A LESSON FOR TASMANIA: Inside Melbourne's secret suburban hydro power system

http://www.theage.com.au/business/by/Darren-Gray-hvew0>
JUNE 29 2017 - 12:15AM

·    
From the outside, it looks like a green shipping container on an industrial block in the suburbs. But on the inside, there's plenty going on.
The box is part of a little-known but growing Melbourne Water network of "mini-hydro" electric plants generating electricity in suburban Melbourne, and in the hills beyond.

This story in THE AGE starts out “from the outside, it looks like a green shipping container on an industrial block in the suburbs. But on the inside, there's plenty going on….The box is part of a little-known but growing Melbourne Water network of "mini-hydro" electric plants generating electricity in suburban Melbourne, and in the hills beyond…”
If you're interested in alternative ways to generate electricity this story has been ticking away in the background for quite some time. Whenever there has been news of this kind of power generation there are always doubters turning up and saying its insignificant, crackpot, fantasy land stuff etc. etc. etc. These naysayers are typically ideologically committed to the Big Power, Super Grid' solutions. – nuclear, big hydro, coal, gas.

This story seems to be turning much of this negativity on its head. It seems that there may now be profitable to intergraded electricity generation within the hydraulics of water reticulation and sewerage systems. Naysayers take note, it’s happening in Melbourne and Sydney and the evidence is Tasmanian policymakers and bureaucrats are looking the other way.
This is the kind of thing that bobs up from time to time that local government in concert with State government needs to be active in the investigation of how such initiatives can be applied in Tasmania not to mention Hobart and Launceston.

WHO SPEAKS FOR THE CITIZENS: Robert Dobrzynski?? The City's Aldermen??

The Ratepayers Association has been pursuing Launceston City Council for decades concerning the need to make provision for and plan for an Eastern Bypass Road.

This effort has long preceded the arrival of Robert Dobrzynski. It more than a little disappointing to read in today’s press that Mr Dobrzynski, on the eve of his departure from his position as General Manager, that he no longer believes a bypass is necessary.

Many Aldermen, including those presently in their positions, were elected on promises and platforms, that they would work for a bypass to be constructed.
The need for a bypass was first established in the Launceston Area Transport Study (LATS) in the 1960s. Alderman Ray Shipp famously carried a copy of this study with him to LCC Meetings and often spoke about it during his long term of service as an Alderman.

Provisions existed in Launceston Planning Schemes to reserve land for the planned bypass, but then planning fashion for the last decade or so, determined that road planning generally was no longer a necessary requirement for Planning Schemes, much to the dissatisfaction and disagreement of the community, including the Ratepayers Association, who took up this lack of planning for roads with the Tasmanian Planning Commission during its Hearings into latter Scheme plans.

The Ratepayers Association took up the debate on many occasions – when developments that would block the course of the Eastern Bypass were proposed; when long term strategic plans and visions were sought and published; when opportunities arose for infrastructure priority lists to be compiled ahead of Federal Elections etc.; and when ill-conceived “bandaid” proposals were aired, such as the formation of a road link extension along the old railway embankment from Forster Street Invermay, instead of the then-vacant course and superior situation of extending Lindsay Street through the edge of the Railyards via Black Bridge to Henry Street to the bypass course.

When the Seapac yard and railway terminus (now TOLL) was first developed, strenuous argument was raised about why this should not have been permitted due to the absence of the Bypass Road and the lack of roads connecting that site to other parts of the City. Residents of Elphin Road, including Mollie Campbell-Smith and the Cimitiere St Glebe Area that in the 1980’s was being rehabilitated as a desirable inner city residential precinct, formed themselves into a very credible and vocal opponent of the TOLL site and opposed the damage being caused to the Cimitiere Street and Elphin Road routes that was to serve it. Launceston City Council promised to accelerate the Eastern Bypass construction and in the interim, extended Boland Street along the edge of the North Esk River, utilising the recently acquired Goods Railyard site, to alleviate the pressures on Cimitiere Street.

It is all too easy for Robert Dobrzynski to now tell Launceston residents and ratepayers that a Bypass Road is no longer required. Launceston residents and road users know only too-well that the roads through the city are hopelessly inadequate, and it is in part this situation and congestion in the central area that has lead to the death of the Central Business District, once the most vibrant retailing and business hub in Tasmania. Congestion, heavy traffic loads and a lack of routes for traffic needing to get through or around the central area continues to be a huge problem, and relocation of retailing and commerce to the suburbs and surrounding municipalities has produced very bad and inefficient planning patters. The living and working amenity of Launceston City has diminished the economic health of the city and property values have plateaued before declining.

Accordingly, the Ratepayers Association supports you in your efforts to have an Eastern Bypass Road and the necessary cross-links planned, funded and constructed.

