Submissions »

Letter: Regent’s Park Netball Court

Letter to:

Planning Department,
City of Kingston,
1230 Nepean Highway,
Cheltenham. 3192

Dear Sir/Madam, re: Regent’s Park Netball Court.

P-896/2017

We object to the removal of 23 trees in the coastal banksia woodland to make way for these courts when an alternatives site is available.

While acknowledging that the Arrows would prefer their own netball court it is also important that councils policy of greening Kingston by increasing tree coverage from a low 14.2% to the 30% recommended for all councils in the Metropolitan area it is vital that the 23 trees are retained.

This woodland provides a valuable passive recreation area for the majority of residents who don’t participate in active sport. A 30% green canopy coverage plays a significant role in heat reduction where there are hard surfaces such as footpaths, roads and outdoor sports grounds.

It is understood that the Arrows netball club have the option of an alternative site for the court and therefore the club would also benefit from the intact banksia woodland providing shade and relief from heat for themselves and the many local passive recreational residents now and in the future.

Yours faithfully,

Mary Rimington
Secretary MBCL

Letter: Environmental Effects Statement for Mordialloc Bypass

Letter to:

Hon Richard,
Minster for Planning,
Parliament House,
Spring Street,
Melbourne.

Dear Minster,

We write to respectfully request that an Environmental Effects Statement be required before the 9 kilometre arterial road linking the end of Mornington Peninsula Freeway at Springvale Road in Aspendale Gardens is approved. This six lane elevated freeway will impact disastrously on the most sensitive wetland section of the Braeside Park.

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Letter to the Premier, Hon. Dr. Denis Napthine – RE: Macarthur Wind Farm

Saturday 20th April 2013,
Letter to:

Hon. Dr. Denis Napthine,
Premier of Victoria,
Level 1, 1 Treasury Place,
Melbourne, VIC 3002

Dear Premier,
Congratulations for supporting the 140-turbine Macarthur wind farm in your electorate. I hope, as the Herald Sun reported last week that you truly believe “those opportunities should be pursued at every opportunity.”

Can you please now support households going solar by improving subsidies but also negotiating better feed-in-tariff terms, which are at the moment so low to be almost negligible. There is also a lot of inequity between those households who are trying to ‘do their bit’ because depending on when you were able to afford solar panels the feed-in tariff varies considerably.

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Re: Changes to the Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act

Letter to:

Review of the Code of Practice for Timber Production,
Forests and Parks Division,
Department of Sustainability & Environment,
PO Box 500,
East Melbourne, VIC 3002

Dear Sir,

We object most strongly to the changes to the Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act permitting the secretary of the Department of Sustainability & Environment to overrule the Act to enable logging of coupes under the Code of Forest Practice for increased timber production and by so doing deceive the public into believing that the Act still protects valuable old growth forest from destruction.

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Letter: ENRC Inquiry into EES process in Victoria

Letter to:

Matthew Guy,
Minister of Planning,
Parliament House,
Spring Street,
Melbourne.

Dear Minister,

As a long established conservation group we are very much aware of the impact large public work projects can have on the environment. We therefore support the recommendations that the Environment and Natural Resources Committee (ENRC) have produced to strengthen the EES process which at present is considered ineffective and easily politicized.

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Re: Foreign Ownership of Agricultural Land and Water Rights

Letter to:

 

Bill Shorten MP,
Assistant Treasurer,
Federal Labor Party,
Parliament House,
Canberra, ACT 2600

Dear Sir,

It is pleasing to note that at last the Coalition and Greens are prepared to join in a Senate Inquiry into foreign investment and sale of agricultural farm land by forming a rural affairs and transport committee to check on how the natural interest test is applied to agricultural land and agri-businesses purchased by foreign companies and foreign sovereign funds.

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Enquiry to the Climate Change Committee

Letter to:

Mark Dreyfus,
Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Change and Energy Efficiency,
Shop 6, Parkmore Shopping Centre,
Cheltenham Road,
Keysborough. 3173.

Dear Sir,

The State Liberal Government abandoned the closure of one of Australia’s dirtiest brown coal power plants thus abandoning the legislated state target of a 20% cut in carbon dioxide emissions this decade. The State Government has also embarked on an aggressive expansion of exploration licenses for the brown coal industry into some of Victoria’s most spectacular natural environments – Ninety Mile Beach, Gippsland Lakes and the Strezlecki Ranges.

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Submission: Inquiry to EES Process in Victoria

Submission to:

Executive Officer
Environmental & Natural Resources Committee,
Parliament House,
Spring Street,
East Melbourne. VIC 3002

Dear Sir,

In responding to the invitation to make a submission to the Inquiry into the Environmental Effects Statement process in Victoria it is proposed to use as an example of a successful inquiry of an Environment Effects Statement – the Port Phillip Bay Channel Deepening Environmental Effects Statement 2004. The rigorous six weeks inquiry was conducted by an expert panel consisting of a skilled chairman and three members with years of scientific backgrounds and experience in marine and coastal management.

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Submission to the Channel Deepening Project for Port Phillip Bay

Author: Mary Rimington

Victoria’s coasts are precious and locations like Port Phillip Bay are an intensively used environment. Activity and processes on the coast, inland in the catchment, and off shore in the ocean, have an influence on the health and sustainability of the coastal environment.

In view of the well documented evidence of sea level rise, the availability of alternatives, and the adverse environmental impact, we are opposed to the deepening of the Rip and dredging of the South Channel to allow larger container vessels entry to Port Phillip Bay.

Our objection to the deepening of the Rip is based on the fact that there is now sound evidence of sea level rise as a result of climate change, and that even a 1-2 cm rise in tide levels will intensify the beach erosion and flooding already occurring on the eastern, most vulnerable side of Port Phillip Bay.

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Global Warming and Port Phillip Bay

Author:  Mary Rimington
Date:  10 October 2001
Submission:  An edited extract from the MBCL Submission to the Kingston Planning Scheme (Amendment C8)

Although there has been in excess of thirty years of warnings of the impact of global warming and climate change on the heavily populated coastal fringes of Port Phillip Bay, especially from Aspendale to Patterson River, no attempt has been made to curtail development on the eastern most vulnerable side of Port Phillip Bay.

Two of Australia’s internationally renowned scientists, both previously based at the CSIRO Atmospheric Research Centre located in Aspendale, Dr Graeme Pearman and Dr Barrie Pittock were issuing warnings of climate change impacts in 1986.  The scientists’ warnings were heeded by the former City of Chelsea, who produced their own Greenhouse Strategy Report in November 1990.

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