Perth Voice Interactive

A RAMMY over a swimming pool has gone off the deep end, with a resident and Stirling council bringing in the lawyers.

The council wants Ajdin Dzemailoski to cough up $200,000 to buy a supposed laneway next to his Wiluna Street property, or demolish eaves and a pool illegally built on it.

Trouble is, Mr Dzemailoski bought the house in the 1990s—30 years after the pool was built—and was completely unaware a disused public laneway ran through his back garden (“Call for calm over council’s $200k pool fix demand,” Voice, February 26, 2015).

In February, Mt Lawley Liberal MP Michael Sutherland called on the council to apply common sense, but those efforts were in vain.

The council is offering no compromise.

“Mr Dzemailoski has to pay for legal advice in a matter that common-sense and a sympathetic attitude would have resolved,” Mr Sutherland says.

“As we all know, going to court is expensive and stressful, and should be the option of last resort.

“He did not do anything wrong yet is being pursued by the council as if he was responsible for the error in the boundary alignment.

“Council’s approach to this matter has been disappointing: its officials are there to serve the public.”

Mr Sutherland, a solicitor in a former life, believes Mr Dzemailoski should be able to argue ownership of the disused laneway through adverse possession.

Stirling mayor Giovanni Italiano has told Mr Sutherland the matter is out of his hands.

“This is an administrative matter and one that neither I nor fellow councillors can intervene [in],” he claimed.

“This matter has been ongoing since 2007 with little action being taken by Mr Dzemailoski.

“The city is now moving to deal with this matter through the legal process.”

Mr Dzemailoski says he recently divorced and is keen to make a fresh start, but says he’s unable to sell till the matter’s resolved.

He claims the council’s actions contributed to his recent heart attack.

by STEPHEN POLLOCK

Traders cop rates whack

BUSINESSES in Vincent are copping a whack from the council this year, with rates to jump 8.5 per cent.

Residents, however, will breathe a sigh of relief, with a relatively modest 2.78 per cent increase.

But motorists face hikes, with parking fees across Vincent set to rise 20 cents an hour.

And owners of modest properties face higher costs too: Vincent’s minimum rates are skyrocketing nearly 30 per cent, from $700 to $900.

Scrimping and saving and the higher fees and charges under new CEO Len Kosova, plus the $2.5 million sale of the old Angove Street police station, sees the Vincent budget back in the black.

That represents a stunning turnaround from last year’s administrative cock-up which saw the council heading towards an $8 million deficit.

Former councillor Dudley Maier stood up in the public gallery this week to describe the move to slug business as “a classic case of populism”, noting business-people rarely vote and there are far more residents.

He says it would be equitable to slug businesses half as much.

But mayor John Carey says in previous years businesses been given an easy ride and needed to make up ground.

Last year 89 per cent of commercial/industrial properties suffered no rate rise at all, and a chunk saw a decrease.

The mayor says parking fees in Vincent need to keep pace with Perth, otherwise Vincent [will] become the carpark for the CBD” leaving residents and local shoppers no space.

by DAVID BELL

A PAIR of luxury Mount Lawley townhouses illegally rented out as short-term accommodation has been a nightmare for locals.

Sick of rowdy parties coming from 63 and 65 Alma Road—including a three-day bender featuring “30 young people, anti-social behaviour, swearing and excessive noise”—neighbours dobbed the properties in to Vincent council.

 

This week the council voted to shut down the operation—which had no approval—ignoring pleas from owner Robert Clark who’d said he’d made “a large investment” in the properties, which he was renting out for between $330 and $415 a night (with a three-night minimum).

“The target tenants are professionals, not students or backpackers, so we have no intention of renting to low-lifes or anything like that,” he’d told the council.

Mr Clark said he was happy to enforce a “no party” rule but was unable to win over the council.

If Mr Clark continues to rent the properties out he faces prosecution.

by DAVID BELL

FORMER Vincent mayor Nick Catania says a new rule requiring Vincent’s elected members to record all meetings with developers sounds like a good idea in principle but might be sticky in practice.

