Perth Voice Interactive

PERTH council says it’s almost inevitable it will have to shut down some of its services as a result of Coronavirus.

It is also implementing a ban on anyone known to have been overseas from entering its administration centre.

On Tuesday the council held a special meeting to discuss its response to the virus, which has led to a wave of event cancellations across the city and staff lay-offs as streets empty of shoppers.

The council has invoked WA’s Emergency Management Act to appoint its community development manager Anne Banks-McAllister as an “incident director” to work with other agencies in implementing a Coronavirus action plan.

Infection curve

At the special meeting, Ms Banks-McAllister said the council’s response to the virus was aimed at “flattening the infection curve” so the state’s health system doesn’t get overloaded, while also protecting staff, ratepayers and visitors.

“The city’s primary focus is on protecting the health and safety of staff, visitors, residents and businesses – while maintaining essential services for as long as we can,” Ms Banks-McAllister said.

But she said a “significant” number of volunteers had already deserted council services.

“It is very likely some of those services will be closing in the future,” Ms Banks-McAllister said.

“With regards to events, that’s possibly one of the most significant impact on the city and its customers at the moment.”

Following prime minister Scott Morrison’s ban on indoor events with more than 100 people, or outdoor events of more than 500, there’s been a swag of cancellations including conferences, festivals such as Beerfest and Bunuru in Yagan Square, concerts including all WA Symphony Orchestra and WA Ballet performances, and markets including a new night noodle market in the Perth Cultural Centre.

Ms Banks-McAllister said the council was looking into how it could support event organisers to survive the shutdown.

Council meetings will stay open to the public for now, though ratepayers will be asked to think carefully about whether they need to attend and will be reminded with signs on the way in to follow strict sanitary practices.

At Tuesday’s meeting commissioners voted to look into extending the city’s free parking trial to help keep business afloat, while a tourism campaign aimed at convincing country folk to have a holiday in the city is also on the table, despite premier Mark McGowan dumping the state’s version, saying it was simply safer to stay at home.

Commissioner Len Kosova, urging the council to liaise closely with the business community, noted one of the more novel problems the response to the virus has created, as well as highlighting the heightened fear level in the community.

“Earlier today when buying a coffee a small business operator declined to accept my cash because they would prefer tap and go,” Commr Kosova said.

by STEVE GRANT

AN army of volunteers who’ve stepped up to ensure Perth’s seniors have some support to get through Coronavirus has restored local MP John Carey’s faith in humanity.

After blanket media coverage of people brawling and panic buying in response to the fast-approaching pandemic, Mr Carey said he was “simply blown away” by the community’s response to his call for volunteers to help the city’s vulnerable elders.

“I came up with this idea because often the elderly and seniors are isolated in the community and don’t have family to help them,” Mr Carey said.

“So we did a call-out for volunteers and in less than 24 hours we had 700 people register, and now we have 1134 people.”

Mr Carey said his office was calling the 1500 or so seniors on their books, and those who needed some assistance such as getting some shopping, or just someone to talk to, were allocated to a volunteer.

“All tasks can be done without physical contact and while implementing the principles of social distancing (phone calls, leaving groceries on the verandah…),” Mr Carey said.

He said while hitting the phones himself, he was also pleased to hear how many seniors were reporting that family and friends were checking up on them.

On Facebook, an “Adopt a Healthcare Worker” page has been created for Perth, teaming up members of the public with someone working on the front line of tackling Coronavirus. Adoptees can help cook up some meals for the freezer, pick up kids or “scrub their shower because it hasn’t been done in a month”.

CORONAVIRUS didn’t deter 18 healthy volunteers from doing the first busy bee at the Inglewood Mt Lawley Community Garden last Sunday.

Since Stirling council approved the garden in May last year, 470 people have signed up to transform the patch of land next to the Inglewood Bowling and Sports Club on Stancliffe Street.

“The garden design has been delivered to Stirling council this week and we hope to have shed construction underway within the next couple of months,” garden committee member Roslyn Park said.

“Mulching and composting are currently taking place and the committee has worked towards a final garden design and water access points.

“…We have also been volunte ering for two months at the Inglewood on Beaufort Monday night markets, encouraging correct use of the newly installed industrial compost bins.” Ms Park said they hadn’t set an opening date for the garden, and were focused on building the shed.

SECRET debates at Bayswater committee meetings will continue after Cr Catherine Ehrhardt’s motion to open them to the public was voted down.

Cr Ehrhardt said it was in line with the council’s ongoing transparency push to open meetings to the public and post audio recordings of them online, which has been adopted by a number of councils across the metro area. She said they could still be briefly closed and recorders switched off for confidential items.

“The intent behind these motions is making the meetings more accessible to the community, as well as to other councillors,” Cr Ehrhardt said. Currently the minutes are published but they only show the final vote, not the debate.

New councillor Steven Ostaszewskyj supported the motion saying “three words: Transparency, accountability, and accessibility” and Cr Georgia Johnson said she welcomed anything to make committee meetings more accessible.

But most other councillors at the March 10 meeting want them kept closed. A couple of committees have non-council members and some of the concern was for them.

Cr Lorna Clarke said the committees often dealt with sensitive items and good decisions had come about from discussions behind closed doors, and having them open and recorded means “you lose some of the informality of how we operate”.