Yours faithfully,
Lionel Morrell
President
Tasmanian Ratepayers Association Inc.

Just who is a "proper stakeholder" Minister Frydenberg

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s4667968.htm

Given that a “stakeholder” was the person who held the money/stake in a bet, the term has something of a ambiguous history in the English language usage.  In matters of governance ‘stakeholder’ has come to mean those with a vested cum pecuniary interest in something – the ambiguity persists unsurprisingly.

However, Josh Frydenberg has it seems invented another class of ‘stakeholder’ in so much as he indicates that in order to be consulted one, it seems, needs to be a “proper stakeholder”.  The question is, who are these ‘proper stakeholders’ and who is it who deems them to be so? After that there are more questions but an answer to this is needed first.

JOSH FRYDENBERG … “And what we need to do is settle our position in response to Dr Finkel’s report, consult widely with the proper stakeholders and then we can start to move it through the political process. To quote Winston Churchill, this is not the beginning of the end, but just the end of the beginning.” ... GO TO: http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s4667968.htm

Regards,

Ray Norman

Ray Norman
<zingHOUSEunlimited>
The lifestyle design enterprise and research network

PH: 03-6334 2176
EMAIL 1: raynorman7250@bigpond.com
40 Delamere Crescent Trevallyn TAS. 7250
WEBsite: http://www.raynorman7250.blogspot.com

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody.” Thomas Paine

“The standard you walk past is the standard you accept ”  David Morrison

The VC's interview and other matters

Mercury link http://www.themercury.com.au/news/tasmania/utass-professor-peter-rathjen-tipped-to-take-on-vicechancellor-role-at-adelaide-university/news-story/b70ea798408ee43657c26c543edc5a83

Here’s a copy of Speak Up Launceston's FB today and a reader's  comment posted to it and the link to ABC radio interview by Leon Compton  with VC Rathjen. Might be something for Lton Concerned Citizens are interested in???

“Speak Up Lton: "Today, 6 June, it is a year since the devastating floods  of June 6 2016 across Tasmania. Anyone reading about or hearing all the  heart-breaking stories about the floods today and then hearing an ABC  radio interview with university vice-chancellor, Peter Rathjen this  morning, would be shaking their head.
http://www.abc.net.au/…/pro…/mornings/utas-vc-leaves/8592840

Despite all the reports about the floods, despite the ongoing work as a result of those floods and despite the article on rising sea-levels and Inveresk area being inundated,
http://www.examiner.com.au/…/46…/city-inundation-predicted/… . Mr Rathjen apparently still thinks it is fine to relocate a whole existing university campus to a tidal flat where major flood evacuation work took up so much of the SES work last June, and where traffic and the level of congestion on that day had to be experienced to be believed."

A reader's post on Speak Up Lton (obviously also heard the interview and has low opinion of the VC): "Texted the ABC whilst he was on air being unnecessarily lauded!!! Don't think they read any texts on him but really!!

The Chancellor has locked us into a ridiculous and expensive relocation of the university in Launceston to the flood zone which will often be inundated with raw sewage because the plumbing of Launceston needs fixing more than the university needs moving He has corporatised and put in layers and layers of bureaucracy at the
university with outlandish salary rates whilst the university for students has diminished and it's breadth of courses and quality of the  university experience has gone backwards."

Regards, Poppy

A new prison
FROM all I have read and heard we may get a new prison. And why not? Incarcerating people is a growth industry globally, so why not here in Tasmania? A new prison creates hundreds of jobs, both in the building and in the ongoing staffing and supplying of goods and services. I do hope that the powers that be can make a better fit of this new prison than they have at Risdon. I wonder how they will avoid the “cultural issues” at Risdon, identified by Greg Barnes. Perhaps a new building will bring with it new attitudes. In any event the boost to the local economy should ensure that everyone is happy except, of course, the inmates.
Christopher Hayton, Trevallyn.

Climate Action 21
THE Department of Premier and Cabinet recently released Tasmania’s Climate Change Action Plan 2017-2021, which included six priority actions and 37 in total. Incredibly sea-level rise is not mentioned in the document despite the latest projections from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and others of 2.7 metres by 2100. Putting this in perspective, Launceston’s flood levees are about 5.1 metres above present mean sea-level and 3.2 metres above mean high Spring tide. So in 2100 we can expect Spring tides at 4.6 metres, or 50 centimetres below the flood levees. It is time to take the threat of sea-level rise seriously. Acknowledgment would be a start, followed by some common-sense planning laws and reality checks by the University of Tasmania and all levels of government.
Dr Ian Kidd, West Launceston.

_________________________________________________________
Peter Rathjen’S Biography
Professor Peter Rathjen has been the Vice-Chancellor and President of the University of Tasmania since March 2011.  