He says the more important aspect of transparency is to make sure every meeting with developers includes the city’s planner and other relevant staff, a convention he always made sure to stick by and which is still carried out today.

“When I was there, nothing was conducted behind closed doors,” Mr Catania told the Voice. “During my time everything was conducted in the open so that you wouldn’t go one to one with a developer, you’d make sure you had planning staff there.

“To me, registering a meeting? Nothing wrong with it, but if I had to register a meeting every time I walked down Fitzgerald Street, there’d be no book big enough!”

He thought it might be more showy than practical.

“I think maybe the intent is right, I’m not criticising the intent, but I don’t think you should shout out ‘look what I’m doing! I’m the purest of the pure because I’m registering everything!’”

Another former Vincent mayor, John Hyde, who now works as an anti-corruption consultant for the United Nations, says “it’s a very good move to boost transparency”.

Now helping nascent democracies in the Pacific stamp out corruption, the former Perth Labor MP says “real corruption is becoming more sophisticated but transparency remains the best deterrent”.

But he adds the rule ought to apply to those against a development too: “The key will be to exclude loopholes such as residents who are lobbyists and lawyers who may not declare their role when contacting their local councillors over neighbourhood development issues or opposing developments by competitors”.

Neighbouring Perth lord mayor Lisa Scaffidi says her council hasn’t formally considered this kind of thing. “I personally have no issue with anything that enhances transparency,” she says, but notes the WA local government department has guidelines.

Prominent local developer Danny Psaros has no problem with the new rule: “We believe in transparent process and if meetings need to be registered then we fully support this process,” he says.

Mr Carey says he’d like to see the rule, introduced last week at Vincent, apply at all councils, but says he’s not going to hold his breath for state government action. The policy will be reviewed in three months.

by DAVID BELL

THE folk from the Vincent men’s shed have been hard at work, making planter boxes to liven up the town.

Local carpenter Deano Hall has been coming down to the shed since February, and says it’s been a great way to make friends and keep mental health in check.

“When I said I was a carpenter they practically skull-dragged me in and said ‘we’ve got work for you!’” the 46-year-old tradie says.

The project’s a collaboration between the Vincent council, North Perth Local community organisation, the shed and the North Perth community garden to add a bit of colour to streets.

People with disabilities such as autism have also been coming down from Adventist Residential Care to help out and learn a few skills. “It’s good seeing a smile on their faces when they build something,” Mr Hall says.

So far they’ve put out seven boxes and have nine more to go, and they’ve been so well received people have been calling up wanting to commission one for their own homes.

by DAVID BELL

A DIGITAL commune for games developers has been created in the state library.

Every second Thursday programmers, wizards and virgins—sometimes the same people are all three—meet at “Level One”, a co-working space with free iMacs, wifi, coffee and tea.

Freelance narrative designer Anthony Sweet, who wrote the script for Black Lab’s Star Hammer, went to the debut session.

“Generally I work from home, but it’s good for your own sanity to be amongst other people and bounce ideas around,” he says. “It’s also useful for networking and meeting other people in the industry. Generally everyone is working on their own thing in there, but you get talking during coffee breaks.”

Level One is equipped with 10 iMacs for people who don’t bring a laptop, and Sweet says around a dozen people attended the launch.

FTI games director Kate Raynes-Goldie hopes the co-working space, hosted in partnership with Murdoch University, can eventually become a permanent fixture.

“These small incubators are so important to the industry and have been used to great effect in Melbourne and Toronto,” she says. “They are even more important given the recent cuts to national and WA games funding. Any small thing we can do to facilitate the creation of games is extremely important.”

Last year the Abbott government slashed $240,000 of FTI’s funding, about 15 per cent of its budget, as part of its cuts to Screen Australia. That resulted in four FTI managers, with a combined 20 years’ experience, losing their jobs. The next Level One session is June 11, to register visit http://www.levelone.org.au

by STEPHEN POLLOCK