Perth Voice Interactive

VINCENT councillors strongly back mayor John Carey’s desire to reconsider the city’s ongoing membership of the WA local government association.

They agree the peak body for WA councils has been a wet lettuce on issues including council amalgamations and transparency.

WALGA president Lynne Craigie sounds largely satisfied with levels of council transparency and training for councillors, something Mr Carey hotly disputes, especially given recent corruption and crime commission investigations into Perth lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi.

He wants other councils to declare all gifts and freebies given to councillors online, along with mandatory training for councillors.

Deputy mayor Ros Harley has attended WALGA zone meetings for four years and says little gets done.

“If you want to go to a really interesting meeting four times a year and feel like you achieve absolutely nothing, zone meetings are the place to go.”

She says WALGA staff do a good job but its state council did little for Vincent during either the amalgamation or transparency debates.

“We’d really like to see some better leadership from WALGA,” Cr Emma Cole agrees.

Cr Matt Buckels was a little equivocal, saying the politics amongst brass at WALGA doesn’t much matter as long as training programs and similar services stack up. But he still voted for a review saying it could be the “kick up the arse” WALGA needs.

Cr Carey says WALGA’s training services are solid and a review will at the very least alert the council to services it may be missing out on.

Council staff will weigh up the pros and cons and report back.

by DAVID BELL

THE Maylands Hawkers Markets should relocate from The Rise or close because the area is busy enough without it and there’s already a parking shortfall says Bayswater councillor John Rifici.

Cr Rifici stood just two seats from markets founder Catherine Ehrhardt — now a colleague on council — when he made his comments this month.

He says the markets had been set up to activate the area and are now no longer needed: “We could look at alternate places,” he says.

Cr Rifici owns the building occupied by Rifo’s cafe — which he used to run — on nearby Eighth Avenue. He has long been wary of the growth of markets and vans, which he fears compete with established traders who pay high fixed costs to operate.

A parking shortfall at the council-owned The Rise is causing the council some headaches: it’s built to accomodate 1000 people, but there are only 163 parking bays.

This month it resolved to spend $960 so a ranger can direct traffic when more than 300 guests are expected. Structural parking changes are likely to be considered at budget time.

Cr Ehrhardt told the Voice there’s no way the markets are moving.  “We run the event in Maylands because we love this place,” she says.

“We’re all volunteers. We don’t make a profit … and every indication is that the local community loves these markets.”

Volunteer Alison Dalziel often directs people to the best parking spots. She says there has “never not been spaces to send people that wasn’t a short walk away”. She notes the IGA supermarket bays are strictly reserved for shoppers. The Coles car park down the road is good after 6pm, when it closes.

Rancho Sombrero owner Mike Thompson says The Rise is a perfect spot for trade because the area is grassed and is easily seen by passers-by on Guildford Road.

Hundreds attend the 5–9pm markets every Saturday from October to March.

by EMMIE DOWLING

THIS sculpture cost about $720,000.

The Maylands artwork was required as part of Bayswater council’s “per cent for public art” policy. Developers with projects more than a million dollars are required to contribute one per cent of the cost to public art: they can either commission their own, or contribute to a council fund.

A local contacted the Voice this week to say the sculpture at the $188 million Finbar development looks like “an afterthought”. The Voice called the developer, who says more artworks are going up, but this sculpture, called “Vault” by WA artist Stuart Green, is the main piece.

“It’s art so it’s whatever you make of it,” Mark from Finbar says. “It was inspired by the former use of the site.” The site was formerly Ross’s Auctioneers & Valuers’ metal workshop.

The mammoth 17,259sqm mixed-use complex will be 10 storeys high and feature 347 apartments.

Stage one is almost complete with the rest expected to be finished by 2017.

by EMMIE DOWLING

LOCAL history fan Dallas Robertson spends countless hours recreating Perth’s lost historic landscape in virtual reality.

After about 80 hours on his Xbox, he recently finished a virtual model of Government House in the computer game Minecraft, a wildly popular Lego-like game that lets players build anything they want.

He’s already fleshing out the surrounds with other historic buildings that once surrounded Government House and has plans to recreate Perth as it was in 1870.

