I think it's a growing health and safety risk. I understand there may always be people who try and exploit something. People are doing that through the fire thing in areas all over Australia, trying to get things they're not entitled to. But I don't think that should stop us dealing with a community that's really, really in need. We go out there and have meetings with them, and we say, We're listening and we're here to help you. And when they really need us, when they've had two disasters, we're fobbing them off. So what I want is I either want for them to have their fees waived at the waste management facility so they can bring the stuff in themselves, or I want us to find a way to go and get their rubbish, and I want councillors to support that.

And if we can't do that, I want a firm no that we're not going to help them in the immediate time, because then they will have to make arrangements so that they protect their properties and theirself from these safety risks that are emerging of all this damp piles of rubbish where there's snakes and things. We simply have to do something about it. I believe it's our obligation. And I think we should have the resources to do it. If there's not people who've already asked for it, and I understand the authenticity argument, that we need to see if people are in the flood zone, but I can't imagine that's too hard. And I think that we just have to do something about it. I can understand the other things you're trying to do, and I understand this is a cleaning up people's property by going on there and physically doing it.

It is to pick up the piles of rubbish that people out there already have. Because I anticipated some level of resistance about being able to do something which really I think should be reasonably easy, I think that if it's not possible, what's the situation with Clean Up Australia Day? Is there something built into that that we can utilise, because that's coming up soon, where people in the flood-affected areas could take their rubbish to be collected when the rest of the cleanup is going on? Is that a possibility?

That's a possibility, as other options. Like we've offered red bins to some people to place all their rubbish in, and said that we'll collect that and take it away. Now, that hasn't always been accepted, and we're struggling to understand why. We also have the cleanup service that we're offering with Cleanaway, and we've also got a small truck that we're looking at using as well. We're trying to understand, though, the nature of all the different waste streams. So if we find there's a whole lot of beds, we'd rather just go and do one trip and gather all the beds. But in the meantime, we can, you know, do some other trips with red bins and things like that and provide some service straight away.

So we can provide some service. I'm looking for an answer to give these people that ask us to help them when they need our help. And I just want to know if it's that we can't do anything immediately, then we can't do it. But I don't accept that that should be how it should be when people are in need, because it's horrifying what they have had to go through. And I think that we've got trucks upon trucks in a depot out there. Why can't we just go and pick it up? I just don't really, I really don't understand that. I'm having difficulty with having to think about whether it's easier to pick up all beds at one time or whatever. There's piles of rubbish that people have dragged out of the river or from where their sheds have been inundated or whatever, and they just want to get rid of it.

So can we not charge them to take it to the tip, or can we maybe go and pick it up? Either of those options possible.

General Manager.

I think it's better if we give them bins and ask them to fill the bins. If we— if , well, the material has to get from their property to the tip in some way, and the best way for us is via the red bins.

But why us That's not

Good enough . They've got massive piles. Like, unless you're going to give them 50 red bins or something. Please don't call out, Miss Geimer. Can you please not call out from the audience, thank you.

So some of the issues we've had relate to, I'm led to believe, tyres. That, again, not sure if they're actually flood waste or not. There's mattresses that don't have any water stains on them and things like that. So we need to understand exactly what it is we're dealing with. But if we just say, bring everything to the tip and we'll pay for it, then you really are exposing Council to a significant financial obligation. We've got to try and wrap it around some structure so that we're able to fund it and manage it at the same time. And that's why we wanted to understand what all the issues are.

And I understand that to a point, but there's an immediate need because— Sorry, there is an immediate need though. So really I'm focusing on my point one, which is for those people who have big piles of rubbish, clearly in flood-affected areas, because you would go there and see where they live, and to see if we can pick up those piles and then continue working with the initiative of identifying the bigger need. But there's people that just have massive piles of rubbish that are clearly from an inundated place . If it's all too hard, then that is the message I will give the community, because I've been asking for this daily since the 12th of February, and I just want us to give them an answer.

How many properties? You know, it's not going to be many properties. It'll be the properties down on the river that — yeah, only a couple. I mean the people that— but they're big piles on a couple of properties. So I'm asking the councillors to direct some form of staff pick-up of this rubbish or to waive the fees at the waste management facility. Could you

Sorry , it's an urgency motion. Nobody else speaks.

So , Deputy Mayor. Yes. I've only just looked at your motion now because I haven't been able to. Does it say that you are directing the council to clean up this rubbish? I mean, are you— I mean, if that's what, if you said something like that and— Well

It says that council commence rubbish removal immediately in flood-affected areas, particularly Colo, for those residents who have already requested assistance as a matter of urgency due to the health and safety risks associated with large piles of rubbish by either A, providing a mode of collection such as suitable vehicles being dispatched to the area to collect and remove the rubbish, or B, waive the fees at the waste management facility for residents able to provide authenticity of flood affectation who wish to deposit refuse at the facility.

So it is a direction to council to clean up the rubbish immediately .

I'm happy to include that. That is what I mean. I mean it's from people who've contacted me and asked what we can do to help them. The final point on point five would be on Colo Reserve if it was to be incorporated into Clean Up Australia Day because that would then be on public where the event is taking place. I mean that's not ideal because you would have people taking things there and so on, and I don't think it's ideal. But I'm simply looking for a way to fix it up because I just— You know, we jump and do some things really fast and other things we just don't do. I think

Your urgency motion asks that it be fixed. Yes

Yes, it does. And

I think you said immediately, or— Yes, immediately. I don't think anybody's arguing with that. And if that is the urgency motion— Yeah. —General Manager, that is doable.

I'd just put, if we can just make a reference to commence the collection of flood-related rubbish.

Well, that's fine. Yep.

Yep, happy with that.

I understand the fire cleanup. The people at Colo have been contacted about when the fire cleanup will go and that they will be having their cleanup done after the bilthen cleanup is done

We're seeking a bit of advice here, Deputy Mayor

So the other thing is, I know there's been reference made to a lot of trucks lying around. The trucks are actually collecting garbage every day and doing stuff. We do have one truck that's potentially available, so that's the option in terms of a vehicle, and we'll have to see if we've got some staff that we can put onto that, because with everything else that's going on, all the cleanup of the roads, the repair of the bridges, the cleanup of the trees and the storm, people are gainfully employed at the moment.

I understand and appreciate that, and I didn't say trucks were lying around. I said we own a lot of trucks, and one available truck. Would be most helpful if that available truck could go and pick some rubbish up.

So what's on the screen is what you're happy with?

Number two, I think we've had that confirmed, that the EPA is waiving the fee for rubbish disposal for flood and fire. You want

To leave out point two?

Yes, please

Any other changes? Is that it?

Well, if it's confirmed that we have the funding, if by us directing this the funding is there, then we can remove point three as well.

Well, I think council needs to direct us that that's what we're going to do.

All right. And

We're expending funds on private land, so again we need some—

Okay, so if funding, and normally I would ask for a report of exactly how much, but I think in this situation, knowing it's only a few properties, I cannot imagine it would be blown out. So I had put there that if there wasn't money for it, that we consider a decision to divert unspent funds from the conference budget, of which we had a remainder. And, or the events budget if we had left over to cover that cost, because in my opinion that would be a priority to assist flood affected victims in that way.

But I believe we have a contingency fund that we can draw from. We need

Some kind of reference about authorising council to do work on private land.

Okay, similar to the delegation in the million dollar one. Is that it? Okay . Well, whatever the wording of that was. Yep .

And our preference is that we don't have B. And the preference is that we don't have 1B. Mr Conroy's preference is that we don't have 1B.

Oh no, we need to keep...

Point 1B.

Oh, you think it'll spoil it.

Can I ask Mr Conroy, if you don't have 1B, are you substituting something else for that?

It's just that's a huge financial exposure, waiving the fees, because I don't know what quantum we're waiving on.

It's, all right, well if by doing that you're committing that the rubbish will be collected for people who are flood affected, who can prove they're flood affected, then... Does that mean that they're not paying for that service?

They're not paying for that service.

Yeah.

So the rubbish will be collected by council.

All right, then point B can go. If the rubbish is going to be collected, then there's no fee to the people. That's fine.

Colo Reserve's got what, Jeff? 750 mil of sand and silt and

With an urgency motion, there's only supposed to be one speaker. Mr Mayor, I'm happy to entertain questions, Councillor. Point

Of order on that. I've just read the Code of Meeting.

Yes. We are

Trying to help. Clause 9.4 says that only the mover of the motion under clause 9.3(a) can speak until that motion is put. That is the motion to whether or not it is urgent or not, not the substantive motion that follows. This is open to debate, as my understanding. Is that right? Yes.

I'll ask for advice on that. Is that the way?

It's on page 14 of the Code of Meeting Practice at the top. Yes. No, but I think the precedent shouldn't be set that you can move a motion as urgent and then lock out debate.

Councillor Conolly, I don't doubt you, so I won't block out debate. And do you have some debate that you—

Look, I just actually had a question anyway, Mr Mayor, which was how , given that we've been told that the State Government has agreed not to charge the environmental levy on the waste, how are they determining whether or not— A property is flood affected

Jeff's going to answer that.

There's various protocols to enact the exemption. So when somebody turns up at the facility, we've got to genuinely believe and understand that it is affected. Obviously, if it's burnt material from a fire, that's quite obvious. If it's got, you know, a title mark on the material, we'd probably accept that. The more difficult one would be obviously storm waste, as opposed to general clean-up. So again, we'd need to look and see what that is. And probably add to that one, it's probably far easier for us to control picking up from a particular site. If there was a judgment call to be made, it could be made on site as to whether that was a genuine one. And I guess we could probably report back to Council on any individual requests.

Thank you for that. I'll just say, in favour of the motion, my point was just that there would have to be an established protocol already, so we're not inventing anything that doesn't exist. It shouldn't be too challenging, given that we already do it. Councillor Garrow, did you have some questions ?

Point of order, Mr Mayor. Councillor Reynolds has a point of order, yes. Just looking through the Code of Meeting Practice. Point 9.4

A motion moved under clause 9.3 can be moved without notice, despite clauses 10.20 to 10.30, only the mover of the motion referred to in the clause can speak to the motion before it is put. Before it? Put to a

Vote. No , the motion hasn't been put to the vote. Well, that's actually the first step before we consider the motion, whether that's urgent

We're talking about two different things.

So, Councillor Conolly's interpretation is, I put the motion to you that we accept the urgency motion. You're talking about whether we now approve the motion. Now, I might ask Mr. Mifsud if he could please give me an answer to that.

Thanks, Mr. Mayor. So basically, if an urgency motion is to be moved, then it needs to be moved and seconded. It needs to then be accepted by the chairperson as a matter of great urgency. If that's the case, then the motion gets put forward and it goes through the usual practice of that. The code of meeting practice is referring to the motion of urgency, and that's where the mover of the motion is the only one that would speak to it.

If it wasn't moved and we went to debate on it, then anybody could answer it.

I think that's what Mr. Mifsud just said. Yes. Why are you going —

My question was, do we get any funding for Clean Up Australia Day that we could contribute to this, considering Clean Up Australia Day is this Sunday?

Mr. Conroy, do we have an answer?

I'm not aware of what funding we get for Clean Up Australia Day.

Do we collect the rubbish? Only advertising. Only advertising. Not for doing the event, but for advertising it. I think this is another thing. I don't

We don't believe so. Okay. We don't believe there's any money except for advertising the event. That's what I got told. Apparently, yes. Is there any other discussion on this matter? Yes, Councillor Richardson.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. I fully, I support the motion. It's intended merit absolutely. I just want to maybe clean up a bit of the wording. Commence rubbish removal immediately in flood-affected areas, particularly Colo, for those residents who have already requested assistance. So are we absolutely limiting it to the residents who've already contacted council for assistance? That was what the

Immediate related to, because they're the people who are having the issue with the— So how many is

That? That should

Be on our record. It's only a few. It's only, yeah, it should be on record with the council, a few, two or three. But that's why point four is in there, to continue finding out who else there is and what else there is there that needs to be done, and that can be done not necessarily, you know, until they know. As

Long as we're fully aware the immediacy of it is for those residents who've already requested and is on our radar. Yeah. So that limits that in that capacity to our limits our expenditure. Yes, exactly there, yeah.