During this period, he has been instrumental in positioning the University as a driver of socio-economic prosperity in Tasmania, including through the creation of vibrant new University precincts and facilities within the CBDs of Hobart, Launceston and Burnie.

Professor Rathjen studied as an undergraduate in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Adelaide. As a 1985 Rhodes Scholar, he undertook a DPhil at Oxford University, studying mobile genetic elements in yeast and mammals.  

As a biochemist, Professor Rathjen specialised in embryonic stem cell research. With his wife, Dr Joy Rathjen, he established an internationally recognised research programme into stem cell biology and stem cell therapies.  Professor Rathjen was a founding member of the Australian Research Council Special Research Centre for the Molecular Genetics of Development and the Australian Stem Cell Centre.  

Professor Rathjen is a non-executive director of the Board of Universities Australia. He is on the Board of the Australian Science Media Centre and is a patron of the Australian Institute of Policy and Science Tall Poppy Campaign.

Prior to taking up this position in March 2011, Professor Rathjen was Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of Melbourne, where he also held the position of Dean of Science from 2006. Before joining the University of Melbourne, he was Executive Dean, Faculty of Sciences, at the University of Adelaide.
Current board positions

• Universities Australia Non-Executive Board Member, the lead Vice-Chancellor Academic, (2017 - )
• Australian Science Media Centre Board (2007 – 2011 and 2017 - )
• University of Tasmania Foundation Director, (2011 – )
• LH Martin Institute Council, (2013 - ),
• Australian Institute for Policy and Science Board, (2009 - )
• Oxford-Australia Scholarships Committee, (2007 - )
• Australian Institute of Policy and Science: Patron of the Tall Poppies Campaign, (2005 - )
• Tasmania University Cricket Club Patron (2016 - )
  

Previous board and committee positions

• Florey Neurosciences Institute Board
• Florey Prize for Medical Research Committee
• International Education Association of Australia Board, (2012 – 2015)
• The Victorian Institute for Chemical Sciences Limited
• The Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research Board
• Botanic Gardens and State Herbarium of South Australia (2003-2006); Finance committee (2004-2006): Gardens 150 Program to renew infrastructure
• Botany Foundation, University of Melbourne (2006 - 2008)
• Victorian College of Optometry Board ( 2006 - 2008)
• Bio21 Institute, University of Melbourne (2006 - 2008)
• In2Science (2006 - 2008)
• Patron of the Science Teachers’ Association of Victoria
• Meat and Livestock Association Advisory Board
• External Member, Hanson Centre for Cancer Research
  

Scientific Advisory Committees

• Chairman, Bresatec/BresaGen International Scientific Advisory Board (1992-1999)
  

Publications: Scholarly Book Chapters

1. Chalmers, D., Rathjen, P., Rathjen, J. and Nicol, D. (In press; Jan 5, 2017). Ethics and Governance of Stem Cell Banks. Crook, J. M. and Ludwig, T. (eds.), Stem Cell Banking: Concepts and Protocols, Methods in Molecular Biology, vol. 1590, DOI 10.1007/978-1-4939-6921-0_7, (Springer Science+Business Media LLC 2017)
2. Rathjen J. and Rathjen, PD. (2012). ES cells. Maloy, S. and Hughes, K. (eds) Brenner’s Online Encyclopedia of Genetics.
3. Rathjen, J. and Rathjen, P. D. (2004). Embryonic stem cells; isolation and application of pluripotent cells from the pre-gastrulation mammalian embryo. Sell. S. (ed) Stem Cell Handbook, Humana Press, Totowa, New Jersey, 33-44.
4. Morris, M., Rathjen, J., Keough, R. and Rathjen, P. D. (2003). Mouse embryonic stem cells. Odorico, J. (ed). Human Embryonic Stem cells. BIOS Scientific Publishers, Oxon UK, 1-15.
5. Keough, R., Rathjen, J. and Rathjen, P.D. (2003). Properties and therapeutic potential of stem cells. Kenneally,  J. and Jones, M (eds). Aust. Anaesthesia. Ed., 201-212.
   

Climate change data shows city's danger

Hayden Johnson 23 May 2017, 6 a.m.
WET: New data shows what parts of Launceston will be inundated when sea levels rise across eight decades. Picture: Coastal Risk Mapping

The University of Tasmania Stadium and other parts of Launceston are predicted to be inundated by rising sea levels within 83 years, according to new data.

Using predictions from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Coastal Risk Mapping <http://coastalrisk.com.au/> shows many more Australian homes, streets and critical infrastructure could be inundated by the year, 2100.

Scientists are forecasting levels will rise between 0.4 and 1.1m over the remainder of this century, depending on how rapidly the world reduces emissions of greenhouse gases.

