Perth Voice Interactive

A MAJORITY of Perth city councillors have released a statement pointing the finger at lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi for local government minister David Templeman’s decision to suspend the council.

“The majority of council do not believe that the lord mayor should get the outcome she wants,” read the statement, which was publicly released on Wednesday by councillor Jemma Green, who says colleagues Lexi Barton, Lily Chen, Reece Harley, Steve Hasluck and James Limnios are also on board. Cr Green was acting lord mayor while Ms Scaffidi stepped aside for a partially successful challenge to a disqualification for not declaring travel and gifts.

Mr Templeman announced on Wednesday his plans to suspend the council, saying the situation at city hall was “untenable”. He says he may simply suspend them on Friday, but could give them 21 days’ grace to argue why they should be allowed to stay.

Cr Reece Harley, who’s called on Ms Scaffidi to resign and has previously run against her for the top job, claimed she was “hell-bent on burning the house down”.

“She said in a meeting I attended this afternoon with the minister that she was “satisfied” with the minister’s intention to possibly suspend the council. This is exactly what she wants,” Mr Harley posted.

“Since losing her majority on council she no longer has any power over the affairs of the council. She’d prefer we all went down with the ship.”

Ms Scaffidi is still facing a possible disqualification by the State Administrative Tribunal over breaches of disclosure rules she failed to beat in her challenge, but has told the ABC there’s no substance to the group’s claims: “No, that is absolutely a spin and is not correct,” she said.

The statement from the councillors says they’re unhappy with how the city has been run.

“The majority of councillors call on minister David Templeman MLA to work with us to deal with the serious issues the council is currently facing.

“We call on the minister to provide the majority of council the opportunity to demonstrate that we can manage this city and meet the expectations of ratepayers.”

Mr Templeman’s announcement came after a tense council meeting Tuesday night where Crs Barton, Green, Limnios, Harley and Hasluck fought tooth and nail to have CEO Martin Mileham’s preferred stand-in while he’s on stress leave replaced by someone of their own choosing.

Council rules gave the pick to Mr Mileham, who chose corporate services director Robert Mianich, but Cr Harley told the meeting that councillors should ultimately determine who got their delegated power.

Despite opposition from Ms Scaffidi and her staunch ally Jim Adamos, director Annaliese Battista was appointed acting CEO. Mr Mianich has also now gone on stress leave.

A day later a letter leaked to the ABC showed Ms Battista criticising Ms Scaffidi and other councillors for poor behaviour and asking Mr Mileham to “take action” over an unsafe workplace.

It was “critical to address these conduct issues prior to Mrs Scaffidi’s return to duties on Monday, 8 January 2018, given her poor conduct is clearly the most sustained and persistent and therefore presents the highest risk to staff safety and well-being,” Ms Battista wrote on December 23, 2017.

Her letter said the Executive Leadership Group (the five directors and the CEO) all considered the workplace as “unsafe, and the administration would be best served by the implementation of commissioners in place of council”.

On Tuesday night Ms Scaffidi questioned the motive of the councillors who’d called the meeting: “I have been informed that last week the acting CEO [Robert Mianich] lodged with the [local government] department complaints concerning various councillors,” she said.

Ms Scaffidi asked whether there was a connection between the complaints and the meeting being called, but Cr Harley assured her “there is not”.

by DAVID BELL

BUNNINGS Inglewood burned near to the ground Monday night, with explosions heard suburbs away and the fire smouldering well into the next day.

The Inglewood Monday Night Markets were just closing up when manager Rudy Perone noticed the fire, calling 000 just after 9pm. The area filled with thick, smelly smoke and a hazmat warning went out for residents to turn off air conditioners to keep toxic fumes out.

Neighbouring homes were evacuated, with locals quick to offer up spare rooms for the displaced. Stirling council also opened the Bob Daniels Community Centre as an evacuation centre.

The following day lasers showed a large wall at the rear of Bunnings was still moving and there were fears it would topple onto adjoining apartments.

The Voice’s graphic designer Helena Tay said she could hear the explosions from Bedford on the other side of Grand Promenade as various chemicals and gas bottles ignited.

On site amongst the ashes on 8th Avenue the following day, the Voice heard the fire started in an area containing pool-cleaning chemicals, while nearby business owners reported hearing the hardware store’s air-conditioner making odd noises in the past couple of weeks.

DFES would only say that it’s looking into all possible sources for the fire.

Stirling mayor Mark Irwin said his council had been able to roll out its on-the-ground resources quicker than the state bureaucracies, helping to house displaced residents in a local hotel.

He also flagged help for affected businesses, saying getting them through the next few weeks might be a better use for council cash than overseas aid.

Bunnings HQ wouldn’t comment on whether the smallish hardware shop will be rebuilt.

by DAVID BELL and EMILEE NEESON

THE decision on Yolk Property’s development at 9-11 King William Street has been made, but the issue continues to split the community, with a supporter’s car being egged and a councillor hammered by threats to vote her out.