And they are people who've called and they haven't got a satisfactory response, which is the reason for bringing a motion.

Thank you. Any further speakers? Councillor Rasmussen

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Look, I don't have a problem with that immediate thing, but it seems to me, and I know of quite a few properties along the Yarramundi precinct and also on the Richmond lowlands who would have been equally affected, but may not have jumped on the blower. To alert Council to the fact that they've got a pile of rubbish. So, and I know that's covered to some extent, but it seems to me that if we do it for Colo residents, and we should — I'm not arguing that point — we equally should do it for people in the obvious areas where flooding did occur and we know it occurred.

I think it says that in the first line. Does it? Flood affected.

So can we include them in the immediate? It does. But wasn't that what you're asking?

Yeah, I wanted to request— We're going to do this, is that the limitation? The limitation on this motion is those people already— Requested

Assistance. It says particularly Colo.

Yeah, I can read. Yeah, and I'm saying that maybe that's a bit narrow, given, because if we start doing that and people then find out that, wait a minute, just because they didn't get on the bloody blower, I'm going to miss out.

And that was their whole issue, was the disparity between, because of the delay of doing anything or getting people to register in a formalised sense, was that—

I know that was a bit of a shambles, and we didn't coordinate that bit really well, but that should— No

But after the floods. So as it goes longer, you know, it becomes harder to address that potential inequality of people getting assistance. So the immediate is for the people then, and then there's an initiative where they're giving flyers and they're following up what there is, that that is for other people who haven't done that. So that's being investigated And I would imagine that that would address— The main reason for the people of Colo is that many of them had their properties damaged by fire previously to the flooding, or even if not directly, if not directly. Yeah

It doesn't say— Only Colo, it says particularly

Yeah, particularly Colo.

And Deputy Mayor, are you happy that your words take into account what's been said?

I think they do. Yes.

Councillor Rasmussen , are you happy with that? Yes

Well, yeah, look, I think I am. But clearly what I'm going to do is get on the blower and tell all the people in my farming community, just get on the blower, get in there and start blowing hard. Just need to confirm the—

Can we confirm whether point B is in or out?

One B is out. Out.

Okay.

Any further discussion? Councillor Richards.

Thanks. It's only the point I raised before, which has now become point two about taking money from the events or conference budget. I probably don't have an issue with the conference budget. I think we can all sacrifice the trip away to pay for this sort of stuff. But the events budget concerns me because I know it's pretty small. I'm happy to

Remove it. Really, I think we have a contingency fund, and if we're all happy for it to go from that, then we just leave it at that. Can remove the events or the—

So your wording just includes contingency then? Yes.

Can I put on notice that we get at the next briefing exactly what's in our contingency fund and how it's been spent?

That's another matter.

Okay, I'll

Now, Deputy Mayor has changed that as well. Is there any other discussion? I'm anxious to move this. Councillor Ross? Yeah, I'm just trying to get an understanding, possibly from the Deputy Mayor, as to the nature of this so-called rubbish. I'm hearing big heaps.

There are big heaps.

But that implies that we're going to have to have machinery there to lift it onto the back of a truck

Possibly. Yes

That's possible.

I point out that now that you've removed point B, point A doesn't flow very well from the stem of the sentence. It says by either, and then it's just got A.

By providing. Is that what you're saying? It's not just breakfast. Is that still read okay? It should be. It should be. Oh yeah, yeah. Paragraph 2 needs to be changed to use the contingency fund. We already decided that, but hasn't been. Can we have that put up, please? We're getting there at a very

Point 2. I apologise to the speakers waiting for it. I thought it'd be rather straightforward. Full stop after course of action. I don't mind.

Councillor Ross, were you finished or you have another question? Looks like he's finished.

Any other discussion? We're up the hill further. No other discussion. Deputy Mayor, do you want right of reply?

Not necessary, thank you, Mr—

Wording's still being fixed. You don't have to stand up.

You

Can stand up if you like. At this time of the morning, what would you expect?

Have you had your micro sleep?

We're just waiting to change point two

It doesn't make sense if it says, if contingency funding is not available, then we fund it from the contingency fund. That doesn't make sense.

So we're working on the words. How's that? Is that simple enough?

We all happy with that? You don't need right of reply Councillor Wheel is going to stand up. All those in favour, please raise your hand.

Confirm minutes from last meeting. It's they've made

The decision. They've made the

Decision. Councillor, I'll ask Mr Conroy to comment on that, please.

I think we've got a decision. It's the previous meeting. Raise your hands and the Mayor will read out your name. So

All those in favour, please put up your hand. In favour, Councillor Ross, Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Garrow, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Deputy Mayor, Councillor Cotter, Councillor Sam Prodonow, Councillor Connelly, Councillor Richards, Councillor Calvert absent, Councillor Tree declare carried.

Move to items with speakers. The first item is item 29, I think, draft Hawkesbury Local Strategic Planning Statement. Our speaker is Sue Guymer.

I've got a bear on my creek bank. I don't own it. Drowned in the flood. Right, the draft LSP that I asked last week if we could hold back on. I speak against this going through as it is for a couple of reasons, and that's because there's a few things in the document I don't agree with or are inaccurate. On page 76, for example, you've got the Hawkesbury, the custodian's part of the UNESCO World Heritage National Park. Well , it's the World Heritage Listed National Park. This is expressed in the sense of ownership by UNESCO. It's not. This is the second government document that I've seen come before me with the word listing missing, where they say, Oh, it's just an error or an oversight. If enough documents go out in that context, then people believe that that's how it is.

So it needs to be put back into it. With flooding, on page 77, you've got the Colo River listed that the peak flood, Colo 15.8 was 1978, and you've got nothing listed for the highest recorded flood level. Well, as far as I know, that was the highest recorded flood level. But just to put that in perspective, you could have listed 2020. Sorry, 2020, because we just hit 15.74, slightly off that mark, which was considered a one in 100 at the time. I know that because I've got the photos, and I lived it. You've got Colo on the next page, one in 100 is 10.4. Are we getting any perspective? The flood levels that we just had at Colo, and the property damage, and everyone's pollution that's there is other people's property, not theirs.

So this document is inaccurate in what it's being presented in here to go before the Greater Western Sydney Commission. When it comes to bushfires and bushfire-prone land, you've got pretty much the entire Hawkesbury listed as bushfire-prone land. Well, all of Australia is bushfire-prone land. Newsflash, that's what Australia does: burns, floods, droughts, the rest of it. You've also, on the right-hand column, second paragraph, listing LEP's current hazard reduction, but backburning policy. Backburning policy is for wildfires and how you fight wildfires. You backburn into a wildfire to contain it. Hazard reduction, backburning, two very different things, right? Hazard reduction saves wildlife.

Backburning kills it, encompasses it, wipes it out, kills it. Two different things. Then in bushfire, you flip here back to protecting the environment with cooling and river systems, and you're worried about aquatic ecosystems. Well, get rid of your weeds. The weeds on the riverbanks is the worst I've seen in 20 or 30 years. All right, no one's allowed to manage it. Farmers and property owners aren't allowed to manage it anymore. They're not allowed to under these policies. So you've got weed infestations there. It's not protecting anything.

This document also goes on about climate change, which I don't agree with. Okay. Well, I do agree with climate change. Climate is always changing, has since the evolution of this planet. But I don't agree with that we're getting hotter and more severe events. 1974, 1976 drought, where Colo pooled and stopped flowing in the gorge just as it has this drought, right, was then followed and broken by a flood event, right, which is exactly what's happened this time around. And I said to a lot of these activists, don't call it climate change when it happens. I'm telling you it's going to happen, right? It's not climate change. It's our normal climate. It's our normal weather patterns that happen here.

So we've had this flood event, just like we did '74, '76, was followed by the '78 flood. That's what's happened here. This is a repeat. I mean, you're listing even these flood events as one in 100, one in 50. We're 232 years old, this country. So where do we get these figures from? Where do we pull them from? I'm a bit amazed because since '78 flood in the Colo, that's 42 years by my calculations, and we've had since then and now 2016, I think it was 14 point something metres on the Colo. We had another one 2014, 2016. So we've had four , over one in 100 flood events for the Colo. To even what is listed here, which is not even correctly recorded.

Hazard reduction is the only way to cool the environment. I disagree with pretty much most of this. All of Colo is now conservation lands. You're going to restrict people in farming communities what they can and can't do on their own property. I look at these documents on conservation, and it's interesting that councils and government are meant to manage the Commonwealth, the public lands, the public assets. That would be the national parks. So why are we discussing private lands when you're meant to be managing the public assets? You leave the national parks here green and they're not listed as conservation priority one like the rest of us in Colo. The document is just inconsistent all over the place.

Hazard reduction, indigenous coal burning. I mean, you want to connect Indigenous people to their culture and give them that freedom, connect them to the environment and country. That's what they're connected to: country, the environment. Start getting our Indigenous people back involved with national parks and land management practices. You know, Indigenous coal burning every year is what we used to do until '78-'79, and the EP&A Act was legislated by Neville Wran. Your time is actually up. Can you round off now? Well, I can leave it at that if you like, but I don't believe this document should go through in its current format to the Commission. It's got inaccuracies and errors. Are you happy to answer questions?

I'm happy if anyone's got any. Any

Questions? Councillor Conolly, thank you. Are there any other inaccuracies that you haven't mentioned yet?

Well, I mean, I look at the climate, the climate change stuff, and to me that's just been photocopied out of some other climate change document for the simple fact that it references rainforest. We don't have them in the Hawkesbury. All right, so I'm wondering where the hell that came from.

I've marked things all over the place in here. I don't believe this. I mean, climate emergency, I don't agree with that. Why is that in this document? There are some people that believe that, but I don't, and there are many others in the Hawkesbury that don't believe that. I see nothing changed in the environment, and I believe both sides of the policies. The only thing that I see that's changed with the environment is policy that's created by man. So the only climate change that's been created across broad areas is how we land manage, which is man and policy created. So , and this is full of more of that continuance of policy, is what I see. So, I mean, Liberal and Labor planning ministers have been signing off on EP&A policies that are being implemented right across government departments since '79.

Greens are running the show just via the EPA and the Department of Planning and Environment.

And there's a lot of stuff in here that's wrong. I haven't had a good chance to look at it, but I know I'll get more opportunity. I appreciate the work you've done in pointing those things out, and I think that's the end of the time, so thank you very

Much for that .

Thank you. If there was only one speaker, would anyone like to move anything?

Councillor Conolly. Can I ask a question? Yes. What is the urgency on adopting this, and is there, would the staff foresee a problem with deferring this to allow further time to consider feedback? Mr

Conolly. Mrs Perrin.

The next stage is to issue this for the assurance process, and then come back to Council, and we're meant to have the document finished by the end of March.

Councillor Rasmussen. Yeah, just a question, Mr Mayor. What is the opportunity for amending this? If we pass it tonight, what is the opportunity for amending it at some later stage? If

Council— so essentially, if Councillors wanted to give us feedback, we can take that feedback through the process of the assurance process leading up to when it will be submitting it back to Council before the end of March.

But it won't be going back on exhibition.

Can I have a follow-up, Mr Mayor? Yes, Councillor.

Thank you. I guess thank you for that. What I was really asking is that obviously we need some more input from the community, and I accept that there are many, many views out there, and some are very , very strongly held, and others are not based on science or any logic at all. But I'm just wondering how, if we wanted to, how could we amend it once the statement had been dealt with on the 31st—was it 31st of March? I mean, what is the opportunity to revisit this thing and update it? Because I agree there are some— Some inconsistencies in that statement, and I think the World Heritage listed area, that's been a bugbear of mine for almost as long as I've been on Council because it's just wrong, plain wrong. But what is the opportunity to revisit?