The modeling shows a rise of 0.7 metres will put most of Invermay, including UTAS Stadium and the university’s Inveresk campus, underwater.
Launceston businesses on Boland Street, near Glebe Farm Road, are also expected to have soggy floors.

Coastal Risk Mapping website co-creator Nathan Eaton said it was critical for people to appreciate what rising sea levels could mean for their communities.
“Anyone can look at these maps and visualise exactly how sea-level rise, driven by climate change, will permanently alter our coastline and neighbourhoods,” he said.
“We already knew this was going to be bad news for low-lying areas, but the latest science is telling us to brace for even worse.”

University of New South Wales Climate Change Research Centre Professor John Church said a two-metre sea level rise was imminent if climate change was not taken seriously.

“With business as usual emissions, the questions are when, rather than if, we will cross a two-metre sea-level rise,” he said.
Across the globe, sea levels have risen an average of 17cm over the 20th century.

Airports in Hobart, Brisbane and Sydney, the Port of Melbourne and low-lying cities like Byron Bay, the Gold Coast, Cairns and Darwin will be inundated under the updated scenario of a two-metre sea level rise by 2100.

But Insurance Council of Australia communications general manager Campbell Fuller said the predictions were unlikely to affect premiums “when ascribed to perils many decades in the future”.

“Insurers underwrite premiums based on their assessment of risk over the 12 months of the policy,” he said.

But Mr Fuller said the council continued to urge the federal government to increase federal mitigation spending to $200 million each year.

“As the impact of climate change becomes more acute, higher spending on physical mitigation will be essential to protect lives and property, and reduce the vastly higher sums needed to repeatedly rebuild homes, businesses and infrastructure,” he said.

NOTE Apparently this information has been available to Launceston City Council and the Flood Authority for a very long lime. Council for whatever reason has chosen to look the other way albeit in the knowledge that if it were to impact upon Launcestonians sometime down the track they'll most likely (hopefully?!) will be out of office. Concerningly, it seems that the modeling hasn’t been done for Launceston or its catchments  by the local flood authority and it does beg the question, why not?

Lismore's [NSW]  had a flood event (2017) that demonstrated what can happen when decision makers look the other way for fiscal, aesthetic, whatever reason there's a real chance that there will be diabolic consequences – fiscal, social, planning, environmental, etc.

Now with Launceston’s General Manager leaving Launceston/Tasmania The Examiner suddenly tells its fading cohort of readers the story of climate change and flood risks. As a backdrop to Council and UTas planning to build a 21st C facility it appears as as if there’ll be no ‘climate change’ considerations in the planning.
 
Quoting the General Manager some time ago the current planning for Utas at Inveresk “is good town planning”. However, his words are quite unlikely to haunt him from wherever he finds himself well away from Tasmania.

 

Tamar Estuary needs Œless politics¹

FROM THE EXAMINER & FACEbook

Albeit that there's a fair bit of 'motherhood' invested in this move of Ald. Williams’, it is a step in a positive direction. It is very clear that the community needs its various ‘authorities’ to be working collaboratively and cooperatively towards a multidimensional outcome and in inclusive ways. Its something that's been evident to many for a long time.

The first notion that needs to be put aside is the one that suggests the Launceston City Council ‘operation’ has anything like the wherewithal to progress this kind of initiative by itself. If it had, and the problem is very, very old, we might have seen a lot more attention paid to it and in holistic ways a long time before now – not a bit of it!

On the evidence, Council and its operational wing have been looking the other way for decades. For progress to be made and real solutions found, innovative solutions, an authority cum research mechanism needs to be put in place that takes into account the entire bio-region and from a holistic perspective.

Launceston is situated at a point where in excess of 20% of Tasmania's drainage passes the city by. This is all too often downplayed and even overplayed for various political purposes.

Mondays meeting may be a start just so long as any grandstanding is put to one side. This is an issue that exceeds politics and the futility of bureaucratic egotisms.

Ray Norman

Alderman Emma Williams to ask City of Launceston to support a broader Tamar River solution.
Holly Monery 19 Mar 2017, 3:30 p.m.

Evidence-based action, not politics or single-focus plans, is needed urgently to address river health within the Tamar Estuary, says Alderman Emma Williams.

ACTION NEEDED: City of Launceston Alderman Emma Williams is seeking a multi-party resolution on the estuary.

She will put forward a motion at Monday’s City of Launceston meeting, asking the council to call on the state government to convene a meeting to resolve the strategic and financial commitments of stakeholders including TasWater and Hydro Tasmania.

Alderman Williams said studies had shown the health of the Tamar was not only linked to sewage but a range of issues including contamination in the catchment area.

“In order to address those we need to sit down around the table with those agencies and bodies that can actually do something, instead of just talking one to one, we need to sit down as a group,” she said.

