Perth Voice Interactive

AFTER two years in the making Bayswater’s men’s shed opened its doors Tuesday July 5.

It’s had about $130,000 from Bayswater council to get up and running and it’s still in the early stages and will be populated with tools once the folk there figure out what they need most.

Once it’s humming along there’ll be space to fix bicycles, carve dovetails, chat with other sheddies or work on projects to benefit the local community — over at Vincent their men’s shed has been making planter boxes to put around town and crosses for war memorial days at Anzac Cottage.

If you want to become a member get in touch with the shed committee at heporrins@bigpond.com or just head down to 21 Raymond Street Bayswater.

PERTH city council ratepayers will see a modest increase in the average rate of 1.6 per cent.

The council’s boasting it’s managed to keep the increase within CPI after “an exhaustive review, including new and streamlined business practices”.

However rubbish fees are up 5.5 per cent for residents and 5 per cent for commercial. The budget notes Elizabeth Quay will be a drain on the council’s coffers for at least four years, when it’s expected there’ll be enough ratepayers to cover the cost of servicing the precinct.

Perth still has relatively cheap residential rates (as a proportion of rental value) compared to Vincent or Subiaco, as they were kept low to encourage more people to live in the CBD. The council is slowly weaning people off the cheapy rates but it’s only a small hit this year.

There’ll be another big spend on capital works this year with $67.2million going towards major projects including:

• $4.4million to upgrade the Perth Concert Hall;

• $4.3million to enhance city streetscapes;

• $4.2million to upgrade Wellington Street as part of the Perth city link project;

• $3.4million for Forrest Place pedestrian walkways; and,

• $2.8million on improved lighting projects.

There’ll be no change in the councillors’ allowances ($13,360 each) and the lord mayor’s allowance goes up a smidgeon to $137,917.

As of July 1 about 3000 new residents are now officially in Perth city council’s area, coming over from Subiaco and Nedlands. The budget doesn’t account for the effect they’ll have on the bottom line and a separate report will be prepared when the beancounters can quantify their impact.

by DAVID BELL

BAYSWATER council is having too many secret discussions, says councillor Dan Bull who wants the number of confidential items minimised.

Under the local government act there’s a slew of reasons an item can be discussed behind closed doors. They include privacy if the council is discussing an employee or someone’s personal affairs, legal advice, or discussions about contracts so tenderers can’t get inside information and pull any shenanigans.

But a lot of them are a matter of discretion, and even if an issue is technically exempted, it can be discussed if “no harm is likely to follow from disclosure of the information”. Many councils have also been drawing a long bow when determining whether to discuss things without public scrutiny.

Cr Bull moved a motion asking for a new draft policy “with the aim of minimising confidential items in council meetings, as well as an accompanying explanatory note for the public” as to why it was confidential.

It was unanimously backed by all councillors, and the staff will now draft something up in time for September 1.

Also on the transparency front, Cr Bull got up another unanimously-voted motion to have a dedicated portal on the city’s website leading to all the accountability and governance information a ratepayer could want, from links to gift and travel registers, to how much councillors are paid and the number of employees paid over $100,000 a year. Some of that information could already be viewed if someone rocks up to council in person and arranges to pore over the papers, but it’s not a very approachable method, takes a lot of time, and the occasions we’ve done it you’re assigned a council bureaucrat to watch over you while you take notes and no photos of the documents were allowed.

by DAVID BELL

VOTE counting continues across the country but in Perth Labor’s Tim Hammond declared victory early Saturday evening.

After preferences his vote sits at 53.9 per cent, and he mostly held retiring MP Alannah MacTiernan’s grip on the seat ceding only 0.11 per cent of the primary vote.

Liberal contender Jeremy Quinn managed 42 per cent of the primary vote, budging little from Darryl Moore’s 2013 effort.

The Greens’ Tim Clifford recorded a 4.6 per cent swing in the primary vote, a stellar performance for the party, which had a similar result in Fremantle but only improved 1.9 per cent across the state.

Perth people largely didn’t go in for the pseudo-libertarianism of the Liberal Democrats (1.59 per cent of the vote) and the “anyone can vote for every bill over the internet” plan from the Online Direct Democracy (1.38 per cent).

Just over 2500 doodlebrains cast an informal vote out of the 69,519 counted.

Up in Stirling Liberal incumbent Michael Keenan stayed safe with 56 per cent of the primary vote, with Labor’s Robert Pearson up about three per cent and the Greens’ Tom Webster making no ground, sitting around the same 11 per cent level as the last election.

In other election news Perth Voice sub-editor Brian Mitchell won the Tasmanian seat of Lyon for Labor. He’d been on leave during the election so he could tramp between Tassie farmhouses, and to avoid any chance of the Voice’s election coverage being perceived as biased.