So from discussions with other councils, some councils are saying that once they finish the various studies that they're doing, which we're doing as well, whether it's land use, employment lands, housing, et cetera, et cetera, they might be bringing the LSPS back to Council within a year to kind of, with additional information for their consideration. So this Council can review this document at any time. We need to meet the deadline that's been set by the State Government by the end of March. But post that, we could be bringing a document back, you know, for review. If we were to do that, I would want to do it within the consideration of other documents that we're also bringing back to Council. Mr Mayor

In that case, I move the motion—move the recommendation.

Councillor Rasmussen's moving the recommendation. Do we have a seconder? Councillor Zamprogno. Councillor Rasmussen, you wish to speak?

Mr Mayor, only to the extent that I take on board the fact that there are some inconsistencies and inaccuracies in that statement. Obviously, the one in one hundred, the science of modelling and so on floods is pretty well known, and you could have, you know, three or four or five floods one after the other that exceed the one in one hundred. So the occurrence of that is— is what it is. So, so it doesn't mean to say that you won't ever have a particular number or a particular level, but anyway . So there are some of those things which just need to be ironed out. But the point, I guess I made earlier is that what I think we need to do is we need to revisit, once we've got the deadline out of the way, then we can revisit and we can update and we can drill down to the fine detail of where local areas need to be updated in terms of local knowledge and also, obviously, the official records.

Thank you. Further speakers? Deputy Mayor.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. I think there's, the way I see it, I also had quite, I did send in a list on the previous draft. I've also got quite a few things on this, but I think there's two different aspects of what I think needs altering in it. There's the first things that are like simple inaccuracies that are in there, for example, Oakville is not a Macquarie town. Things that perhaps if we sent in a list, would they be able to be changed so they're factually correct? There are just some things that are just inaccurate that we shouldn't be submitting to the Greater Sydney Commission without them being correct. And then there's the bigger picture of the vision statement as it is itself, which I agree would be better looked at once we've completed the studies that are feeding into it.

For example, if we're looking for, you know, incompatibility of zone objectives that might arise over what we're putting forward and so on, and that's probably a more extensive thing and something we could do as Councillor Rasmussen just had clarified when we have this document back, but— Certainly, for the one going in for the assessment, I would think that if it was acceptable, either for anybody who's raised it or for the councillors to send in any actual factual corrections, is that possible, that we do that? Yes, and we'd welcome that feedback. Yes, so before that goes in. The other thing I would just point out, and I think it probably doesn't sit well with many people in the community, is where we're looking at town and village character, there's quite a disparity in the information given about Poor Gloosodia is a small rural village with a shopping centre.

Now, I'm sure there's a lot more things about Gloosodia that could be said, and yet other towns are enhanced to, you know, it just—I just think that we need to be quite careful about how we're describing people's, and in the Byles Park one it says that it, you know, lacks open space and community interaction, which they got to retain a park tonight, but that's not necessarily true. So if staff are open to us being able to send in anything that we feel is factually incorrect or that should be changed without changing the overall, you know, not sending in our own opinion on something about changing any of the vision as such, is that acceptable? Yes, it is. Thank you.

Further speakers? Councillor Kotlash.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Yes, I agree with the Deputy Mayor on those points about — Some parts of it are inconsistent, but overall it's just disappointingly sloppy. And I've got—I know that we've got a terrible deadline, but there's just so many bits of it that it just needs a good edit. And also, it's—I just have to say this, there's— and I hear this quite often— that the word, the term biodiversity is quite often used incorrectly. And the first paragraph on page 86 says, ‘ Biodiversity within the Hawkesbury's vast and comprises almost 70% of the land area. The biodiversity within the national park and state parks and reserves are protected through a range of state and Commonwealth legislations.’

That's just— it's just a word salad. Biodiversity is a term that was shortened from biological diversity. It's not a thing in itself. It's a description of how an ecosystem manifests itself. It's not— it's neither good, high nor low. There's pristine ecosystems that have low diversity. We have to come to grips with these terms if we're going to use them in these sorts of documents. And

It's sort of just—it really just needs a good edit and a bit of a rewrite. But, I mean, we could go on all night, and since it's morning we won't. But— I mean, I'll support it, but please, some editing.

Thank you. Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. Look, I agree with Councillor Kotlash. What this document most needs is a really harsh edit. And I think this is probably illustrative of the speed of the process and also of the impost that producing this document has presented for our planning staff. It's yet another one of those things that we've had to come up with, and because we didn't get any funding, we've had to do it with our current resources. And what we see is that our current resources aren't sufficient to provide a document at a level that we're comfortable with within the time allowed. I think there's also, we probably should have bought into this process more heavily earlier. We should have committed to editing this document and to make sure that some of these quite staggering inaccuracies are not there.

I think probably part of that's a timing thing around, we've had members of the community highlight that they couldn't engage because this happened during the bushfire crisis. I think that's probably plagued all of us, the general fatigue and just the volume of stuff that we're constantly processing in this place in order to meet everybody's demands. And I think we need to note that the timelines attached to this document are not of Council's making. They're of the State Government's making, and we are dancing to their tune. I think some of this document is a triumph of optimism. We simply don't have the power to deliver things like a 30-minute city, an hour-and-a-half city maybe, probably got that down pat, although my train journeys in the morning seem to be getting longer and longer going to the city.

We can form all the partnerships in the world, but if the private sector and the State Government won't play, we've got no power to enforce our demands. We do have some clear statements in here about the challenges faced by residents with respect to transport and social housing and affordability, and I think they're really, really useful. I would point out to councillors the 3,184 affordable dwellings needed by 2021. We've got nothing in place to provide this, and I think it's little bits that you pull out of this document that actually show the usefulness of having a local strategic planning statement, because it gives us something that we then need to work towards. And particularly when developers come into this place, we have some guidelines to say to them, if you want to play here, you need to help move us towards these goals so that we meet some of these challenges.

And so I think this document will probably be useful eventually, but it needs a jolly good tidy up before it gets there. I've got real issues around the inclusion of some of these potential future housing supplies, and I hope that they come back to Council once we've got other studies done. The inclusion of North Richmond as a place for potential future housing supply is really worrying, given that it can't cope with the housing that it's already got, and given that, you know, we're looking at, say, 2027 for a duplicated bridge.

What we need is, and then we need far better evidence of feeder roads and main road capacity to deal with supply increases at places like Hobartville, which again I think is really optimistic. I've got real concerns about the Aboriginal heritage section. I think it's a whitewash. I really want this read by a member of the local Darug community before we process it. It's currently two flimsy paragraphs, and it's extremely weak. The term tribe is no longer appropriate in modern Australia, for pity's sake. That needs fixing, and it need before it goes anywhere. I can't believe that it's got this far.

We've still got significant work to do before we can submit this as any sort of document for Council to hang its hat on.

Anything else? Councillor Richards.

Thank you. I'll be very brief given the time

Yeah

But I'll stick to it. So I didn't support this document when it came to us last time, and I won't be supporting it again this time. I hold the same similar concerns as the other councillors about the absolute number of mistakes all the way through it. I'm not sure how many pairs of eyes ticked this one off, but it certainly is a very, very poorly written document. I mean, even on page 37, where this whole paragraph I will never support is the Outer Sydney Orbital and Bells Line of Road corridor planning. Like, seriously? After everything we went through, we're going to bring that one back? Down the bottom of that first paragraph on the left-hand side, it says, Council will advocate for greater question mark, question mark in terms of corridor planning.

We don't even know what Council's advocating for, but we've left question marks in our document. Like, I can't even put—I'm not putting my name to that. The other thing is those couple of pages, page 80 and 81 on climate change. Not going to get into a massive debate, but there is no way I am supporting the language that is used throughout those entire two pages, especially when I did not, as a councillor in this chamber, vote on that motion of climate emergency. And you've got two pages there that just go on with the most extreme language I've ever heard. So based on those two points and the fact it's half past 12, I won't elaborate more, but that's just a start. I could happy to email more thoughts through.

Thank you. Any further speakers? Councillor Ross.

At the previous meeting, I suggested a 12-month hold be put on this. That wasn't acceptable, but it seems to me that with the vagaries that have been brought to light tonight, that we should hold back on this for six months, so drop it off to planning by September 31. And the situation is, well, if they don't get it on March 31, what are they going to do?

What's it going to cost

Us?

Nothing. I think we should just take our time and get it right.

Councillor Sam Brogner.

Mr Mayor, I feel a little confused because the LSPS was billed to the community as a mid-level planning document that would subsume a lot of the public consultation that we were going to be engaging in relating to our residential land strategy or our rural land strategy. And, on that basis, I was going out to people and saying, Look, all of this bitsy-bitsy stuff, a higher level approach is being taken here, and this should allow us to have a really synergistic look at the whole district and what kind of development would be appropriate in what areas. And on that basis, a thick binder of public submissions came to us before Christmas, and people took— The same sense as to what the LSPS meant.

So there were unsolicited proposals for various types of development and an assurance that that public feedback would be synthesised and placed into this document here, and I don't see it. And even though I have deep misgivings about certain types of development and urban sprawl, I was hopeful that one of the things that this document would do is provide greater certainty about what our mid- to long-term strategies were for land use, and I don't see that. All of the talk that we engaged in at the beginning of this council term, where we generated our community strategic plan, this document looks like a beefed-up version of the community strategic plan, and I don't know that that's what it's supposed to be.

For example, we were talking about densification in existing town centres, Howaboutville or South Windsor to cite some examples, and to advocate for some medium density. The only references that I can see to medium density are that council will explore possibilities for medium density housing provision through zonings. It's not particularly comprehensive, or that we'll continue to advocate for dual occupancy or secondary dwelling opportunities will be sought, S-O-R-T, at appropriate sites where there are no flood or fire constraints . That's a fairly thin gesture towards something that's really much more complicated and where we could have struck out. A much more definite position about what we want the future of the Hawkesbury to look like.

It also raises the spectre of what happens to areas in, for example, Oakville and Moralia, because it says that once the Outer Sydney Orbital Corridor is finalised by the State Government, Council will then consider zoning opportunities along the corridor. That seems to, in a sense, pledge us to a process of rezoning vast areas of RU2 and RU4 housing for some other purpose. And I find this generally to be loose and that it doesn't strike the tone that I'd hoped that this document would strike. I was looking for more meat on the bones. And although this has weight, most of it is fat.

Deputy Mayor.

I just had a question, Mr Mayor, which sort of centres on what Councillor Zamprogno was just saying. Could we just have a brief outline, for example, so of course this will feed into our LEP, I'm just wondering, can we just have an idea of at what point would we be considering any potential changes in zoning? So, for example, if a new zone were to be introduced to cover something in line with land use changes or to, you know, put protections or to enable something that previously wasn't allowable. At what point is that actual process done to reflect from this document to the LEP, and what part do those studies that are still being done take in the process?

So to answer the questions that was posed by Councillor Zamprogno, the studies that we're undertaking in terms of the housing study, the employment lands, the housing strategy, the employment land strategy and the rural land strategy will be much more detailed and will give us more information that you're looking for. The Local Strategic Planning Statement was never, ever going to give us that level of detail. Those studies will inform this and they will inform the work that we want to do in terms of the LEP review and the DCP review, of which the project line has to be developed and brought back to Council. Thank you.

Councillor Kotlash.

A question if I may, Mr Mayor. What are the ramifications if we don't meet our March deadline?

I'm not sure.

Thank you. Any further discussion? If not, Councillor Rasmussen's right of reply. Not necessary, Mr Mayor. Thank you. Not necessary. I'll put the motion then. All those in favour of the motion please raise your hand.