“The Tamar estuary is an issue for the community in Launceston … its about developing actions that we can actually undertake and recognising that its not about one-off quick fix, even though sewage treatment is not a one off thing.”

She said repeated Tamar Estuary and Esk Rivers Program reports into the health of the estuary indicate that the zone of the Tamar within the urban area of Launceston has a poor and degraded ecosystem health.

“These poor results represent not only a threat to environmental and human health, but other social and economic matters including tourism, lifestyle and business investment opportunities,” Alderman Williams said.

“A body of evidence-based work has been produced identifying influencing factors in the current state of the Tamar, including the TEER Water Quality Improvement Plan (2015). However, these factors can only be addressed by a multi-stakeholder approach to responsibilities.”

CONSCRIPTED INVESTMENT THE WAY TASMANIA GETS ITS MONEY

The fiscal landscape in Tasmania is starting to be very concerning. When government administrations collude to cut corners, and for the benefit of who knows who, you have to worry. However, it gets worse when the perpetrators of what appears to be fiscal delinquency place themselves beyond accountability and then you know its going to get seriouser and seriouser.

At the Glamorgan Spring Bay Council’s Annual General Meeting, a unanimous motion from the floor was passed querying the state of the Council’s finances. There was also overt criticisms of the processes in play where the General Manager, apparently acting alone, took a decision to apply for a $6Mil loan from Treasury. Now, clearly this is a bridge too far and especially so when management starts making ‘strategic decisions’ – governance’s preserve – and the State’s Treasurer, Peter Gutwein entertains the whole idea – indeed seemingly endorses the concept.

The Glamorgan Spring Bay $6Mil loan will be substantially directed towards the construction of a dam and the associated infrastructure to supply water for a controversial fish farm. However, what income will this farm be called upon to provide to Council if the infrastructure is funded by a $6Mil loan to the council. Glamorgan Spring Bay Council has a a $7Mil rate base? Indeed, has the issue of affordability been addressed in any way at all?  

Given the size of the loan and there being such a small rate base, it appears that a full assessment of the costs and benefits to the ratepayers has never been provided to the wider community. It would also seem that the General Manager, perhaps operating under SECTION 62 of the Local Govt. Act, has not seen fit to present councilors with a fiscal plan nor any other details relevant to the loan that, in the final analysis, ratepayers will pay off one way or another – quite likely via a rates increase or even a reduction of services.

The Glamorgan Spring Bay motion called for the engagement of an external, independent risk assessment and expert advice. That advice would be on the viability of providing commercial-scale quantities of fresh water to the Solis and Tassal companies. Interestingly, the General Manager under SECTION 65 of the Local Govt. Act is required to guarantee that councilors make their decisions based on “expert advice”. Here it appears as though he has deemed his own advice to be both expert and appropriate –and the lender has accepted it. 

Moreover, the Treasurer, the lender, seems to have done so knowing that ratepayers, or their representatives, have had only scant opportunities to interrogate their fiscal position from a strategic standpoint.

Indeed, did the General Manager have the Delegated Authority to approve a loan of the size he apparently has and has anyone asked him or anyone else about this? That’s something one might think that Peter Gutwein acting as the Treasurer and Minister for Local Govt. might have wanted to satisfy himself about but it seems not.

However, the Glamorgan Spring Bay situation is not an isolated one. In Launceston, by all accounts, the General Manager has been playing similar fiscal games that are equally risky for ratepayers. Just before the last meeting for 2016 it became clear that ‘Launceston’ was borrowing $9Mil for the redevelopment of the CH Smith Building and quite apparently on the initiative of the General Manager and seemingly operating under the aegis of SECTION 62 of the Local Govt. Act. 

While the aldermen, it seems, were on side they were also in the dark as to how this loan was to be serviced in five years. In effect 30 thousand ratepayers have been conscripted to invest in the development with their ‘pay-off’ being a 300 car parking station with questionable income prospects.

If this infrastructure is going to earn the income to repay the loan in the required five years it will need to make a $5,000 per week profit in the timeframe. Presumably Tasmania’s taxpayers will be picking up the interest bill – the same people really. The rhetoric embedded in the notion that suggests that this money is coming from somewhere else – Mars or its equivalent(?) – is quite concerning and deceptive to say the least.

Bach in December when the numbers started to be done in the community Council packed up for the year in the hope that their critics would head for the beach or the bookshop and forget about the issue of ‘doing the numbers’. Then suddenly enough it was 2017 and the borrowing had apparently grown to $20Mil, for an even larger shopping spree, surprise, surprise! This too is apparently the GM’s work and a strategy put together whilst the aldermen were away from the scene and out of sight and out of mind – if they were ever on anyone’s mind.

Apparently Launceston’s aldermen believed that they had to go with the GM’s strategy and there hasn’t been the slightest hint of descent. However, did they  have to and do they have to?

