“I DON’T want Bayswater to be known as the rubbish dump of Perth!” blared Cr Barry McKenna. The council has voted to refuse an application to build a waste transfer facility in Bayswater that accepts class 2 type waste, which includes putrescible waste (food), green waste and building site rubble. Instant Waste Management wanted to…

STARVING artists, cash-strapped novelists and musicians with well-worn heels have all turned to crowdfunding to raise cash for their projects, but now local foodies are also trying their hand. The guys from North Perth’s The Classroom have put out their hat, testing the waters to raise a cool hundred grand for their new noodle bar,…

AUSTRALIA’S competition watchdog has ruled Coles’ proposed takeover of the Supa IGA in Dianella is not anti-competitive. If the takeover goes ahead—which now seems certain—Coles will own half the 10 supermarkets within 3km of the store. The Dianella store was one of four WA Supa IGAs in Coles’ sights to be scrutinised by the Australian…

TWO Tibetan Buddhist monks are in Perth this month to spend hours painstakingly creating an intricate mandala with coloured sand, which they’ll then destroy and return to the earth as a contemplation of the impermanence of life. Voice readers can see the monks in action and join in meditative chants, for free. The event runs…

A DECISION made behind closed doors to relocate Morley library has infuriated the Bayswater City Residents’ Association. In a meeting closed to the public, Bayswater council voted to shift the library from the Galleria to the Morley sport and recreation centre before 2016. BCRA president Tony Green says the public was bypassed. “City of Bayswater…

AMIDST the flurry of patriotic flag waving in the lead up to the centenary of the Great War, a local theatre company is taking a more critical look at the conflict. The WA Young Theatre Co’s play The Dreaming Hill tells the tale of Australian soldiers on the Greek Isle of Lemnos. Writer Hellie Turner’s…

THE folks from the Vincent Men’s Shed are hard at work crafting 200 crosses for Anzac Cottage’s Remembrance Day. The Mt Hawthorn cottage was built in one day during the Great War as a memorial that also served as a home for a returned serviceman: it was bestowed on Cuthbert John Porter when he returned…

JUST 10 escaped birds started it all, and now Hyde Park is plagued by rainbow lorikeets. Back in the 1960s fewer than 10 of the pretty but nasty eastern states birds were “either deliberately released or had escaped” according to the WA agriculture and food department. Fifty years later the population’s booming, with complaints about…

STIRLING residents living in congested streets will be able to apply for free parking permits under a new city-wide scheme. A council committee wanted to charge residents $25 a year for a permit, but the council eventually voted to issue them for free, and to review the scheme after 12 months. A free transitional permit…

ST JOHN OF GOD hospital in Mt Lawley wants more Tom Clancy and less Mills and Boon. The hospital is starting up a patient library and is looking for volunteers to run the library and people to donate books. So far staff have donated around 150 books, but hospital coordinator Kerrie James says they would…