He’s been with the paper since it was taken over by the Fremantle Herald and relaunched in its current incarnation in 2001, and his influence was seen in many a punny headline, bitingly witty replies to letters to the editor, and rants against what he described as the “powerful but unelected” state administrative tribunal.

by DAVID BELL

ARTIST Sioux Tempestt brings an unorthodox eye to Perth’s heritage buildings in her new exhibition Chronicle at the Museum of Perth

Most heritage photography is utterly and proudly straight forward; front-on shots of buildings with every sill and drain pipe captured. Instead of this painstaking style of documentation, Tempestt prefers to distort, twist and mash together favourite buildings like the Manchester Dye Works, Lincoln Street’s art deco sewerage tower or Fremantle’s working clubs together.

The result is an overall impression of the building, washed over with pop-art colourings.

Despite the unorthodox approach Tempestt has a lot of reverence for the buildings, and hopes her works will make people look at them anew: “My family migrated to Perth in the early 70s, so I’ve had the opportunity to see Perth change over a period of time,” she says.

“I’ve always held an appreciation for and interest in the beauty of architecture, the elements of design and impact on environment.

“I love that you can smell the history in old objects and buildings and wonder at the stories they hold. Watching our history being destroyed over the years with the demolition of beautifully crafted buildings has been difficult.”

Tempestt says Perth is changing at an “alarming rate,” and while she understands the need for development reckons “it can be achieved with a far better outcome”.

It’s a light-hearted change of direction for the little museum, which has just finished up its exhibition documenting rediscovered photographs of soldiers just before they left for the Great War.

Chronicle is at the Museum of Perth, Grand Lane, from July 8 to 22.

by DAVID BELL

CENTURY-old sewerage vents will be granted the highest heritage protection by Vincent city council.

The vents at Hyde Park are a small sample of the surviving sewerage infrastructure that’s mostly been moved, built over or forgotten.

Perth council’s already protected some within its borders, and heritage buffs consider them an important part of the state’s history.

They were only installed after 10 years of agitation by Perth folk growing increasingly unhappy with unhygienic conditions.

As early as the 1860s there were reports of the problem causing illness, and CT Stannage’s book The People of Perth relates that Perth was referred to as a “dunghill”.

The Perth Board of Health tried cess pits and earth closets, but they couldn’t cope with the influx of gold diggers during the boom of the 1890s.

Trinity Antiques dealer Trevor Hancock currently has an exquisite example of how the well-to-do tried to overcome the smell; a small silver locket with a piece of sea sponge inside which would be doused in vinegar and held close to the face.

The council of the day introduced a pan collection system in 1893 but there were still typhoid outbreaks in 1895, 1896 and 1897.

Politicians like Winthrop Hackett agitated for a deep sewer system, and despite the high cost senior engineer Hugh Oldham was given the brief to design the system in 1903.

The plan had one problem, as chief engineer CSR Palmer noted, the system was emitting “noxious gases”.

By 1914 people were complaining of foul smells, especially around the Claisebrook treatment centre, and it only grew worse as summer hit.

Because the poo wasn’t getting enough air, it was generating hydrogen sulphide — a stench far worse than a mere Edwardian-era stool. The solution was to get air into the underworld.

In 1912 the first vents came into operation at Cook Street and Adelaide Terrace, and while complaints about smells decreased, whinges about the high cost of installing them grew at around the same rate.

They continued to be rolled out across the decades, the most iconic being the Smith and Lincoln Street tower in Highgate that’s a frequent target of happy snappers because of its peculiar art deco stylings.

To this day it’s a mystery when the vents were disconnected from the sewer system. A report from the state heritage council states “one opinion is that after World War II, changes in the operation of the sewerage system did away with the need for ventilation shafts and they were disconnected”. Another theory holds that the bulk of them were still operating until Perth switched from an open to a closed sewer system in the 1970s. A third theory points to the introduction of plastic piping which is less susceptible to hydrogen sulphide.

The state heritage council now describes them “as a collection of street furniture with no current functional use”.

by DAVID BELL

MEMBERS of the Buddha’s Light International Association of WA spread a little of the divine one’s love at the Lightning Park bushland late last month.

About 25 volunteers planted 880 plants to the mantra “environmental and spiritual preservation”.

The group follows the teachings of Chinese monk Hsing Yun who promotes “humanistic” Buddhism which focuses on more grounded good works in the human realm.

Members do a lot of volunteer work aiming at relieve suffering and bring “loving kindness to all”.  Based in the Fo Guang Shan Temple on Guildford Road in Maylands, their tree planting project was set up by the East Metropolitan Regional Council with Landcare and Bayswater council funding.

The bushland is one of the last remaining natural habitats managed by Bayswater council which has been working to protect it for about 10 years alongside the Friends of Lightning Swamp. Dieback, offroad motorbikes and foreign weeds are the main issues facing the bush.