Transparency

Cr Barry McKenna liked open committees, but not recording them.

“We live in a litigious society,” he warned, saying non-council members mightn’t have the experience to know “when to bite your tongue” and get sued for defamation.

Cr Stephanie Gray said recorded meetings might deter shy members of the public from attending, while being behind closed doors allowed innovative thinking and a place to “toss ideas around freely” for quiet feedback.

Mayor Dan Bull did not speak on the item but voted against it.

Only the Reconciliation Advisory Committee is open currently. It’s required by law as it has its own independent powers to carry out the Reconciliation Action Plan. The others just have members vote on which recommendation to put to full council.

The Local Government Department operational guidelines say opening committees “allows the community to view the decision-making process from the time an issue is first presented to elected members through to the final decision”.

Vincent council decides Tuesday March 16 whether to open up its workshops. Currently they are highly secretive and even the agendas aren’t published. Former councillor Dudley Maier put up a successful motion at the last electors’ meeting to open them and publish the agendas to be consistent with the city’s talk of transparency. 

Staff recommended councillors keep them closed: “Workshops are not decision making forums … the purpose of council workshops is for elected members to be engaged and ask questions on strategies, plans and policies that are in the early planning stages. No decisions or indication of voting intentions are disclosed at council workshops”.

by DAVID BELL

REPEATED beheading of the snail sculptures in Bardon Park in Maylands has led to their removal.

Bayswater councillor Catherine Ehrhardt reports “unfortunately due to ongoing senseless vandalism of the snails in the children’s playground at Bardon Park, the snails will be removed and replaced with stepping stones”. 

Their removal was roundly mourned when Cr Ehrhardt posted a pic of the beheaded snails on her councillor social media page. 

One mum said her kids had even referred to the place as “Snail Park”.  

A FAMILY hoping to give their intellectually disabled daughter and her friends some independence have got the green light from Vincent council.

At Tuesday’s meeting, the council approved three homes on Leake Street that are designed to create a mini-community for their daughter, who has Down syndrome, and seven friends.

“Our daughter has several friends who are ready to embrace living independently, as most 30+ years olds want to do,” the family wrote in their application.

They said purpose-built homes were necessary to “allow privacy and personal space, interaction with each other between the homes, independence and safe, easy accessibility within the community allowing for increased confidence and capacity building”.

But the application didn’t initially thrill neighbours, particularly as the family applied for one of the homes to be more than 50 per cent bigger than allowed under the R-codes.

Following 11 objections, that was scaled back to 120sqm, which still requires discretion from the council but was deemed acceptable by its planners.

Neighbours also objected to the lack of visitor parking for the two rear dwellings, but because the occupants are unlikely to drive and public transport is close at hand, the planners also ticked that off.

VINCENT council will abandon its latest attempt to protect the character of its “Norfolk” precinct after admitting it still hasn’t got it quite right.

The council had initiated an amendment to its planning scheme to try and prevent ugly infill ruining the pre-1940s, single-storey streetscapes in the triangle bounded by Walcott, Vincent and Fitzgerald Streets.

It first tried to limit redevelopments to two buildings per lot with its 1998 planning scheme, but even after two rewrites for its second scheme in 2018, bigger developments have slipped through.

Council planners say there were four loopholes; a legal interpretation of “two dwellings” in the state act allowed more than two dwellings, decision-makers using discretion, planners not invoking the relevant clause and savvy owners sub-dividing lots into green titles which could each have two dwellings.

The council says the first three issues have been addressed, but sub-division continues to bug their ambitions. They also have no power to prevent the demolition of single homes under the latest state act.

“…there are many circumstances where character dwellings have been demolished and replaced with a new single house or two new grouped dwellings,” a report from the council’s planners read.

It said heritage listing was the only way to protect the pre-1940s stock, although it could also beef up its character retention policies if it could further define what makes the Norfolk precinct unique.

A LONG-RUNNING stoush over the location of a new public toilet in Maylands has taken another turn after council officers recommended installing it opposite the Whatley Crescent retail strip.

The Exeloo would be on the road reserve beside the Maylands train station, just outside the heritage-listed Parcel Office, and cost $179,028.

Last year council looked at putting the toilet at the Seventh Avenue bridge, but that sparked an outcry from locals who didn’t want the bridge’s public sculpture moved to accommodate the dunny, which they said would be too far from the station.

There’s no outhouse within 350m of the station and locals have been complaining for nearly a decade about people peeing and defecating there.

The city originally wanted to install the loo at the station, but the Public Transport Authority repeatedly refused the request, citing concerns about who would maintain the toilet and provide security.

The PTA are still not happy with the latest location.

“The PTA does not recommend this option (albeit on road reserve) due to the close proximity to the station and the entry to the North East car park,” the PTA wrote to council. 

“Although it is in road reserve, this option will create greater security concerns for our patrons and require a security presence, which PTA is not resourced for and the city would be responsible for. 

“As we discussed yesterday PTA has been approached many times over the years to locate public toilets at this station and the response has always been the same. 

“Our transit and security staff are required to protect our patrons on public transport, not for public toilets. 

“We recommend the city find locations on land under its control that is suitable for public toilets to provide amenities for its residents and shopkeepers.” 

Councillors will vote on the toilet’s location at Tuesday night’s council meeting (March 24).