Bayswater councillor Catherine Ehrhardt says she’s been peppered by negative comments after voting to support the development at the JDAP.

Supporters of the six-storey project say it’ll inject life into the town centre and help businesses flourish, but opponents from Bayswater Deserves Better say it’s too tall and will see a category 3 heritage building destroyed.

Cr Ehrhardt says in all her time on council no other issue has elicited such an angry response.

“I appreciate they’re passionate, but they also have to understand that different people have different views,” she says.

“They are entitled to their view, but I’m not going to base a vote on fear.”

Public posts on Facebook have called her a shill for developers and a supporter of “heritage destruction” who’s not representing the community and needs be booted out come election time.

Greg Smith from Bayswater Deserves Better publicly posted: “Your vote for the Yolk development illustrates that you represent the developer lobby & not the Bayswater community: you should resign!”

Paul Shanahan is a local school teacher and spokesperson for Future Bayswater, a group supporting the project in the hope it’ll kickstart a revitalisation of the area, bringing in residents to support businesses and providing affordable housing for younger people  and seniors.

He spoke in favour of the development at the JDAP meeting, and in the nights that followed his car was egged twice.

Mr Shanahan says the backlash is “pretty hurtful to some of our members, and it’s not nice to have that said about you as a teacher in the area”.

But an egging hasn’t cracked his resolve.

”We have to answer this question: Where are our young and old going to live? The reason Future Bayswater started, for me, was to start a conversation about that.

“Unfortunately I attract a lot of criticism and vitriol, but that question is too important for me to back off, and I’m just not going to.”

by DAVID BELL

THE WA Planning Commission has thrown a spanner in the works of Stirling council’s plans to preserve the character of Beaufort Street north of Walcott.

The council’s Beaufort Street Local Development Plan took five years to put together and won a commendation award from the Planning Institute of Australia for its consultation, but that wasn’t good enough for the WAPC.

The commission altered the document before sending it to planning minister Rita Saffioti with changes labelled “silly” by Mount Lawley society president Paul Collins.

The changes pose “a significant threat to the heritage and character retention of Beaufort Street within Inglewood and Mount Lawley,” Mr Collins said. The society had collaborated on the document.

One section the WAPC scrubbed was a requirement for new developments to fit in with one of the four pre-1960s architectural styles along that strip.

Mr Collins said the clause was added to ensure Inglewood’s iconic town hall clock didn’t end up surrounded by glass cages, but wasn’t intended to be a prescription for exact copies.

“It may well, for example, mean a developer will pick a style such as art deco and do a modern interpretation of that style by focussing, for example on horizontal masonry lines,” Mr Collins says.

Another change requires all new development to be a minimum of two stories along the three kilometre stretch fronting Beaufort Street.

“Forcing landowners to ensure any new build is two storey is draconian and inappropriate for a major three-kilometre heritage precinct.

“It is also an infringement on the freedom of individual property rights and one could be excused for thinking the minister is seeking advice from an overseas planning commission, perhaps in Moscow or Beijing.”

At last week’s council meeting, a majority of councillors (save Giovanni Italiano) voted to write to the minister requesting the changes be deleted before the final rubber stamping.

Mt Lawley MP Simon Millman says: “I’m eager to see the heritage and architectural character of our local area protected. I look forward to working with the minister so that we can arrive at an outcome the community is happy with.”

The plan also stretches into Maylands MP Lisa Baker’s electorate and she likewise wants the heritage character protected and says she’ll seek more information from the minister.

by DAVID BELL

IT was stuck on freeze frame for a couple of months, but the Mount Lawley Society’s short film festival is back.

The first festival in November 2016 sold out and co-organiser Christina Gustavson said they’d fielded requests about the next since then, with students from Central Institute of Technology’s film course eager to add a pre-Oscar gong to their CV.

Ms Gustavson said this year’s themes are “Mt Lawley” and “remember when”, the latter because they want to focus on human history, not just old buildings. She’s heard there’s already a flick about Northbridge’s first Chinese store in the works.

“One of the great things that emerged out of the last festival was the number of young people who participated, as they were very interested in things that had once been part of their city but had since disappeared,” she says.

Films have to be seven minutes long at most, and registrations close March 25 at 6pm. There’s a prize for the best overall pic and the best pic by a secondary school student. Ms Gustavson said the festival screening will be on April 29 at the Astor Theatre, with a selection of the best films and some film footage from yesteryear.

Entry detail from http://www.mtlawleyshortfilmfestival.com.au

QUESTIONS have been raised about whether a Fringe Festival show crossed the line with its depictions of self-harm.

Fringe is known for dishing up the unorthodox and unusual, but Danger Cabaret’s El Bizarro left audiences in a cold sweat last week, with one person fainting during the performance.

“We are a freak side show,” says MC and co-creative director Magnus Danger Magnus.