Somewhat curiously this whole process has been expedient and perfunctory. Also, missing is any semblance of the prudential elements one might expect, elements like tendering and consultation that would normally go with a $6Mil public expenditure exercise. Evidently, it’s a cut-corners approval process. It is also a process that raises a raft of uncomfortable questions. Likewise, accountability it seems has been deemed to be discretionary.

Back in Glamorgan Spring Bay, and given the background, and given all the questions to do with a large dam’s social impacts, contention abounds. And, that's not to mention the very well founded community concerns to do with financial risk the Council is exposed to. And that's not to mention the risk they are exposed to as residents and ratepayers.  If residents and ratepayers are outraged at the premature and imprudent approval of a $6Mil loan to assist a controversial and as-yet unapproved private commercial operation that ratepayers have been conscripted to fund – and by stealth – it is totally understandable that they might be. 

Ratepayers are worried, and quite reasonably they expect that they will ultimately carry the financial and social burden – and that's the case for Launceston and Glamorgan Spring Bay. Concerningly, in Glamorgan Spring Bay it will be the cost of a loan to subsidise a corporate development the majority don’t want that will be the burden.  Those who might support the development are, reportedly, very concerned about the lack of fiscal risk assessment not to mention the opacity around the whole process.

If all this smells a bit fishy then there might be a reason for that? 

If the noxious odour is so strong it might well be time to stop, think and thoroughly investigate the whole process in play – and from a state-wide perspective. The circumstances are such that any such investigation needs to be independent and transparent. 

Here is the rub, can anyone see the Treasurer or Local Govt. bureaucracies lining up for any such thing as an open and transparent investigation? More to the point, its not especially likely if anything resembling rigorous accountability is involved. Nonetheless, it should happen!

Ray Norman

Launceston Jan 2017

Is this a collapse scenario that's now in play in Launceston

Click here to go to The Examiner

FROM SUNDAY JAN 22  EXAMINER 

"North gathers momentum moving forward 
Piia WirsuPiia Wirsu 22 Jan 2017, 7 a.m.

Treasurer Peter Gutwein’s announcement on Saturday of a $20 million interest-free loan to the City of Launceston is another indicator the city is moving forward. 

The money will go towards a St John Street redevelopment, upgrades to the Cataract Gorge, Brisbane Street Mall regeneration works and a car park at the CH Smith site, fast-tracking estimated completion dates. 

As state tourism numbers skyrocket, ensuring the North is keeping up and has the infrastructure to both attract and handle tourists, visitors and locals is crucial, and this announcement shows it is on the agenda. 

It is an exciting time for Launceston, and the entire northern region, as the stimulus of improved tourism flow to the state, new events, and investor interest is harnessed to improve the area’s economy and infrastructure. 

This announcement comes on the back of a host of other developments and can assure Launceston residents the city is progressing and will be able to compete with the best. 

Last year saw a host of development announcements, with developer Errol Stewart and architect Scott Curran unveiling designs for a revitalised CH Smith redevelopment; plans announced for a redevelopment of the TRC site including car parking, a hotel and conference facilities; and continuing work on the Silo Hotel development. .

As City of Launceston deputy mayor Rob Soward pointed out, the accelerated projects are in addition to the council’s existing 2016-17 $20 million capital works program. 

“[This includes] the $9 million North Bank redevelopment, the major redevelopment of Civic Square, the redevelopment and repurposing of Macquarie House, the second-stage upgrade of the Seaport Boardwalk, and the $260 million University of Tasmania relocation,” he said. 

There is a growing momentum in the north, and these developments and improvements are overdue. The optimistic future they capture is welcome. 

The interest and investment from a range of sectors and people is just what Launceston needs to revitalise and continue to grow in tourism, the economy, business and industry. 

With such backing and optimism, the future looks bright for Launceston and the North. Let’s hope continued commitment and interest keeps the momentum up, as the region sets itself apart as a place for tourism, business and investment.

END

COMMENTS FROM AROUND THE TRAPS

FOREWORD: At the start of the working year this editorial speaks loudly about either Launceston Council's absolute cynicism or its ineptitude. The apparent reliance upon 'the punters' being asleep at the beach or off catching up on their reading is too, too cynical for words. In cahoots with 'The Treasurer' it seems that the Aldermen have abandoned any idea of careful fiscal management (Progress With Prudence) and have consequently left 'things' in the hands of 'management'. 

Well not everyone was as 'asleep at the wheel' as the 'cutters and dryers at Town Hall', that is Launceston's Mayor and General Manager have apparently assumed.  In attempting to 'pull a fast one' at tomorrow's Launceston Council meeting this act is just as deserving of the contempt as the contempt the entire Council appears to be holding its ratepayers and residents in.