Councillor Rasmussen and Councillor Calvert in favour. Against? Councillor Ross, Councillor Garrow, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor— Wheeler, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Zamprogno, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Richards, absent, Councillor Tree. Declare the motion lost.

Does anyone want to move anything based— Anyone want to move anything based on that?

We leave that. Can I ask a question? You can ask a question. Mr Mayor, Councillor Ross made a point earlier that if we weren't to give it to them on the 31st of March, what are they going to do about it? That sort of strikes true. Is there anything the staff have to add as to anything we should consider as what they might do about it? Councillor Kotlash, just ask that question.

Mr Mayor, I'd like to move some sort of a motion because I appreciate the amount of work that has been done, but clearly from what councillors have said, there still needs to be a lot more work done before it's ready to be submitted. So could I perhaps move that we again revisit it at briefing session. I know we have heavy briefing, but I'm open to what other councillors think we should do. Clearly we need a way forward, and we've got—we need to do more work on it.

Moving, if we have it at the next—you need a briefing session before March 31st probably. No.

Well, if it gets in by—

First available.

The first available, or a specific one, and in saying that, perhaps this is an instance where the councillors may wish to have a discussion that doesn't— you know, we can work through it and not have to put a lot of burden on staff preparing things for it. Perhaps if we could come up with the things that we think are missing or that we want to have is any corrections, etcetera, that that is an easier process for the staff than to redraw something up rather than having to

So what are you moving then?

I don't know. Yes. Yes.

You're moving that—

I'm moving that we do all that that I just said. We defer for a briefing session.

And at that briefing session, we can work all that out. Yep. Yes. Do we have a seconder for that?

With councillors to bring corrections to that briefing meeting.

Councillor Wheeler, are you seconding that? Any discussion?

No discussion.

Councillor Rasmussen. Thank you, Mr Mayor. Can I just clarify what we're actually doing? So we're going to go to a briefing session sometime or other, not sure when. Next available, that could be next year. And what are we going to do with this? We're all going to sit down and wordsmith something? What are we going to do?

I mean— Take corrections.

Take corrections, that's what I mean. Wordsmith it, right? We're going to put in words, and some of us are going to agree, disagree. Someone is going to— Councillor Richards has flagged where she's going to, you know, lay it down the law about certain things. So we're clearly not going to— anyway.

I think we just need to get on with the process. And as I've said earlier, I think we need to then adjust it as time evolves.

I mean, if

Well, we've already— We've already been through that. We've already rejected it. We didn't pass it. Now the Deputy Mayor is looking for a way forward. Okay

Councillor Reynolds. A question, Mr Mayor. Was this document done completely in-house, or was there any consultancy involved?

It was done in-house. We had no money to get a consultant, unlike other councils.

Okay.

To be frank, yes, the time got— there were, from the consultation period that we had last year, there were two further meetings with the Greater Sydney Commission where we got feedback, and then it was a really short time frame, so we had very limited time to meet their requirements and also our own council requirements, get the report in on time. So yes, it's been crunched.

Been moved and seconded to Councillor Wheeler. Do you wish to speak?

I'm hoping that the Deputy Mayor will allow some variation to her wording.

What kind of variation would you like?

I don't know that bringing this back to a briefing session is actually the best way forward. I think we're going to have to put up or shut up. I think if we want changes to this document, we are going to have to make them ourselves and forward them to a staff member who can join them into a document that can come back to this council and we can vote on. Because otherwise we'll be sitting in a briefing until quarter to one, all arguing the toss and getting absolutely nowhere and just giving the staff more grief and more stuff to deal with. There isn't some stellar failure anywhere in this process. It is what it is. We don't have the resources to do this really, really well. We all expect to have some high standard document from nothing.

We can't get blood out of the stone. We know that our planning department is flat knacker just processing planning, and yet here we are expecting them to produce something that other councils have been given two and a half million dollars to get underway. If we want this to be better than it is, we are going to have to use our personal resources to get it there. That means us all taking this home for homework, sorting it out and bringing it back within, say, three to four weeks so that a staff member can join it back together. And I think a stronger motion would reflect that. Deputy Mayor, you happy to make that

Your motion

I am happy, and that's what I was alluding to by not having to have staff. I thought just either a councillor meeting where we discussed it, but then perhaps it's easier. What I would want to see happen is because previously I think I have sent in a lot of things to do with it and gone through it and suggested changes. I think if we all make each other aware of what we're submitting so that we have an understanding that when we come back, it's not going to be another debate of this should or this shouldn't. I think that the only thing with that, if there's no discussion as it's going on, is that if there are significant changes proposed, who is making the decision of whether they go in or not.

So that is the flaw I would see with that. But certainly in terms of the straight-out corrections, but I still do, I agree with the councillors that thing we have to get it right, given the importance of the document, and if it's a little bit late, I don't think that matters.

So can we have some wording for this, please?

Councillor Connelly, are you adding something? Talking across the room. Please address your comments through the... Now that I've started, I'm not sure what the words are going to be, that's all. Mrs. Spurren would like to say something on this topic.

May I make a suggestion that if for councillors, you allocate the time frame in which you give us any wordsmithing changes, copy your fellow councillors into that, that's fine. We will then make those words, those typo changes, et cetera, et cetera. If there's any recommended changes which potentially challenge an overall intent or objective, we'll collate those and then we will actually have them as subject of a briefing for discussion with the councillors before then amending the document.

Thank you. That sounds like a very sensible solution. Feel free to put the words up there to reflect that. Thank you very much.

I don't think we need to wait for the words, but you're happy to move that. Happy to move that, thank you. Councillor Wheeler seconding it. Would there be any further discussion or can we move on this? No, I don't think we need the words for it. If you're in favour of that motion, please raise your hands. Councillor Richards, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Zamprogno, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Garrow, Councillor Rasmussen , and Councillor Ross, Councillor Calvert, absent, Councillor Tree, declared carried. Move to item.

Number 30, we have... Yes. I have a conflict disclosure. Councillor Reynolds has declared a pecuniary interest.

Yes, less than significant, non-pecuniary.

The item relates to passive use of council property and does not affect my home. So you're staying. First speaker is Mr Graham Eds.

Good evening, Mr Mayor, councillors. Look, thank you for, I guess, allowing me to speak at this late hour, or this early morning, and I hope that we can actually do this justice because it is a very important part of this community, the Windsor Bridge Replacement Project. We know that it's proceeding, we can see it, and we know all of that's happening. Look, I acknowledge the four recommendations that council have put forward, or council staff have put forward, and I generally agree with the majority of those. However, I do have a few other things to say. And I'm here on behalf of myself as a conservation architect who actually deals with historic sites on a daily basis, but also as part of council's heritage advisory committee and its deputy chair.

Look, I do applaud council in its previous resolutions to actually keep and maintain the state significant Windsor Bridge as a pedestrian use and also for light vehicle, whatever that is. And I would actually ask that council actually keep pursuing that because I think it's actually a worthwhile thing to do, as well as maintaining a bridge which is historically significant. Look , recommendation two, I talk individually as well as Deputy Chair of Council's Heritage Advisory Committee and encourage Council, as I said, to retain and appropriately display all the significant artefacts within the Hawkesbury that have actually been found on that site.

It's understood that Aboriginal archaeology is to be reburied, and I don't know how many of you know about this, but it actually came up at the meeting, to be reburied within the museum grounds, and there is actually grant funding that's been accepted for that. Look, I think this is a bit of a silly thing to do, to be truthful. I would have thought that it would be better to not sterilise that site because the museum building is constrained now; it's too small, and I believe that in burying those artefacts on that particular part of the site would actually stifle any further development and any further use of that site. So I guess I would suggest to Council that they not go ahead with that and perhaps put that grant towards reburial within Thompson Square itself and actually combine those artefacts with perhaps exposing some of the barrel drain and the like so that this whole thing can actually become a tourist attraction in its own right and we can actually bring some of the tourism activity back into the Hawkesbury where it's been taken so far out of Thompson Square.

So I think there's a lot of thinking to do, and I don't think when it comes round to it, this interpretation plan, which I'll come to shortly, is really looking at things in a positive and forward-thinking sense. I believe, and I think the majority of the Heritage Advisory Committee also believe, that the people that are actually preparing this interpretation plan are just really pandering to the RMS or Transport New South Wales, all decisions that have already been made. This interpretation plan was supposed to lead the project, and yet it hasn't. We're putting the cart before the horse, and it should be the other way around, as you well know. So there are lots of things to be said in regard to this, and I think that when you actually go into this particular document, the historic facts are actually incorrect.

So how can you actually start to actually interpret, give a true sense of interpretation plan when the historic documents are so incorrect? And that's actually been, I guess, brought forward by the historians which form part of the Heritage Advisory Committee, and they've actually written pages of inaccuracies and facts that are just purely not correct. So I guess there are lots of issues that come and things that need to be looked really, really carefully at. So I believe that the interpretation plan is wanting. It's a really, I believe, it's a poor document, and I guess if they were a consultant that I was working with, I wouldn't accept what's been brought forward. I don't know whether all of the Heritage Advisory Committee are of that mind, but certainly the majority, I think, are.

Time's actually up, Mr. Ritz.

I do have a lot more to say, Mr. Mayor, but—

Are there any questions? Councillor Ross.

I was going to ask if it would be possible to grant Mr. Ritz an extension

Extension of time? Yes. Second. Did you say how many minutes?

Oh, I think another three at least, wouldn't it? Three.

How much time do you need? Twenty minutes.

Oh, look, it depends on how important you think this is, and I, I guess I really do think it's an important thing that Council is going to be looking at tonight.

We'll go for five then, Graham. Oh,

Thank you.

It's been moved and seconded. All those in favour say aye. Aye. Against? Declare carried. Five minutes extension.

Thank you very much, Mayor and councillors. Look, I think when we come down to recommendation three, I'm somewhat unhappy, as I said, with the draft interpretation plan, and it's my professional opinion that I'm appalled that it actually, as I said before, reinforces the wishes of Transport New South Wales. And I don't believe that the assessment so far actually puts Thompson Square in the correct light that it should have as a leading document.

I personally believe that there's an overemphasis on Aboriginal within this document. And I say that purely because the essence of the historic value of Thompson Square is with European development and also use. Sure, Aboriginal were involved within that area, but I think their true significance is all the way up and down the Hawkesbury and in other areas too. But when you actually look at Thompson Square as such, it's really a European development, and I think its major significance is there. Yet this document actually looks at and brings forward the colours from modern artworks coming from the Aboriginal community rather than out of Thompson Square itself. You know, the colours of the buildings, the colours of the other colours that you actually find around within Thompson Square, not necessarily an artwork that is actually of modern day time.

So I think there are lots of things which are wanting within this document.

I said before about the historic facts being incorrect, Jan Barkley Jack, and also Michelle Nichols, part of the history research have actually found a swag of inaccuracies within that. So, and I think these have probably been reported, well certainly been reported to the Heritage Advisory Committee fairly carefully.

There are lots of things which are actually missing from this interpretation plan, and some of those are significant archaeological finds like the historic vessel that's been brought forward, and we've been told, I think by the consultants or by those that— Have discussed with the consultants that it all came too late. They'd already started their plan and these fines, particularly that one for the vessel and also the gates to the government domain, they're not included. The barrel drain and the box drains that actually feed it, I don't believe that are actually truly brought forward, nor is the existing bridge. You know, the interpretation of the existing bridge I find pretty ordinary as well.

Here we are left with a couple of stubs and we don't even know how we're going to actually address the ballast rating. Crikey, you know, if I was looking at this, I'd be looking at what has been there in history, and there was a collapsible ballast rating all across that bridge for flooding. So why wouldn't we be interpreting the ballast rating to actually reflect that, which is an important part of that bridge?