“I wanted to feel what it was like to live around that time… to give a sense of what it’s like to live in early Perth, to see what it’s like to walk down St Georges Terrace and see how Government House looms, how the town hall would have been impressive and everything else was so small next to it,” he says.

Mr Robertson, who started the virtual Museum of Perth and helped found the bricks and mortar version in Grand Lane, says he hopes it’ll act as a portal to get kids interested in local history, and plans to use it as part of an exhibition at the museum.

He uses historic photographs, many by the famous early photographer AH Stone, to recreate the buildings: he used 60 to ensure he had Government House accurate from every angle. He’s even modelled an interior so you can wander through and see where the royal family might have stayed, overlooking St Georges Terrace.

“I’ve had to splice [the photos] together, sometimes I can only see one part of the building and have to use two or three different photos to put together what it looks like from the back or the side.

“I sit with my iPad on my lap, I can flick through the photos, zoom in on the details and recreate them.”

1870 was a good year for the project because that’s when the town hall was finished, and photos were taken from the top showing a radial view of the city. Not many photographers wanted to use precious film photographing the backs of buildings, but he’s been able to zoom in on the backgrounds of other pictures to recreate the rears inadvertently snapped in the frame.

Given the limitations of Minecraft (he’s working with big bulky blocks that make curved shapes tough), it’s impossible to get a 1:1 replication, and the bright colours of the game don’t quite gel with the old photos that show dust and weeds growing everywhere.

“It’s obviously a fairytale version of it and hyper-real digital copy of it, but it’s as close as you’re going to get without going into an ArchiMAD program,” he says, referring to the complex and expensive professional architectural software.

Along with getting kids interested, using Minecraft means anyone else who gets inspired to recreate their own little part of historic Perth can easily pick up the game and figure it out in a few minutes.

While this project’s ongoing, Mr Robertson’s next task is to tackle a far more modern building: “The City of Perth have commented [on Facebook] and liked my Government House creation, and said ‘why don’t you build the new Perth city library?’”

by DAVID BELL

CHINATOWN may soon stretch down William or James streets under a multi-million dollar revamp of Northbridge.

Chung Wah Association secretary Ting Chen met with WA treasurer Mike Nahan late late year to discuss options for a new Chinatown as part of an overhaul of the suburb.

Dr Chen has tabled two options: closing James Street from William and Lake streets to create an Asian-themed mall, or putting two entrance gates on William Street, at Brisbane and James streets.

He says the latter — making Chinatown, or “Asiatown”, six times bigger — is cheaper, but more difficult to plan because it crosses into two councils: Perth and Vincent.

“It’s not easy to develop the Chinatown where the gate is now because that area is owned by private landowners,” Dr Chen says.

“We are working with the Italian and Greek communities to develop Northbridge because we know we are not the only cultural group here. Northbridge is diverse and it makes sense to develop it as the multicultural centre of Perth.

“The Chinese community would like it to happen as soon as possible. This would be very good for businesses and attract a lot of people.”

There’s talk the Northbridge overhaul will also feature Italian and Greek streets.

Chung Wah staffers have been busy planning their Chinese New Year Fair for this weekend at Lake and James streets, and are planning to meet Perth Liberal state MP Eleni Evangel in coming weeks.

Council of elders member Yit Seng Yow says Chinatown “needs sprucing”.

The community has grown over the past quarter-century and deserves and a bigger and better cultural centre, he says.

The 67-year-old moved to Australia from Malaysia in 1988, when Chinese new year celebrations were small and local news wasn’t available in Mandarin.

Now there are five Chinese language newspapers, three magazines and a 24/7 radio station in Perth.

Chinese immigrants arrived in Perth just four months after James Stirling established the Swan River colony in 1829. Most were labourers, and made the area now known as Northbridge their home early on.

The Year of the Monkey started Monday, and the fair is on noon-9pm on Sunday, February 14. It will include food stalls, lion and dragon dances, and a street parade.

For more information, visit chungwahcac.org.au.

by EMMIE DOWLING

A SUPPORTER of Aboriginal activists will receive $966.70 in compensation from Perth city council for items confiscated last year from a Heirisson Island camp.

