Forum Farce
‘Growth through imposition’ – you’ve got to be kidding! More like ‘How I gave up my democratic rights and learned to love the dam!’
Up until Sam Bailey’s presentation I was very disappointed with what we were hearing at the so called forum (a public meeting for OPEN discussion) held last Wednesday evening (6 Aug 2008) at Dungog High School. It had been promoted as a chance to hear from and discuss issues with tourism experts and other dam affected communities about making the best of it. Each of the 6 speakers prior to Sam made numerous assumptions and presented various ‘facts’ which left one wondering if they had really thought about who they were talking to – do they really know or care about our situation or were they at the wrong meeting?
Glenn Wall, Mayor of Dungog Shire spoke of how difficult it is to make decisions on behalf of the community and then highlighted the demand for small rural lifestyle living blocks – NOT LIKELY IN THIS SHIRE WITH THE SHADOW OF A HUGE DAM LOOMING.
Bob Hawes from the Property Council of Australia questioned the assumptions and validity of the numbers in the Lower Hunter Regional Strategy – from which population predictions have been used in the post hoc justification for the Tillegra Dam proposal. Further, he clearly stated that the existing trend for tourism in our region, of visiting friends and relatives, is stagnating and not sustainable. ANOTHER LARGE BODY OF WATER NEAR TO THE COASTAL FRINGE IS NOT ABOUT TO TURN THIS AROUND.
Cameron Archer, new member of the Board of the Hunter Economic Development Corporation, made outrageous and ill-informed assumptions about water management and the effect of the dam – that the region would be better off with a dam (what evidence!) and that there is undoubtedly a need to store more water (we already have the amongst the highest world per capita water storage!). His one relevant comment was about the linkage between electoral cycles and government spending. YES, CAMERON WE KNOW – IT IS EXACTLY WHERE THIS ILL-CONCEIVED DAM PROPOSAL CAME FROM.
Brett Peterkin, on behalf of Meander Dam representatives (who couldn’t make it) read from a short unreadable PowerPoint presentation about a popular irrigation dam in Tasmania that is about twice the size of our nearby Lostock Dam. SO WE ALREADY HAVE A DAM LIKE THIS IN THE REGION – WHERE IS THE GREAT TOURIST THRONG?
Gae Swain, Mayor of Gunnedah Shire Council gave a passionate and very positive account of their community’s embrace of an irrigation/flood mitigation dam that directly benefits their community. She stressed the need for community awareness, discussion and input…THIS IS JUST WHAT HAS NOT HAPPENED WITH US FOR A DAM PROPOSAL THAT MAY BENEFIT SUBURBAN AND INDUSTRIAL USERS WITH DRINKING QUALITY WATER.
Norman Lovemore, Project Manager for Leighton Contractors building the Shannon Creek storage facility in the Clarence Valley, told of much goodwill and community involvement in a dam directly benefiting the local community with off-site storage to ameliorate the dam’s effect on the environmental flows of the stream. THIS IS NOT RELEVANT TO OUR SITUATION.
What was the relevance of all this to the evening’s intention’s? The literal handful of students that were there were bored and very disappointed and were left wondering what it was all about.
The only highlight was an inspiring and entertaining account of overcoming the odds by Sam Bailey. I left feeling very encouraged – we should not give up or fight against an unnecessary, uneconomic and non-environmentally sustainable proposal to dam the Williams River!