We've also looked at signage, and I think the Heritage Advisory Committee, when we had some community consultation, talked about the signage being very discreet and not overpowering. Yet the signage which has been brought forward to us is bold and in your face.

And I think if Council has actually looked at signage fairly seriously along the riverbank, and I think the signage that has actually been used there is quite discreet and not in your face, but it actually sits in quite nicely. So why wouldn't you reflect what's already been done that's successful and can continue?

I think there's an opportunity here, Council or Councillors, to actually really give a forward-thinking approach to the archaeology that has been found, the museum, and Thompson Square as a whole. And I don't think that the interpretation plan, as presented to us to date, really fulfils what it should be fulfilling. Thanks very much.

You're happy to take questions?

Absolutely.

Any questions? Councillor Sam. Councillor Rasmussen.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Mr Edwards, thank you very much, and thank you for staying around this length of time and presenting so well. I know you've just recently come back from overseas, and so you must be buggered as well. But anyway, thank you for that. I appreciate what you've just said. Could you outline what recommendation you would make to Council about correcting this document? Do you have any suggestions of what Council could do to make it a better document?

Well, first of all, I think Council should reject the document, and I guess that's pretty harsh words, but I believe that it's so inaccurate and failing in many, many ways that that's really the only thing that should happen. I think the recommendation for, I think it is, that Transport NSW actually get together with the Heritage Advisory Committee and go through the concerns. Well, of course, that's a positive thing to happen, but I just wonder whether any notice is going to happen by the RMS or Transport NSW from that committee. I think it really needs a stern approach from this Council to actually say to the proposers, this is not good enough. We need to relook at it.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Eds. We have one more speaker, and that's Mr. Harry Terry

Mr. Mayor, councillors, council staff, member of the gallery, and my wife. Unfortunately, her carriage has turned into a pumpkin at this hour. I had hoped the heritage interpretation plan would have learnt from the other reports that failed to meet the criteria of being honest and truthful. But alas, that is not the case, even given the stated aim of the HIP to be truthful and honest. The members of the Heritage Advisory Committee have far more knowledge and expertise than I, and their judgment will be far more insightful than my superficial observations. Nevertheless, whilst having an initial quick read of the HIP, I noticed some obvious oops, and I will share some of those oops with you. The HIP does not appear to know what is Thompson Square.

On page seven it says, Today it is part of the Thompson Square Conservation Area, but does not say which part or what it was before today. On page fourteen it says, The 1819 Wall of the MacArms, defining the western boundary of Thompson Square. Does that imply the square also extends to the fences of the buildings on the east, to the front of the buildings to the south, and the river to the north? Or does the HIP consider the square to be the grasslands within Thompson Square? On page 9 it says, Today the site of Thompson Square remains one of the oldest public squares in Australia. It is more accurate to state Thompson Square is the oldest public square in Australia. One of the conditions of approval for the replacement bridge was for the RMS to prepare and submit a detailed interpretation plan prior to the commencement of pre-construction.

But on page 11 of this document it says, This HIP is to satisfy the requirement of that condition. I think it's a little late. On page 30 it says, With the reunification of Thompson Square, the notion of a square only applies, as Graham said, in European occupation. From 1794-95 there were paths, tracks, roads leading to the river. For the river trade, these roads became more defined when the wharves were built, the ferry was in operation and later when the bridge was built. This is verified on page 78. If the HIP means the grasslands when referring to Thompson Square, then the correct words would be unification of the grasslands. This would be truthful and honest. The term unification rather than reunification has been adopted in the transport for NSW response to the submissions to the application for approval for Mod 1 for the slip lane.

On page 61 it says, Macquarie then acquired part of Thompson's estate. A more accurate statement would be Andrew Thompson bequeathed parts of his estate to Macquarie. On page 68 it says, the restricted passage of the Sackville and Brooklyn areas. Does Brooklyn have any impact on flooding in the Hawkesbury due to restrictive passages? On page 68 it says, the waters rose to an unprecedented 19 metres above normal height at Windsor. There is clear archaeological evidence higher floods have occurred prior to European occupation, hardly unprecedented. On page 72 says, 1881 tolls arrived. However, on page 66 it says, in 1802 he, Thompson, built the first toll bridge on South Creek. There is also the 1835 toll house currently beside South Creek.

On page 77 it says, cutting the bridge street through middle of Thompson Square, 1933. How does that equate with a statement on page 75 which says, 1934. On page 77 it says, in relation to the barrel drain complex, it eventually silted up and was forgotten, except as a story of a smugglers tunnel supposed to run from the wharf to the pub. The local historians and informed citizens know that is simply untrue. The tunnel was known about and played in, and it was known to be a drainage tunnel. On page 40, two comments I'd like to make, rather than oops. On page 46 and 55. How will the railings of the viewing platform and the interpretation signage cope with the effects of flooding? On page 61-62.

Given the extremely unique construction of the 1874 bridge, a particular sign should be allocated to its construction methods. I've just about finished. The current HIP does not meet the criteria of being truthful and honest. It lacks rigour, veracity and indeed independence. It cannot be accepted as a serious work. It is typical RMS. It should be rejected by the council. My recommendation is the same as Graeme's, it turns out. The council requests the RMS to have the HIP rewritten according to the information provided by the Heritage Advisory Committee, and a new draft report be returned to that committee for further assessment. Thank you.

Thank you. Any questions?

Thank you, Mr Terry. That was the final speaker. Council, finally. Is there a recommendation in the business paper? Do we have a seconder?

No.

Councillor Wheeler .

I have some changes to the recommendation that I will just finish off and send to the staff. You'd like to move

Another motion?

Yes, please.

And I will get words as soon as I can. Sorry. Okay

Would you like to speak on it now

Describe it to us, please .

It's not complete. I haven't finished point five. So it changes, makes changes to the recommendation in the business paper based on the comments from the speakers. Point one, that Council receive and note the contents of this report, including the status of actions in relation to previous resolutions regarding heritage issues in relation to the Windsor Bridge and the draft Heritage Implementation Plan, noting serious concerns over inaccuracies in the document, the downplaying of Thompson Square's importance in Australia's history, and the suitability of the implementation plan. Two, Council endorse in principle the acceptance and retention of significant artefacts for display in the Hawkesbury, noting concerns with lack of display space and ongoing costs to Council and requesting that Transport for NSW works with Council to find and fund suitable display and storage that does justice to this important collection.

Three, Council endorse the comments received from the Heritage Advisory Committee on the draft Heritage Interpretation Plan for the Windsor Bridge replacement project and note that they are to be forwarded to Transport for NSW. Four, a formal Heritage Advisory Committee meeting be organised with Transport for NSW to work through each of the committee's statements. The Heritage Advisory Committee meeting minutes will be sent to Council. And then point five, which mirrors Mr Terry's request, that Council request that Transport for NSW amend and resubmit the interpretation plan to Council based on—

Based on Council's feedback.

Can I ask then, are we actually in point one receiving this?

I think we have to receive it in order to comment on it. Okay . So we're not endorsing it. We're not saying that we like it, because many of us don't, and our own Heritage Committee feels very strongly that this document is not appropriate. But I think in order to comment on it and to give feedback, we have to say we've got it, which is what I understand, receiving and noting. We're not agreeing with it. We're just taking it.

I don't agree with you. I think Council can note, but anyway, do we have a seconder?

I'm happy to take your advice on that matter, Mr Mayor. If you think that it's better to remove that and leave it as Council note the contents, then I'm happy to take that on

Board. I think receive implies that you've accepted it, seconded by Council Deputy Mayor. No . Council Wheeler, do you wish to speak to it?

Briefly, Mr Mayor. I think Mr Eds has done the bulk of the work in speaking to the problems with this document. The Heritage Advisory Committee had a lengthy meeting where members had already gone through the document at length and then had come in, and we had to cut ourselves short. There were so many concerns with this document that we had to stop ourselves from picking it apart and tried to discuss the overall issues with the document rather than particular things. But, I mean, they— You've heard about the colours, you've heard about the inaccuracies, even to the point where the documents used to refer to the significance of parts of the square come from an obscure newspaper from the New England district.

I mean, this is one of the most fertile areas for colonial heritage in the country, and we can't even use our own heritage documents to refer to them. It's really staggering that the very process of talking this place up has meant a pushing away of the importance of the site. I mean, we're really held over a barrel by the New South Wales Government here. We've basically been given an ultimatum: take the artefacts that Transport for New South Wales has deigned to preserve for us, and those of us who watch some of the excavation will see that many things were not preserved, and lose space in our own museum to house them, pay for their upkeep, pay to continue to curate them, take a useless viewing platform that looks out onto an obtrusive modern structure of zero architectural merit rammed through the oldest public square in the country that doesn't fix traffic,

Lose a footbridge and pay for the upkeep of that as well. This is insulting, frankly. And the alternative is that we get nought. The alternative is that it all goes away to some other museum and the Hawkesbury loses another piece of its really important heritage. To give you an idea of how precious these colonial bits and pieces are, the very muster book that refers to convict musters across New South Wales in 1800, at a time when that convict muster would have occurred in Thompson Square, as one of the muster sites, is held in the library of the Parliament of New South Wales. It's the most valuable document, most valuable book in the library collection. It's worth two million dollars. Such is the value of items of colonial heritage.

We have such a wealth of stuff under our feet and yet we're being told that a tiny portion of our existing museum is sufficient to do justice to what has happened to Thompson Square. And I and the other members of the Heritage Advisory Committee reject that.

This is a slap in the face. This is a further slap in the face for the people of the Hawkesbury, for Thompson Square, for Windsor and for anybody who cares about Australia's colonial heritage. There have been real attempts to consult with the Aboriginal community and to bring the importance of Aboriginal heritage forward, and I applaud the author of the document for doing that. I want to clear up a point around the grant for dealing with those artefacts. It's actually a grant to build a food garden that reflects local Indigenous food. It's not part of dealing with the artefacts. The artefacts are an add-on. That grant funding was received already and when they were wondering about which hole they were going to stick them in, basically, they came up with the idea of putting them there.

But you're right, it does sterilise the rest of the site and means that an expansion is impossible. We've already seen how long it took to get around one convict-built wall. So I'm not sure that is the best place, but that's, I don't think for us to determine. That needs to go back to discussion with the Aboriginal community. But we can't take this as the final solution for Thompson Square. It simply isn't good enough.

Further speakers? Councillor Sam Brogan.

Thank you, Mr Mayor.

It's after midnight.

The witching hour. We noticed.

I'm

Going to vote for Councillor Wheeler's motion, unless you all think that I've gone native . I'm going to be clear about why I'm going to be doing that. I agree with Mr Ed's comments. In fact, they resonated with me very much. It's really important to get historical interpretation right. I know that there are some who will, you know, do hand springs to try and make the motion before us and the historical interpretation study do their bidding to continue to fight a rearguard action against the legitimacy of the whole project, or to fight a rearguard action to protect the old bridge from demolition, and I'm not party to that. But where it comes to historical interpretation, a lot of time has been invested in a document that I feel doesn't pass muster.

Mr Eds drew attention to the historical balance between European and non-European history. I happen to believe Very passionately that this is a European space, and the predominance of the significance lies in our European history. Nevertheless, I'm far from surprised to see that when a consultant is engaged, then there's a powerful, powerful motivation to be woke and to give equal prominence to the Aboriginal heritage, which in this case I don't believe is warranted. The European archaeology that's occurred at this site has turned up a rich trove of our early colonial history. The Aboriginal archaeology turned up a bucket of gravel. And, you know, I can't agree with an interpretation that places so much emphasis on the Aboriginal heritage, either at a council briefing or at a meeting of the Heritage Advisory Committee.

