Saving Point Nepean
E-letter No 4
Dear members and supporters
Please sign on to the Community Consensus Statement on Point Nepean
VNPA and the National Trust of Australia (Victoria) are facilitating a
Community Consensus Statement on Point Nepean (see below) in the lead up
to the closing of tenders (6 October) for the lease of the 90 hectares
of Commonwealth land at Point Nepean.
The Consensus Statement is a reflection of the Victorian Community
Expression of Interest (EOI) in Point Nepean (you can see it on
www.vnpa.org.au ) facilitated by VNPA and the National Trust.
At the EOI's heart was the return of Point Nepean to Victoria for
inclusion within a national park.
The Consensus Statement reaffirms that objective and also articulates
the community concerns about the leasing process for Point Nepean
recently announced by the Commonwealth Government (for more detail see
www.vnpa.org.au).
We are very keen to gain your support, or that of your group, for the
Point Nepean campaign by signing on to the Consensus Statement.
If you or your group wishes to sign on all you need do is send Chris
Smyth a note by snail mail or email, or give him a call, or fax it back
to him with the name and group's contact details (Chris's details are
below). If you know of other groups or people that you believe would be
keen to sign on, please forward this email to them.
We will eventually release the consensus statement and the list of
groups, individuals etc that have signed on to send a clear message of
the widespread and growing community support for Saving Point Nepean.
If you can get your details to Chris by noon on Tuesday 30 September it
would be much appreciated.
COMMUNITY CONSENSUS STATEMENT ON THE FUTURE OF
COMMONWEALTH LAND AT POINT NEPEAN
We the undersigned community groups, associations, institutions,
agencies, companies and individuals concerned about the future of 311
hectares of Commonwealth land at Point Nepean state that:
POINT NEPEAN is a national treasure, an icon of Australia's rich natural
and cultural heritage, with magnificent 19th and 20th-century
heritage-listed buildings, breathtaking coastscapes and seascapes, and
threatened coastal moonah woodland.
POINT NEPEAN is endangered by the Commonwealth Government's impending
break up of the 311 hectares of Commonwealth land 205 hectares to the
Victorian Government, 17.6 hectares to the local council, and the
remaining 85-90 hectares to private developers under lease.
We the undersigned oppose the Commonwealth Government's lease of the
advertised 85-90 hectares of Commonwealth land at Point Nepean (by 1
November 2003) because it will:
* disintegrate the ownership, management and control of Point
Nepean's exceptional natural and cultural heritage
* threaten the integrity, fabric and spatial association of
the Quarantine Station buildings, and encourage linear and
overdevelopment along the shoreline
* be contrary to the Community Master Plan's vision of a
'public park managed as a whole'
* exempt developers from public scrutiny and local and state
planning schemes and regulations designed to protect area's of
significant natural and cultural heritage such as Point Nepean
* enable intensification of development simply by the private
developer and the Commonwealth Government agreeing to change lease
conditions or to convert the land to freehold
* establish prior use rights for private developers who could
use them to prevent future governments and the local council removing
inappropriate and excessive developments as a means to improve the
protection and management of Point Nepean
* avoid the protection of new national heritage legislation
that comes into force in 2004.
We the undersigned urge that:
The Commonwealth and Victorian governments forge a partnership with the
Victorian community to protect all of Point Nepean in a national park,
with the Victorian Government upholding its commitment to cover the
ongoing management and restoration costs, and the Commonwealth
Government providing the land.
All of the 311 hectares of Commonwealth Land at Point Nepean, including
the Quarantine Station and Police Point, be transferred to the Victorian
Government and added to the adjoining Mornington Peninsula National Park
under the management of one agency Parks Victoria.
Signed for and on behalf of:
__________________________________________________________________
IN OTHER NEWS
Despite the National Trust's avowed commitment to being apolitical, from
time to time it is involved in campaigns that regrettably fall along
party lines. The National Trust's only interest s protection of Point
Nepean.
The decisions made about Point Nepean endure well beyond the term of
individual governments and it is the decisions and not who makes them
that are of paramount consideration.
Parks Australia will not be involved in Point Nepean
Mrs Fran Bailey, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Defence
on 23 September, confirmed to VNPA that the landlord under the lease
would be the Department of Defence and that Parks Australia would not be
gifted the land or involved in the leasing arrangements.
No hotel in Victorian Community Expression of Interest
The Victorian Community Expression of Interest facilitated by the VNPA
and the National Trust of Australia (Victoria) for the EOI process for
sale of the site was a visionary statement about how a national park
could be established, managed, maintained and used at Point Nepean.
The uses for the proposed national park at Point Nepean would not be
determined until the land is transferred by the Commonwealth Government
to Victoria, its national park status is approved by State Parliament,
and a community-based consultation process prepares a management plan
for the park that first establishes the conservation, management,
research, education tourism and other objectives of the park and later
selects appropriate uses. This is the right and proper way to proceed,
rather than proposing to use the available land and buildings first and
then consider protection as an afterthought.
Under the EOI's suggestions accommodation at Point Nepean, were it
approved by the national park management plan, would be only for those
people involved in the education, research, conservation and other
programs at Point Nepean. And when considering the use of just one of
the buildings on site, the Commanding Officers House, alternative
suggestions in the EOI were a small conference venue and a training
restaurant for student chefs and hospitality students.
At the heart of the EOI is the integrated management of all the
Commonwealth land at Point Nepean (311 hectares) with the two Mornington
Peninsula National Park areas at Point Nepean (310 hectares) under one
management plan and one management agency. This endorses the Community
Master Plan's vision of a 'public park managed as a whole'.
The EOI then suggested that the Quarantine Station buildings (about 30
hectares of the 611 hectares) be leased by a ministerially appointed
Board of Management accountable to State Parliament and comprising
community representatives and experts in the field of park management
and built heritage conservation and restoration.
This is very different to what the Commonwealth Government has
announced. It is carving up the 311 hectares of Commonwealth land into
at least three management areas and leasing out 90 hectares of this to
private commercial developers who could sublease to other parties and
thus further disintegrate management, control and accountability.
RING YOUR BELL FOR POINT NEPEAN!
JOIN THE RALLY AT POINT NEPEAN
BE THERE ON SUNDAY 5 OCTOBER AT 2PM
How to get there? Just follow the signs once you arrive at the National
Park Visitor Centre to the west of Portsea township.
Why ring a bell? A bell is a marine distress signal. We will be ringing
the bell to warn of the serious threat to Point Nepean. Please come.
More details will follow in subsequent Saving Point Nepean E-letter.
And if you have your own bell, bring it along.
Please forward this e-letter to your relatives, friends and colleagues.
Chris Smyth
Marine Campaign Officer
VNPA
Level 3 60 Leicester Street
Carlton VIC 3053
Ph: 03 9341 6512
Fax: 03 9347 5199
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
The National Trust is a non-government community organisation that
relies on membership subscriptions and property entrance fees for its
income. Donations of $2 or more are tax deductible.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Tel: 9656 9800 Fax: 9650 0004
"Advice and opinions expressed by Trust members and staff are
proffered in good faith but on the basis that no legal liability is
accepted by the Trust or the individual concerned."
.
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