The mediated settlement looks likely to pave the way for many more compensation claims: five truckloads of property was taken in nine raids between March and August by Perth city council officers trying to disrupt people’s attempts to camp at the site.

Five months ago Matagarup group supporter Diane Niyati applied to the magistrate’s court for the return of items she’d donated to the group, including blankets, which had been confiscated by authorities.

Under the WA local government act confiscated goods are required to be returned within seven days. As part of a mediation arrangement Perth council was directed to return items but when Ms Niyati visited the storage facility her items were gone, and the place was full of ruined tents and other property in poor condition.

Jennifer Kaeshagen has been assisting with the claims and says 10 more are pending already. With this win she predicts many more will be lodged.

Ms Kaeshagen says “about 80 First Nations people” remain on the island, many homeless, who are there for activism purposes and just for a place to stay. They contend federal laws recognising their historic connection to Matagarup permits them to stay, irrespective of the council’s bylaws prohibiting camping.

Despite being given two working days’ notice the council’s ratepayer-funded media team again failed to respond to the Perth Voice’s questions, continuing a pattern of refusing to engage in journalism enquiries that are not publicity driven.

by DAVID BELL

MOST people picture mayoral duties as cutting the ribbon on a new length of footpath or debating the height of fences, but Vincent mayor John Carey found himself playing hire-a-hubby to an 81-year-old ratepayer who called him about security issues.

On Sunday he posted on Facebook he was “contacted last night at 9pm from an 81-year-old woman… regarding safety. Drove over there this afternoon-checked her fence to make sure no one can jump over, moved outdoor furniture into her home and changed two blown light bulbs”.

His post was met with a dozen requests for him to come round and help with painting, fence fixing and furniture moving, along with calls for him to run for the state seat of Perth, and to stick around as Vincent mayor.

by DAVID BELL

WOOLWORTHS hasn’t given up on its long-held desire to demolish the Maylands Peninsula Tavern and replace it with a $3.5 million, 1000sqm Dan Murphy’s liquor barn.

The grocery giant says it is “reviewing and assessing” its options regarding the WA liquor commission’s rejection of its application last week.

Maylands Labor MP Lisa Baker, a long-time critic of the plan, says any appeal is likely to fail.

She says Coles went down the same route in 2010 with its plans for a 1250sqm First Choice store on Guildford Road and that ended in tears.

The commission has not yet published its reasons for the rejection but Ms Baker says it didn’t pass the “public interest test”.

“Size matters,” she says.

“They’ve got the wrong business case. People don’t want big liquor stores on their iconic blocks where there’s housing.

“It’s fine when it’s in a shopping centre like the Galleria.”

by EMMIE DOWLING

Just slow down
WITH thousands of children returning to school for the start of the 2016 educational year, we’ll also see the enforcement of specially zoned speed limits around schools in the mornings and afternoons.
Road safety authorities set the school zone limits to 40km per hour at those specific times of day, for a very simple reason — it can save lives. Excited young children can be unpredictable and hard to see, and even a small reduction in speed can make a dramatic difference to the horrific injuries a child might sustain if hit by a car.
As a lawyer, I’ve had the heart-breaking task of representing families of young road accident victims. The impact on the lives of family members is something they never get over. Speeding anywhere on our roads is a criminal offence, but speeding in a school zone is simply reckless. Even 40kph is often too fast in busy times. Please slow down and protect our children from life-changing injuries.
Tony O’Hurley
Slater and Gordon

City of No Fun
I HAVE recently been informed the City of Stirling has developed a policy for “slacklining” (the recreational pastime in which people walk on a tightrope between two anchor points for enjoyment and fitness).
The policy seeks to protect the council’s trees (a measure most slackliners fully endorse — after all, it is a tree huggers’ sport!). However, the policy goes too far in regulating what is essentially a recreational activity.
Amongst other things, the policy stipulates, “activities such as stunts or tricks involving flips are prohibited”.
This got me thinking….. I wonder what is next? Will the city stop the next world champion surfer from honing their skills at Trigg Point, or limit the height at which kite surfers can jump, or stop kids from climbing trees.
As the self-proclaimed “City of Choice,” Stirling is ironically limiting the recreational activities of its residents.
Larissa Ashton
Farnley St, Mount Lawley