We had Wolfpack, Wolfpeak, Wolfblass, whoever it was that wrote this report,

And

I remonstrated with one of the consultants and I said, Look, when you came here the first time, you mentioned that the blue glazed tiling and the labelling that would be applied to those wouldn't include the year markings, that they'd only have a statistical marker , one in ten, one in fifty, one in one hundred. And I said, That's not good enough, because there are European dates associated with certain flood events. We don't have to record all of them, but, you know, there's a reasonable expectation that people will be able to see that a particular flood occurred in a particular year. The fact that a particular marker represents a one in one hundred level or a one in seventy-five level is of significantly less interest.

In fact, it was the subject of some furore on social media. The consultant took on board that and promised me that European dates would be reflected in the signage, and yet on page 45 it says that

The signage will show the regularity of flooding levels rather than dates. So that feedback hasn't been taken on board at all.

So I think this document could do with some revisitation, not only to correct the many inaccuracies that have been brought to our attention by Mr Eds and by Mr Terry, but to also change the tone and the emphasis of the document so that it's more fit for purpose.

Thank you. Further speakers? Councillor Ross.

Councillor Ross.

Thank you.

I don't believe that the action

Proposed in the

Motion is sufficiently robust. I think we should be mindful of Mr Eds.

I would suggest, plea, that in fact Council should reject the Heritage Interpretation Plan and tell Transport for New South Wales to bloody well go back and sort it out, and come back to us when it's done. The second point about my disaffection with what is being proposed..

Is that

They are trying to slap on an ambit claim in regard to the archaeological relics, whether they be European , Indigenous or marine. And they're saying, well, possession is nine-tenths of the law. You either take what we've got and we're prepared to give you, or we'll go and run off down to Parramatta or somewhere else, put the stuff there. And we've certainly not been offered the three vessels or parts thereof that have been discovered. In fact, we're going to get a model, an interpretation, by some model maker, who we don't know. That's totally unacceptable. Totally unacceptable. We should be demanding all of the archaeological relics, including maritime, be returned to this area and that Transport for New South Wales also dole out the money for an exhibition space for them.

All of them. All of them. Never mind trying to impose and bludge on us, as they are trying to do. This is just ridiculous. Just unacceptable. Totally unacceptable

For the historic nature of the township and the items that we're speaking of. This is just absolutely pathetic and weak-kneed. I believe it's got to be strengthened, and I hope my fellow councillors might consider that worthy. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Ross. Councillor Rasmussen. Yep. Thank you, Mr Mayor. Mr Mayor,

I agree with the speakers that the report does not reflect the status and the standing of the square, and nor does it represent correctly the significance of the European part of that square. That is not to say that the Aboriginal part is not there. Of course it's there, and we know it's there. And I disagree with Councillor Zamprogno that, you know, all we've got is a bag full of rubble. I think there's significant pieces of Aboriginal artefacts there as well. However, what disappoints me is that there does not seem to be the appetite from Transport New South Wales or the State Government to actually recognise the importance of what is there and what has been found in the archaeological dig and also as the excavations for the bridge proceeded.

I mean, the tunnels and the drains and the— I mean, this is of highly, highly national significance and state significance. And not to interpret it correctly or in any significant way, I think is just the most tragic thing that could happen. Not only for this area, but for the state and the nation as well. So many people would be interested in the history of this place. So many people and future generations would be interested in our heritage in that square. So, to me, Mr Mayor, it represents a very, very weak, weak and washy, and totally unacceptable spending of, what was it, $290,000 on this study, on this plan. For goodness sake, that is a lot of taxes. That is a lot of taxes out of mums and dads' wages to pay for that.

Seriously. Anyway, Mr Mayor, I just totally—it's just unacceptable, and it's sad that this area, so rich in history, and we cannot build a case for getting this area and this particular part of this area really, really given a prominence and a display and interpretation worthy of its history and our history. Mr Mayor, I would like to suggest that maybe what we could incorporate into the motion at item number one is that, yes, we note Council notes, but also rejects significant sections and interpretations contained in the HIP. Now, that would send the clear message that yes, we note it, yet we know we've got it and we can read, but we reject significant sections of it and interpretations contained therein.

And I think if we did that . Add something like along those words, we might give some standing, as Councillor Ross said, to our disgust and our, yeah, I guess disappointment with an interpretation of this plan.

Councillor Wheeler, are you interested in entertaining that change?

I could be persuaded to entertain that change, Mr Mayor, if Councillor Rasmussen was to give some words.

I know it's early. I know it's early in the morning, and some of us are not used to being up this early. But being a military man, I'm used to being up early. Now, so what I would suggest we add is that council notes and rejects significant sections and interpretations contained in the HIP, and the rest then flows on.

Happy with that change? Deputy Mayor, are you happy with a seconder? Thank you. Any further speakers? Councillor Wheeler, right of reply.

Very, very quickly, Mr Mayor, I need to comment on Councillor Zamponio's comments on the Aboriginal archaeology. The bucket of gravel that he refers to has also been referred to as one of the most intensely studied sites in the Sydney Basin. The artefacts are some of the best examples ever seen, and the collection is of national significance. Not bad for a bucket of gravel, I would think. Your comments, Councillor, through you, Mr Mayor, are deeply, deeply misinformed and offensive , and that's really all that needs to be said on that matter, I think. I'm pleased that other councillors seem to be behind this motion. This isn't an attempt to hold up the process. This is an attempt to get some justice for what we have managed to save from Thompson Square.

Thank you. That was right of reply. I'll put the motion. All those in favour, please raise your hands. In favour: Councillor Ross, Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Zamprogno, Councillor Calvert. Against? Against, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Richards. Absent is Councillor Tree and Councillor Garrow. Declare it carried.

We have other items on the business paper.

Move

Items en bloc.

Now, item 31 apparently needs to be dealt with tonight, and 28. 28 and 31, would someone like to move that we move those two forward? Yeah, moved. Councillor Sambrogno. Should

We move the ones en bloc? Weren't there some en bloc?

I'll second that. Yeah, I know, we've got to

Do that. Two. I'll move those.

It's been moved by Councillor Sambrogno and Councillor Rasmussen that we move items 28 and 31 forward so we can discuss them.

They have to be dealt

With tonight.

Is there any— Can I just agree? I think that's a reasonable question, Mr Mayor. Why would they have to be dealt with tonight? What's the consequence of leaving them? The quarterly report is supposed to be dealt with within two months of the period that it relates to, so that's the December quarter. And the six-monthly report relates to that as well.

Can we move a motion to tie

That over?

The motion is that we move those two items forward so we can discuss them. It's moved by Councillor Rasmussen, seconded by Councillor Wheeler. That's what we're discussing. No further discussion. I'll put that motion. All those in favour, raise your hand.

Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Calvert, Councillor Conolly,

That we move the items forward. Councillor Richards and Councillor Sambrogno, did anyone vote against that? Did you vote against that, Councillor Ross? Yes. And Councillor Garrow and Councillor Tree are absent. Declare it carried that we move those two items forward. But before that there is one item to be moved on block, Deputy Mayor's moving that, seconded Councillor Wheeler. All those in favour say aye. Declare it carried. Item 28.

Would someone like to move item 28? Move the recommendation. Second that, Mr Mayor . Councillor Conolly, Councillor Rasmussen. Any discussion?

Councillor Wheeler, is that discussion?

Just a point, Mr Mayor. It would be helpful. What we've got here is whether things are in progress or ongoing or complete. It would be easier, I think, for councillors to have some idea of whether they were on target for completion or not, particularly given that we're at the pointy end of the financial year.

General Manager? This is the first report we're doing with that new format, new software, and we're changing that so it'll be on target, not on target, those sorts of things going forward.

Happy? Any further discussion? It's been moved by Councillor Conolly, seconded by Councillor Rasmussen. If there's no further discussion, I'll put that item. If you're in favour, please raise your hand. In favour: Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Cottenage, Councillor Sam Provan, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Rees, Councillor Calvert. Against is Councillor Ross. Absent is Councillor Garrow, and Councillor Tree declared it carried. The other item is—

Item 31.

Move the recommendation.

Moved by Councillor Conolly, seconded by Councillor Rasmussen. Any discussion? Item 31.

Oh, sorry. You've never

Seen me anyway. That's okay. All right, bear with me please. I have some serious concerns about this quarterly budget review statement. I'm deeply concerned we're operating in a deficit. Very concerned. Even though some people may say that the deficit amount is quite small, I still believe it's absolutely valid to explore this. So what I don't quite understand is how this Council can collect additional revenue from its ratepayers, but now be operating in a deficit. Essentially, I'm nervous about the financial position that we find ourselves in, and how do we justify this to our ratepayers based on all of that above? When I've gone through the report here, just let me go through it because I've made notes everywhere.

Okay. Page 75, it says overall we have a $60,000 deficit budgeted position. I'm not going to raise the total publicly in this meeting, but we were told a different position at the briefing. So I'm very concerned about that. My second issue is that it is proposed that the $60,000 deficit is budgeted to be funded through the contingency reserve. So if we're already in a deficit, does that mean the contingency reserve was sitting at zero or will be sitting at zero once it pays this deficit? That's something I guess before I continue on, can I get an answer to that one please?

Yes, Ms Galia.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. The contingency reserve currently holds around $791,000, so taking this deficit from that will still leave a balance there.

So still with a $60,000 deficit, we actually have $791,000 in contingency.

Sorry. So contingency reserve is set up to deal with unexpected events, including deficits, like what we have in front of us now. So essentially, it's a budgeted deficit that we have. I have to emphasise it's a budgeted position, and if we fund it from the contingency, it means that overall the budget will remain balanced. So

There will still be money in the contingency fund. Okay, thanks for clearing that one up.

Further questions? Oh, yeah .

Thanks. So it says here on page 75, Council adopted the operational plan, 19/20 operational plan, has fully allocated the available resources and funding to works, services and projects. Accordingly , Council has limited capacity to respond to adverse external influences. So based on what you've just said is in contingency, that sentence is actually quite alarming. Council has limited capacity to respond to adverse external influences moving forward.

That's dangerous. You'd like an answer to that? Yeah, I guess . It's kind of a

Statement, but anyway. Mr Mayor, what that statement is meant to portray is that, as it actually says, all the budget is allocated to expenditure already, which means that when there is adverse situations like reduced income or increased expenditure, unless we go back and adjust the income somehow or reduce the expenditure, there is no— the only capacity we have is the contingency reserve, but it is a reserve and it's not something that we should be rely on all the time.

Okay, so I'm taking from that, correct me if I'm wrong, but we're in danger. If we have no buffer and no room to move in this council, and we have put through an SRV, which I completely understand is for capital works, but we have got no room to move in this council, then I have serious concerns about how this council is managing money. I'm concerned with the amount of legal advice that we are getting through planning matters. Like, we're putting everything to legal advice. So basically what I'm going to call for in an amendment is a detailed report about our budget to come back at the next meeting, but I want things itemised. I want how much we've actually spent on legal advice and how many DAs or planning matters or anything like that.

We've actually gone and sought external consultants for. I want to know exactly where all of this extra money is going. I want to know in detail, it says here on page 76, in terms of income generation, work is underway in regard to biodiversity offsets and property management. I need someone to explain to me how a biodiversity offset and how property management will generate income, please.

So you would like that in—

How are we doing that as a council? Not a general definition. How are we doing that as a council? Would you like an answer

Now, or are you saying you'd like that in a report?

I guess I'd like that in the detailed report. I'm happy to wait till then. This other statement is quite alarming for me. While the short-term financial position for council at this stage is likely to remain satisfactory, this could be at risk if the external factors outlined above deteriorate further, or in the event other matters having an adverse impact on council's budgeted income and expenditure arise during the remainder of the financial year. Well, guess what? We've just gone through a fire and a flood. And we've just tonight, and I fully support the motion that we put through about paying for cleanup with contingency funds for ratepayers who are in distress at the moment, and I get that.