“We wanted to make the weirdest cabaret we could.”

The Voice saw the Perth-based show last week, and despite content warnings about “nudity”, “course language” and ”live body piercing”, we weren’t prepared for the horror that unfolded and had to make a very abrupt seat change from front to back row.

“There’s a lot of intense stuff,” agrees Magnus.

“Ordinarily people walk out and faint. I think we are doing our job right if people get shocked and crazied out.”

But audience member Jemma Goodliffe says El Bizarro crossed the line.

“Harming yourself with potentially long-term consequences is not what I’d consider an acceptable form of entertainment.

“The lack for forewarning of the self-harm content left me feeling quite disturbed.”

During the show performer Damien Kenny, self-described as a pin cushion virtuoso, repeatedly plunged needles into his arm and spattered a white sheet with blood before bringing the display to a climax by stabbing a small sword through both cheeks.

Circus Carnis also had the audience turning a collective shade of off-white, as the married couple shared their twisted fantasies, including the Princess of Pain dancing on broken glass, and Reverend Butcher lifting a metal drum with some very delicate parts of his flesh.

Magnus says the difference between self-harming and his cabaret is the intent.

“The intent of our acts is to entertain, whereas self harm has a very different intent.

“All of these people are professionals and mentally stable people and they know what they are doing.”

He says after the show there is an hour long procedure during which medical grade quarantining and wound attending takes place.

“We are very, very careful about safety.”

Creative director Jasmine Danks says the show was born in 2015 from a desire to “turn it up to eleven.”

“We knew all these weirdoes and friends of ours had some pretty crazy acts no one would let them do.”

Danks says almost every show sold out, and the season went well.

“We are one of the only shows where people came back maybe three or four times to watch the same show,” she says.

by MOLLY SCHMIDT

LANDOWNERS who leave commercial blocks vacant would pay higher rates under a plan being considered by Bayswater council.

The differential rating would encourage landowners to develop derelict sites, which can lower the tone of the city and affect the value of neighbouring properties.

Councillor Elli Petersen-Pik says the plan “has the potential to reduce the burden on residential ratepayers, whilst also achieving other city objectives by setting higher rates on specific classes of land, such as noxious industry and many eyesore commercial vacant lots around our city”.

He says the Fremantle and Vincent councils currently have differential rates, and notes it almost doubles the landowners’ bill.

“Vincent justifies the application of differential rates on vacant commercial land on the basis that those lots are often unsightly and unkempt, and their development is in the best interests of the community as it will increase the street appeal and the vibrancy of town centres,” Cr Petersen-Pik says.

Eyesore

“We all know many examples of neglected sites in our wards. One high profile example, which many of you are aware of, is the vacant site owned by Coles on Guildford Road, in the middle of the Maylands town centre,” he said at the council’s last finance committee meeting.

Other eyesore blocks that could be slugged with double rates include the vacant lot at the corner of Peninsula Road and East Street, and the corner of King William St and Guildford Road (though there may be some good news on that latter site, with mayor Dan Bull saying he’d met with the developer and there’s something’s in the works).

Staff will now investigate the plan and bring it back to councillors in time for the 2018-2019 budget.

by DAVID BELL

THERE’S not a single egg battery in Perth state MP John Carey’s electorate, but chook welfare tops concerns raised by constituents.

“I have been inundated with emails from people opposed to cage eggs and who want to see higher welfare standards,” Mr Carey says, noting 150 calls and emails so far.

“I have to say it’s taken me by surprise: It’s an issue that appears to cut across age, sex, and demographics.”

The discussion was sparked by the federal government calling for submissions on proposed chicken welfare standards.

Mr Carey backs WA agriculture minister Alannah MacTiernan’s assessment the draft doesn’t alleviate suffering, but says he’d go even further.

“My personal view is that we should phase out caged hens full stop,” he says.

About 70 per cent of egg-laying hens in Australia live in battery cages.

Apart from cheaper eggs, Egg Farmers Australia claims caged chickens have lower mortality and cannibalism rates compared to their barn and free range cousins, and suffer similar levels of stress.

The RSPCA wants cages banned, saying an area the size of an A4 piece of paper isn’t enough room to stretch a wing, let alone practise instinctive behaviours like perching or taking dust baths.

Part of the problem in comparing welfare between farming types is that standards allow free range birds to be stocked so densely that angry pecking and cannibalism is still rife.

Mr Carey says shoppers would be surprised by how many chickens can be stuffed into one space and still have their eggs sold as “free range”.

The CSIRO’s model code of practice is 1500 hens per hectare, but a Choice magazine survey found many WA brands packing 10,000 birds into the same area.

Crowded chickens can get anxious and aggressive, so many farmers trim the beaks of chicks using an infrared beam, following up regrowth with a 700-degree blade that cuts and cauterises the tip.

The RSCPA says this causes “pain and stress” to the animals and wants its use minimised as much as possible.

by DAVID BELL