Is this anywhere near good enough?

The following  comments and questions have been dribbling in throughout today:

• Far from being totally 'GOOD NEWS' the implications in this editorial is that Launceston's ratepayers are facing the spectre of their Council putting them into a position that might be described as an unsustainable debt crisis!

• Bulldust is bulldust even when it's printed by 'The Examiner' and far from saving Launceston,  Tasmania's Treasurer is visiting increasing debts upon the city that's ultimately to be repaid by 30,000 ratepayers and arguably for the benefit of a handful of business people working within an outmoded operational/business model.

• Just who is doing the numbers in all this? When one gets down to thinking about that, it's all the more worrying! It is especially worrying when the city's Deputy Mayor Soward comes out as a spokesperson and shows himself to be totally unable to do either "the numbers or the politics". With two chartered accountants on 'the team' just what have they been doing? In fact would you trust these people with your superannuation money?

• Before Christmas Minister/Treasurer Peter Gutwein was lending Launceston $9Million and now its $20Million all to be repaid by ratepayers over 5 years but there's no plausible explanation as to how they'll be doing it.

• Launceston's General Manager, Robert Dobrzynski, before Christmas is reported to have said that the then $9Million Loan would be repaid out of "parking income". Doing the numbers then, that meant that the new parking station was going to need to make $5K per week PROFIT. But who is/was doing 'the numbers' when "the interest free loan" was accepted? More to the pint who is doing them now that the debt is $20Million?

• It has been reported that Deputy Mayor Soward is saying that over 5 years each and every ratepayer in Launceston has been signed up to repay $700 PLUS. When did the community consultation for that take place? Is not this a rates increase by stealth? Is this the end of the 'fiscal folly' that Launceston City Council is embarked upon or is there more to come? How does this increased expenditure measure up against the city's 'Strategic or Fiscal Planning'?

• Just what value is being created via this expenditure and by whom for whom? Are the potential answers to all this being hidden and/or glossed over?

• Does West Tamar Council's decision to seek $1.7Million as an interest free loan for a project already planned for and to only accept 'the debt' after community consultation, actually tell us anything important about Launceston's apparent fiscal recklessness?

• With all this projected expenditure there is not a sausage being mentioned about 'fixing up the Tamar', so does this tell anybody anything at all about Launceston's Aldermen's concern for 'the state of the river', or for that matter 'the environment', or indeed their priorities or even their aspirations for the ratepayers they're paid to represent?

• To what extent has Launceston's fiscal planning changed, over what timeframe and at what cost to ratepayers? Who is aware – that is which Aldermen are aware – of the extent of change or indeed who has even been looking? Who is telling who what?

AND the answers to these questions pose ever more questions but who is going to answer them and/or even has the ability to do so?

Getting A Big Heritage Tick In Launceston/Tasmania

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE EXAMINER STORY

"Launceston’s infamous CH Smith site is a step closer to revival with the Tasmanian Heritage Council giving developers Errol Stewart and Scott Curran’s plans the tick of approval.

The pair discussed their vision with board members of the Heritage Council in Hobart on Wednesday.

“I understand that within about an hour they had called us to say that they had approved it, so they were pretty impressed with what we had presented,” Mr Stewart said.

“Now it’s back to Launceston City Council to make a determination, which I am pretty sure that they will do at the next council meeting, hopefully in the positive.”

The development application has been advertised for public comment and Mr Stewart said it had received a number of representations.

“At this stage approval has been given by the Heritage Council for our plans as presented, so now council will consider that at the next meeting and hopefully if they give us the green light then we will be good to go unless anybody takes us to appeal,” Mr Stewart said."

___________________________

EDITOR'S NOTE: To put this story into context it needs to be understood that representations to the Heritage Council and  Launceston Council closed at the end of the day December 20 and the HeritageCouncil, according to this story, had made its decision before linch the very next day. 

This seems both fast and hasty and it seems a fair question to ask, just how carefully has this body of decision makers considered ALL the submissions made to it? What submissions were made about what?

We might well consider this "R v Sussex Justices, Ex parte McCarthy ([1924] 1 KB 256, [1923] All ER Rep 233) is a leading English case on the impartiality and recusal of judges. It is famous for its precedence in establishing the principle that the mere appearance of bias is sufficient to overturn a judicial decision. It also brought into common parlance the oft-quoted aphorism "Not only must Justice be done; it must also be seen to be done"

However in the current age of deeming that might well be a redundant concept or at least an idea that's adhered to 'somewhere else'! It couldn't have passed its use by date could it??

Contact Them

Heritage Tasmania

GPO Box 618

Hobart TAS 7000

Phone: 1300 850 332

Email: enquiries@heritage.tas.gov.au

Website: http://www.heritage.tas.gov.au

COMMUNITY SOLUTIONS

There is an apparent need for communities to initiate solution to their problems and issues in ways that fit their circumstances. 