But that paragraph there says, again, what we just said a minute ago. We don't have room to move. We've got no room to move if something happens. We should not be operating as a council in that capacity. So basically what I want to do is call for a. .. where have I written it? Hold on. I'd like to move an amendment to call for a more detailed report based on everything that I've just said, especially in light of further upcoming budget discussions that we need to have. I believe that it's in the ratepayers' best interest to have all of this on the business paper. It also says in the report that discretionary expenditure will be reviewed. Well, I think that if we are operating in a council where we have no room to move, then I want to know what this discretionary expenditure is.

I would have thought that in a budget position like this, we wouldn't even be considering any discretionary spending. I would like in that detailed report, as I said before, to know, list exactly all the matters that have gone to legal advice, what that legal advice has amounted to, if that has gone over what we budgeted for legal advice. I'd like a report that details all of the external , not just legal advice, but external advice from experts that we've got on matters and where that has come from, if it came under its budgetary heading or it came out of the discretionary contingency fund. I want to know that if we are operating the way we are on the smell of an oily rag, what are the things that we are not going to be able to do that we had projected or budgeted to do leading up to the end of this financial year.

I'd like to know in that report how many staff were employed at the start of this term in September 2016 and how many people and staff we now employ at this point in time. I want to know what the increase is in staff and the increase in their wages over that period of time and where that has been justified in the budget. I don't know if you probably haven't got that. You'd probably have to listen back to the... podcast to get all of that, but if the other councillors understood where I was coming from there, that's what I would basically like to call for in a more detailed report. Let me just see if I've got any other notes written down.

It says here, on the dividend arising from the sale of Southern Phone equity, favourable variance $27,000. But then it's got in that paragraph, in addition to the distribution of the proceeds of the sale, $786,000. Where did that go?

Is that a question?

Yeah. Through you, Mr Mayor. So the proceeds from the sale, this $785,000, so that has been restricted to an internal reserve, which means essentially we've put it aside with the idea that we discuss the use of those funds as part of the budget process, as part of the overall... So it's

Separate to the other contingency

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So that's just been put aside to be discussed as a source of funding during the budget process. Because I think we did move a motion

Saying that we would come back and discuss what we were going to spend that money on.

That's right. So

It's just been put aside, so it hasn't been absorbed in the whole mix. It's been put aside. It's there waiting for whatever council decides to do with it. But at this point it's going

To look like we have to absorb it as part of our budget because we are running so tight. I mean, that's just an off-the-hand comment.

And the $27,000 that has gone to the bottom line because that's just a dividend.

Okay. All right

I had highlighted here the paragraph on page 79. As detailed in this report, external factors outside council's control have resulted in proposed unfavourable budget variations not being able to be completely offset by favourable budget variations, resulting in a budgeted overall deficit position. I just think that is absolutely alarming, given we've had all this money come in and I want to know exactly how it's been spent. So, I'm not going to put... I had some other things here that I think are quite alarming if I put them on the public record. So basically, I'd like to move an amendment calling for all of that extra detailed information at the next council meeting, please.

Can I clarify, please? The current recommendation on page 74 has two points. First point is we receive it. Second point is we adopt it. Are you keeping those two points and adding a third?

Certainly not adopting it.

I'm

Not adopting it, so I've got way too many concerns.

So what are you keeping, point one?

I'm happy to receive the report, but I want to receive this report, but at the next council meeting bring back a more detailed report based on the concerns raised tonight. Okay.

So two points. Correct. Councillor Conolly, would you be considering changing your motion to read that way?

Just a thought as perhaps a potential way through. If councillors were to submit these as, submit those sorts of questions as written questions with notice, would that be too detailed for those answers to appear in the questions section?

Mr Conroy.

I think I'd rather do it in a report.

Okay. I guess my only question was that we were told we need to deal with it tonight because it had to be adopted. What happens if we don't adopt it? Good question.

Mr Conroy.

Through you, Mr Mayor. So essentially, if council adopted the quarterly review, what it would mean is that the proposed adjustments, most of which are necessary, will be reflected in the budget, the ongoing budget. If it's not adopted, essentially we're left with a budget with shortfalls in it that we will have to address at some point. So my suggestion would be we need to adopt it.

Yes. I understand the questions have been asked, and I understand why. I would just put some perspective on this, that we have used the contingency in the past. The reason we have a contingency is for these situations. And the issue of the declining situation in terms of income and economic activity is something that is difficult to predict, but we can go into all those details. I don't think that adopting this position tonight is going to compromise things going forward. It's something that can be managed within the contingency reserve. The reserve is there just for that purpose.

Can I suggest a different wording then that might be satisfactory?

Okay. So what if we added a point three that Council note the projected $8.75 million deficit for the 2019-20 financial year and calls for a report to explain in detail how this deficit has been arrived at, especially given the special rate variation, especially considering that this year we have received a special rate variation on rates—just say that actually, special rate variation.

Council Richards, would you be happy to support that or you want to keep your amendment? So your amendment is we receive this and secondly we ask for a report.

I'll withdraw my amendment and Councillor Connelly can put up his, but I won't be supporting it.

See, withdraw the amendment. Councillor Connelly's changing his motion to have three points. Yeah. Seconder was Councillor Ross.

Councillor Rasmussen, sorry.

You seconded the motion. Yeah, and I'm asking you, now that—is that— No, Mr Mayor, no. No, you don't want to add that point. Absolutely not. Okay.

So Councillor Connelly doesn't have a seconder for that.

Sorry?

Needs another seconder.

I know, that's what I said. Is there someone else who wants to second that?

Sorry, wasn't the seconder Councillor Ross ? The proposition is that we adopt this, but we call for a more detailed report explaining the exact financial position with some answers to the questions Councillor Richards asked

Councillor Ross, are you saying you second that or not?

Councillor Conolly asked you if you were going to second what he just said. Are you?

Okay, Councillor Zamprogno is going to second. Thank you, Councillor Zamprogno. So we now have a motion on the table, seconded by Councillor Sam Progno. Deputy Mayor, wish to speak. I

Just had a question actually regarding the information that Councillor Richards was asking for. Would we be getting a report at any stage that did outline, because all those details asked for, for the previous four years, would, do we get, I can't recall from the last council term, if we get like a finalised overall report

Of the financial sort of status, not the current operating budget or anything, but I know there were questions asked. I'd be interested to see sort of exactly over this period of time what was given to external organisations, for example, like the River County Council and the Sports Council and all those sorts of things as well. Is there a summary document for the end of the council term, basically, I suppose

I believe what you may be referring to is the end of term report, which tends to be more on what was achieved in terms of activities, not so much the financial. But that is something that we can produce if that's what Council ask for.

If at some point councillors gave a list of what they might like to see in it, could that be included or something?

Through, Mr Mayor, yes. Yes.

The answer is yes. Councillor Connelly, did you wish to speak on your new version of the motion?

Yes, Mr Mayor.

I would thank staff for the briefing that we had on the quarterly budget review, and I think that looking solely at the quarterly adjustments, I think each one has been explained as to what's changed this quarter. But I think what Councillor Richards was getting at, perhaps my perception was that we're just talking in this report about a $60,000 deficit. The deficit, of course, is projected to be $8.7 million. This $60,000 is just the cash movement from the contingency reserve that's required to fund the cash deficit overall. But the operating ratio shows a deficit of $8.7 million, and I think there would be some questions about, and I think it would be quite useful for the community to have just something in writing that just shows some of this is timing, some of this is big-ticket items.

How did we get from our original projected position, we've got an SRV in there and we're still going to come back to you and say we've got an $8.7 million budget deficit. It would be useful to have that information in a form that was easy for people to understand and see how we've arrived at that. I also think that, in general terms, my general view has always been that— If a councillor wants more information around the financials, it's never a good idea to say no, even if the request seems superfluous or unnecessary. As soon as we start, as a council, resolving not to provide additional financial information and transparency, that's when things start to look dodgy and it seems like things are being covered up.

So I think the way I would operate is if someone's asking the questions, always better to put the answer out there, whether or not, given we've got those answers and there's nothing in there should be particularly hard to produce.

Thank you. Further discussion? Councillor Reynolds.

Yes, Mr Mayor. I was wondering too, when this comes back to us at a briefing with more details, if staff could include an approximation of the impost of cost shifting in this year's budget. It was $6.8 million in 2016, and we were in the top 10 in New South Wales. The state average went from $680 million in 2016 to $820 million in 2018 and was predicted to go higher, and I'd like to know how that has impacted us as well. Thank you.

Councillor Connelly, are you happy to add that as part of the report?

As part of the report on the—

Part three.

Yeah, I mean, as long as we don't tie the two together, because obviously this is, what we're talking about here, Councillor Reynolds, is not so much the deficit but the movement in the deficit, how we got there from the start of the year. So obviously that's got nothing to do with cost shifting, because all the cost shifting—

Councillor Reynolds is just wanting another item in the report.

Yeah, I would say—well, I would propose, Mr Mayor, that it be at point four: council also receive a report on cost shifting, because the two are not related.

You'd be happy to add a point four? Happy with that, Councillor Reynolds. Councillor Sam Brognow as seconder, you happy with that? I am, yes. Good. So 0.4 is the cost shifting one, if we could add that. Any further speakers? Question

Mr Mayor. Can Ms Galia perhaps just tell us that when the term 8.7 million dollar budget deficit is written there, what exactly that means?

Through you, Mr Mayor. So the 8.7 million refers to the operating result, which essentially it excludes capital items, it excludes any reserve funding. So essentially it's operating income against operating expenditure. So that's the target that we have to meet for fit for the future, that result. The 8.7 million, whilst it appears a large figure, as explained during the briefing, 6.2 million of that relates to the prepayment of the financial assistance grant, which was 2.3 million, and 3.9 million in relation to timing between income and expenditure in regard to deliverability grant. So if you take that into account, that brings it down to 2.5 million. And the other factor also that went in is we, the audit office..

. Directed us to bring the fire trucks on our books, and with that comes around $450,000 worth of depreciation. So I suppose if you really want to see sort of where we're heading, if you take those things out of the equation, the projected deficit as at June, at this stage, it's $2.1 million, and that is assuming that as at June we have no operational carryovers whatsoever. There would always be some operational carryovers. So essentially there will always be money that's not spent because work is not capital but just operating. So that 2.1, realistically, you know, based on sort of previous experience with carryovers, it's more likely to be a much lower figure because it won't all be spent.

So that's, yeah, I suppose that's where we're at when you take into account those timing differences, which really, I mean, they're not—they're completely outside of Council's control, and it's not a reflection of our income and expenditure. It's just timing difference. But the remaining balance is what we're left with. Thank you

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Thank you, Ms Galea. I'm not prepared to support it with that statement in there because I don't think it's a true representation, and I think it could be a little bit devious on the part of the Councillor that moved it to make a link with the special rate variation. I would be happy to support the rest of the motion and happy to adopt that and happy to have another report come. But I think the way it's worded, after what Ms Galea has just explained to us, is not a true representation of how things are, and it will be a figure appearing without the explanation. I'm happy for those figures to be there when there's an explanation, but not happy to have it worded in that way, so I won't be supporting it.

In which case I'll move an amendment.

And the amendment would

I'm trying to bring you in. Oh, sorry, I didn't see you there. If the issue, I mean, the 8.7 million is taken directly from page 10, but if it's already printed in the business paper, but what if we got rid of everything after how the situation has been arrived at?

I mean, because I'm just—it's just quoting the correct result, because my issue was that I don't believe the current business paper actually mentions that result anywhere except in the attachment, whereas that is the projected result. Shall leave out the

Special rate variation? Yeah,

If that's—if I can see where that...

Would you be happy with that, Councillor?

Not really, Mr Mayor, because it's a quarterly review. It's not an annual review, and so it's giving just a figure. I would prefer no figure there. I'm happy for it to say Council note budget deficit and calls for a report detailing how the situation has been arrived at . But the point is that we—well, the projected budget is 2.9 million.

So Councillor Conolly is keeping his motion the way it is?

Yes. Well, my amendment would be just a motion with the first two points.

First two points. Do we have a seconder for the amendment? Councillor Wheeler.

You've just spoke. Did you want to speak on your amendment, or we consider that done?

Any further discussion on the amendment, which is now the first two points? Councillor Wheeler.

Thanks, Mr Mayor. I think the amendment is a better reflection. I appreciate Councillor Connolly's attempt to obtain more information, but I think conflating the SRV with the budget deficit is unreasonable in this instance. The SRV, as we are all well aware, is for capital works. The projected deficit is not caused by blowouts in capital works. Ms Galea has just outlined what has caused the budget deficit, and none of it is capital works. I'd be happy for us to discuss this further in a briefing. I would like us to have some handle on our budget projections and whether we are amending those in line with the current economic projections. I think we've seen now over a period of more than 12 months that there's been a downturn in development applications and in building, and I think that our budget has to better reflect that, because I don't think we have done that in the last 12 months.

I think we've projected income that hasn't arrived. I would hope that we don't do that again next year. But this is a quarterly review. This isn't the end, and several of these things are outside our control, and they will continue to be a problem whenever we get a portion of our income from an outside source and we are above the benchmark for own-source income. But wherever we get money from things like the livability fund that Council doesn't control, or FAG grants that Council can't control the timing of. They will make our budget cycle look messy. Is it problematic that we aren't hitting the targets for some of these things? Absolutely. Do any of us want to run—do any of us want to have a budget that's in deficit?

Of course not. But I don't think we need to be selling this to the public as an $8 point something million deficit based on an SRV. I mean, there's clearly incorrect information and clearly overselling the problem, and I'd hate to think that you would be doing that in an election year. But the cynic in me says that that motion is unsupportable, so I'll be supporting the Deputy Mayor's amendment. Councillor Connelly. Thanks

Just to point out some of the inaccuracy in those comments, and it might come from genuine misunderstanding, but the way that the SRV works—the SRV is an increase in rating revenue, so that all goes directly into the operating performance ratio. The capital works are not included in the operating performance ratio. So the operating performance ratio should only get better and better for the SRV. The fact that whether or not it's been spent or not is completely irrelevant. Whether it's for capital works or not is completely irrelevant. We can put our hand in the sand and pretend this is not the result, but the projected result of this quarterly budget review is an $8.7 million deficit, and I think it's actually perfectly foreseeable that people will look at this and say, How did Council get to the point where we're paying more rates than ever and we've got a projected result of a deficit of $8.7 million?

That's, I think, a reasonable question people will be asking, and it's obvious. As we just heard, there's a couple of big-ticket items that actually explain most of it, and to have a document there that says this is how we got there, this is why it's happened, actually clears up the bulk of that deficit. But if people would prefer to put their head in the sand and pretend it doesn't exist, and we don't want to tell anybody, that's up to you. I'd hate to be a cynic as well.

Councillor Rasmussen. Yeah,

Thank you, Mr Mayor. Yeah, I tend to agree—well, lots of it I agree with Councillor Wheeler—that this is an election year, and you can just see the headlines if we had passed this motion previously, that $8.7 million deficit. You can just see the Facebook headlines now, running into an election. The fact of the matter is, and we heard it from the Chief Financial Officer, it's a timing issue. It's a timing issue. We've had the Auditor-General say, You must bring your big, bright red fire trucks online. We're not in a dire situation. We have got 700 and—what did he say? 30, plus another 700 and whatever it was, $40,000 in reserves, right? In reserves. So the 2.1 million that might be left in a quarterly outcome will be whittled down again because there's those two reserves.

You cannot put out— you cannot put out a message, and you can shake your head if you like, you can shake your head if you like— Councillor Rasmussen.

And I

Didn't sit there shaking my head when you rattled on about all your stuff.

Councillor Rasmussen, no personal comments, just— Well, I'm not— Well, carry on, please.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. I just find a little bit condescending that I don't sit there and make funny snide comments.

Well, that's good. Can you continue? I

Will continue. Thank you, Mr Mayor. It just seems to me to be totally grandstanding and designed for a particular headline on Facebook or wherever. That's what that was designed for.

It

Was a blind,

Blind Freddy — We have a point of order, yes, Councillor

He has no idea that I had a Facebook headline designed, ready to go. I didn't mention anything about you. I'm asking questions about the budget. It's not

A point of order, Councillor Richards . Councillor Rasmussen is expressing an opinion, which he's entitled to do. Councillor Rasmussen.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. I mean, you could be mistaken for thinking that, you know, there's only a couple of councillors in here entitled to a view or opinion.

Please continue what you have to say. Thank you.

Yeah, look, I just think this is appalling because that is not what Council is about. This Council and its staff have worked really, really, really hard, and we know that because we go to the briefings, we hear the outcomes, we hear what they've done, and we hear the savings they've made to achieve what they've come up with. You would not expect a surplus in this Council. And why? Because if you had a surplus, you have taken too much money out of the community. It's as simple as that. A surplus means you've got a stack of money that you took out of the community that you didn't need for operational or other uses. It is just plain silly to be doing this sort of thing. And I'm certainly not going to be supporting it.

I mean, it's dishonest, it's simple, it's stupid, and it's certainly not rational. This is a quarterly review. Let's see what it ends up at at the final review, and then we can make some judgments about whether or not Council staff or us in particular, because we're the ones who determine where funds will go or not go, and what will get funded and what gets funded, it comes back on us.

Point of

Order, Mr Mayor. Thank you, Councillor Rasmussen. Is this a point

Of order? It is. I'd ask Councillor Rasmussen to consider withdrawing his remark that the motion is dishonest. It's quoting figures directly from the tabled papers. He can not like it, but it's not dishonest.

Councillor Rasmussen

I withdraw that, and perhaps devious, as Councillor Reynolds has said.

Thank you.

That's a point of order as well. How is asking for more information devious? That's just—

That's an opinion. That's not a personal comment, okay? Dishonesty was a personal comment, I believe. We have an amendment, and we have it seconded. Is there any further discussion? The amendment is moved by Deputy Mayor, seconded by Councillor Wheeler, I believe,

If I've got it right, and that's the amendment on the board . That's the amendment

That's the amendment from the Deputy Mayor. No further speakers, I'll put that amendment. If you're in favour please raise your hand. In favour is Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Cottrell, Councillor Calvert. Against please raise your hand. Councillor Richards, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Zamprogno. Councillor Ross, you against ? Declared carried.

It was Councillor Tree and Councillor Garrow, sorry. So the amendment is now the motion. Because it's now a motion, we can continue discussing it or we can just put it. It's up to you. Any further discussion? Councillor Richards. I

Just a very brief statement that I think it's very disappointing that this council, when someone seeks clarification and further information to be put on the public record so there is a level of accountability and transparency, that the adjectives that come from the other side in asking to do so have been used tonight. I find that absolutely appalling.

Thank you for that. Any further discussion? Councillor Deputy Mayor.

Thank you, Mr Mayor. I haven't said anything. If I'm on the other side, I haven't said anything like that. I in fact supported a report to come. I believe we need a comprehensive report for the whole council term, and I think that will give us a better indication of what has happened overall, rather than jumping from one quarter to another with an extra report on that. We'll have to have the annual one coming up, and I think we do need any of those questions that councillors have raised about which to enhance transparency, we need more information. I think that that's good to call for that, but that's probably quite a sizable job. And if one of us, I think, should probably bring a notice of motion actually requesting that as a specific item.

The General Manager wants to add something.

I think going into the budget, if we don't answer these questions in the budget, there will be doubts anyhow. So we'll probably take away everything that's been said tonight and make sure that we deal with those things in the budget process. I'm just saying that anyhow.

Yes, we do get a report every year. Thank you. Any further discussion? Otherwise, Councillor Rasmussen.

Yeah, Mr Mayor, I just want to put on the record, I don't have a problem with getting reports, but the reports that we ask for, particularly when it deals with financial matters, and I spend a lot of time on the audit committee and at briefings and listening and reading up the stuff. Now, you've got to be reasonable about the sort of things you ask for, and if you go to the briefings, you find out. That's where the information is detailed and accurate and precise. That's where it comes from.

So I'm not against getting more and better information all the time for councillors. Certainly not something I want to be labelled with, and I can see that coming from certain quarters. But let me make it very, very clear that that is not what it's about. But let's be accurate about it. Let's get the final results and let's see where the final results end up.

Thank you. Councillor Conolly, do you wish to exercise right of reply?

Yeah, just briefly, a couple of things. That's my motion. You amended my motion, but it's unfortunately still my motion.

I'm quite confident about it, so... I can see that. Yeah.

So, a couple of things. I mean, first of all, I think it's really important that we get some basic financial literacy. The balance of the reserves has got nothing to do with the budget result. It's completely irrelevant. The balance of the reserves is not 700,000; it's 30-something million in reserves. But that's not the point at all. The state government is looking at - the state government is looking at the operating performance ratio, and they want it to be zero. So they don't want a surplus, but they don't want us, on an ongoing basis, spending more than our income on our operating expenses. And for a local government, that seems like a fairly fundamental principle, although others clearly would contest that that's a problem.

But to suggest that, you know, if you've got a surplus, you've taken too much money, yeah, in some ways I would agree. But you can't actually, in local government, we're not a nation, we can't have international borrowings. We cannot forever have higher operating expenses than our operating income. So I think it's important to understand that. I also would just like to go back to the other comment made, that the information is in the briefings, and, you know, we've all seen the savings that are being achieved. There's something to be said about getting things on the public record. It's very easy, and there's no allegations being made; that's not the point of this. But it's very easy to put on a board, we've saved this much percent over these years in these areas.

But what is actually truth is the income and expenses statements that we adopt as a council, and that's where it comes out in the wash. You can sort of say anything you want, but until it's got to go through a quarterly budget review and then an audit, that's when we find out what was actually achieved or not. So if councillors wanted more information, getting it on the public record is valuable when you're asking for these things so that your answers are 100 percent: we know, we asked the questions we needed to ask to fulfil our obligations as councillors, we got the information back on the public record, and we can rely on it. So I think there is something to be said for, yes, briefings are very useful, but the purpose of a briefing is not necessarily the same purpose as a report to council.

I already said so I won't say it again, but, you know, head in the sand is the way it looks like we're going to go.

Thank you. That was right of reply. I'll put the motion. If you're in favour of the motion, please raise your hand. Favour is Councillor Rasmussen, Councillor Reynolds, Councillor Wheeler, Councillor Lyons-Buckett, Councillor Kotlash, Councillor Calvert. Against, please raise your hand. Councillor Ross, Councillor Zamprogno, Councillor Conolly, Councillor Richards. Declare it carried.

Now at this point, I would just keep going unless someone moves something to the contrary.

No.

We should, we should. I think we should knock over 32 and 33, don't we ? There's also 27.

If you're anticipating quick resolution, it's not going to happen. I

Think I would like, I would move that we bring forwards items 32 and 33. No, I think— Okay.

Can we do this in an orderly manner, please? Councillor Conolly has asked that we move items 32 and 33 together forward. Any discussion on that?

I've got my light on, Mr Mayor. Yeah

I know. I'm asking about the discussion. Councillor Conolly and Councillor Wheeler, you wish to discuss that?

No, I want to move a procedural motion, Mr Mayor, that we defer the remaining items for discussion to the next council meeting.

Do we have a seconder for that? Councillor Kotlash. Any discussion?

Well, we can do it properly this time because we have electricity this time.

So it's been moved and seconded. Any further discussion on that?

No further discussion. I'll move that. All those in favour, please raise your hand. Carried unanimously.

I will now adjourn the meeting. Is that the correct? Is that until the 10th of March? I'll ask. We've deferred everything to the next meeting, so they're going to be listed on the agenda for the next meeting. So this meeting is concluded, and those items are deferred to the next meeting. So I'll close this meeting at 2.17 a. m