It is increasingly obvious that communities themselves need to be a part of 'the solution' to the problems they themselves identify.

Rather than have solutions imposed upon them by governments, regulators, authorities, organisations, administrations, etc. communities need to be empowered to work together plus interact cooperatively and collaboratively.

Communities, that is ‘community organisations’, charities, activist groups, social networks, community clubs, etc., need to come together and establish a networks of networks .
These networks, once established, could work towards communities finding solutions to problems they identify and prioritise.

With prospective solutions to hand they will be empowered to hold their elected representatives to account.

Can you identify a community problem in need of a solution? Are you interested in becoming a part of such a solution oriented network?

For More Information eMAIL: LAUNCESTONprojects@bigpond.com

THE-TRUE-STORY According To Basil Fitch

FOREWORD

Over at Tassie Times there is a bit of stoush going on with a couple of 'commentators' taking Lonnie's council to task.

Basil Fitch has come out for Christmas with a present of 'the truth' for anyone who wants to know it. 

The entire exchange is worth reading in that just about all the issues are explored together in ways that, as likely as not, they are not being looked at by Launceston's 'Alderpeople'.

The Council is clearly at 'sixes and sevens' while all the time fumbling around trying to stay below the radar. It is increasingly clear that it is so. The bit that is not being considered all that often is that it is the Local Govt. Act that is not serving Tasmanians well. Launceston Council is just a carbuncle on the backside that is aggravating and annoying those people looking for some accountability. 

THE-TRUE-STORY According to Basil Fitch

The con job by Gutwein Liberal Party , the Examiner, L.A.F.M and selected proponents of Utas started back before the federal election., double banger. 

To get Nikolic elected and also prop up Gutwein and Co. for state election 2018. 

In May 2015 Gutwein introduces ” MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING “{ M.O.U }signed by Utas ,Liberals , Launceston City Council and T.A F.E all in agreement to move Utas from Newnham to Inveresk. 

Then the secret deal was exposed Council had already sold 120 Unit site to Utas for $500,000 dollars and it was immediately placed by Council right behind flood levy .

Council also agreed to give free Willis Street Car Park returning $88,000 dollars per year and old Velodrome land for nothing to Utas. 

Council valuation $4.5 million dollars for both but never put on open market , I consider both to be worth between $10 and $20 million for both. 

A Group called L.C.C {Launceston Concerned Citizens } network took all parties to task , but neither Mayor , General Manager or Aldermen would hold a public meeting I asked 4 .times . 

We then issued a petition to the council with 1,500 signatures to council under section 57 Local Government Act , forcing council to hold a public meeting. 

The meeting voted unanimously for the council to rescind council decision , but they refused ,so much for Gutwein,s Local Government Act. 

The Examiner refused point blank to allow Launceston Concerned Citizens to make any press statements and editor would only allow comments in : letters to the editor : and they were scrutinized . .

All those proponents involved reminded me of the “Pulp Mill ” debacle , the only thing missing was Martin Gilmour who know doubt had plenty to say now he is the Premier,s C.E.O 

Launceston City Council passed this great con job on November the 9th November 2015 and still Utas has not yet put in a development application into council and there are no plans. 

The Examiner led the way before the Federal election and forced Shorten and Turnbull to finance this shonky deal for $150 million dollars. 

The York Park sponsorship was given to Utas by the General Manager { and naming rights University of Tasmania.} However will not release the financials {commercial in confidence}The Aldermen were not notified and when questioned the General Manager said he could make a decision with out getting council approval under section 62 of local government act .

Now you all should be aware why Huon , Glenorchy , and others are in such a mess City Managers have complete control not Mayors or Aldermen. 

C.H.Smith another Gutwein con job this is a real cracker Gutwein gives Council $9 million dollars loan interest fee Council to repay in 5 years time in full. 

Council behind scenes talks to Errol Stuart and Scott Curran developers . 

Stuart and Curran lease from owners C.H.Smith building with option to purchase.

Council will give Stuart and Curran $9 million dollars and they must build 300 car parks , when finished Stuart and Curran hand over car park and land to council. 

The land left over Stuart and Curran build a 500 staff office block . 

On A.B.C Leon Compton, a person rang in and said it was going to be used by public servants in the north in one area. .

Both the council and city manager? where will the repayment of $9 million come from , both have said money from generated from 300 car parks. 

300 cars $4 per day equals $1,200 dollars $9 million over 5 years equals $5,000 dollars shortfall $3,800 dollars per day. 

God help us have a happy Christmas Scratchrat 45 and Daphne-Bowen -Smyth 

Basil J. Fitch 

Former City Alderman  

CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE TASSIE TIME SAGA