Presentations to Council Public Access 12 November 2025
Stephanie Chiu’s presentation on planning for housing in Batemans Bay
Beyond meeting individual needs, the provision of the right type of housing in the right place and at the right time is critical to the economic and social wellbeing of the whole community. – Gary Fielding, Chair of the Regional Housing Taskforce, NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment
Djamaga bumulaga njindiwan – good morning everyone!
Thank you for the opportunity to speak about our shared future here in Yuin Country. As we listen and discuss plans being made about the land of the Walbunja people, I ask that we consider the weight and responsibility of such a task. I ask that we consider the ongoing plea of all indigenous people across the world – no conversations about us, without us. I thank councillors and staff for the work you’ve done so far, and urge for further work to ensure that the voices of the community are heard in policies and plans which impact them directly.
Firstly, the adopted Housing Strategy, is an example amongst many, where there was barely enough time for the community to read it, let alone respond. While I am excited to see the benefits of a housing working group working with council staff to guide the Strategy, it could be vastly improved. I have included my response to it in my presentation and request that these be reviewed and considered.
Today I will speak to tangible steps for better planning for housing in Batemans Bay in relation to the Draft Batemans Bay Masterplan as the vehicle for Council’s $200,000 grant agreement with the State Government, for the “preparation of an LEP amendment and development control plans to implement the Batemans Bay Master Plan” with an indicative dwelling yield of 8000 which I’ve included.
Let’s decouple the existing draft masterplan from the grant.
Last month two Urban Design and Landscape Architecture planning experts from the University of New South Wales brought their students to Batemans Bay to engage with the masterplan. These highly regarded voices in the industry left a scathing review of the plan and process in an interview with About Regional. Essentially providing us with a high level third party assessment by respected senior practitioners and academics in planning, they describe ‘...a lack of genuine engagement with the community which is normal best practice for a master plan’ and end with “Ideally, this master plan would be stopped and independently peer reviewed”.
In response to these clear and direct concerns, my recommendation to councillors is for the draft master plan process to be halted and decoupled from the grant from NSW. This decoupling would not prevent Council from utilising the grant, but allow the Strategic Planning Team to focus on fulfilling the grant’s primary aim in enabling more diverse and affordable housing.
I also recommend that an independent urban planning peer review be undertaken of all documentation and processes, such that we can learn ahead of developing future urban plans. Independent peer reviews start from first principles, and provide a more impartial evaluation to maintain quality, improve performance and provide credibility with the aim to enhance the quality and alignment with best practice. I have included pages from the Byron Bay Masterplan as an excellent example of a regional urban design plan for your reference.
Now focusing on the grant, our first foundation to set is an appropriate timeframe. In the words of our visiting Urban Design Planning experts, ‘master planning should be based on realistic horizons with a transparent line of sight over five-year, 10-year and 20-year horizons.’ Consultants for the Housing Strategy worked up to 2041, an industry standard of 20 years from current census data. Strategically, the State Government’s guide for housing, our very own Local Strategic Planning Statement and Community Strategic Plan are 20 year documents. All strategies and plans that sit under these documents, including the grant to increase housing in Batemans Bay, should therefore remain consistent.
A 75 year timespan would be inconsistent, unprecedented, and likely inaccurate. With this context, the draft masterplan’s 75 year timeframe is an unsubstantiated overreach to inflate population numbers and push development beyond the evidence. It’s clear from submissions summary presented last week that this timeframe is widely criticised, considered unrealistic and unfeasible. My recommendation to councillors is to reduce the timeframe to 10-20 years, and advocate for the removal of any reference to 75 years when assessing any options for LEP amendments related to this grant for Batemans Bay, in addition to any short-medium term plans that affect the Shire.
So then, what is an appropriate projected population and dwelling for the grant?
After addressing an inflated 75-year timeframe, we can now look at the evidence-based population figures relevant to future housing needs in Batemans Bay.
In the State government grant application, Council staff gave an indicative dwelling yield for Batemans Bay of 8,000 dwellings, potentially housing 16,000 people at an average of 2 people per dwelling. 16,000 people, 8,000 dwellings.
In comparison, the Local Housing Strategy Background Report by Judith Stubbs in 2023 estimated a population increase of ~9,400 people and ~4,700 dwellings by 2041 across the entire Shire, using forecast.id data.
Since then population projections have dropped even further in forecast.id’s late 2024 update, projecting a population increase of ~5700 in 2041 and only ~2860 dwellings – again for the entire shire, not Batemans Bay.
To put this into perspective, Council’s indicative yield for the Bay alone is now projected to be 280% of the entirety of the Shire’s growth by 2041. Additionally, construction costs have risen drastically since the original dwelling yield forecast, meaning that such inflated and unrealistic growth would come with an even less feasible price tag.
To have any chance at a good foundation for planning, my recommendation to councillors is for the report to be updated and any gaps filled by Judith Stubbs or another third party like a tertiary research institution, such as, the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI) or other housing research organisations. And for the report to be inclusive but not limited to the calculation occupancy rate changes and typology by age cohort, visitor numbers, feasibility of construction costs with updated data from local and potential developers, builders and real estate agents, analysis of the masterplan submissions for an assessment framework of community priorities.
My final recommendation is to submit a grant scope variation, reducing the ‘indicative dwelling yield’ to an evidenced based number referenced off a consultants report, and for a time variation, so we don’t have to rush this vital process of setting an important foundation before making a planning proposal for LEP amendments.
Councillors, I request this Council to strive towards best practice in planning by investing in a peer review of the Batemans Bay Masterplan and with the General Manager continue to review performance and service delivery around this State grant, ensuring a good foundation which enables an excellent urban design response for Batemans Bay.
Stephanie Chiu – Registered Architect NSW
A Better Eurobodalla (ABE) presentation Regarding Public Access to Council Information,
with Specific Reference to the draft Batemans Bay Master Plan
Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to address Council. I am presenting as Co-Convenor of A Better Eurobodalla (ABE), a community forum dedicated to having open and inclusive government in our region. ABE expects that before governments, at any level, make decisions that will impact their communities, they will undertake broad and meaningful consultation, listen to and share expert advice, and proceed using a transparent decision-making process.
Today ABE is applying these principles to public access to Council information, with specific reference to the draft Batemans Bay Master Plan (BBMP).
Public access to government information in NSW is regulated under the Government Information (Public Access) Act 2009, more commonly known as the GIPA Act. This Act is administered by the NSW Information and Privacy Commission using processes outlined in the GIPA Regulation 2018.
The provision of public access to Council information is a key element of achieving transparency and accountability in governance, as articulated by the NSW Information and Privacy Commission :
The objects of the GIPA Act are to maintain and advance a system of responsible and representative democratic Government that is open, accountable, fair and effective.
The GIPA Act:
- authorises and encourages the proactive release of information by NSW public sector agencies
- gives members of the public a legally enforceable right to access government information
- ensures that access to government information is restricted only when there is an overriding public interest against releasing that information.
The GIPA Act applies to all NSW government agencies, and also extends to Ministers and their staff, local councils, state-owned corporations, courts in their non-judicial functions, and to certain public authorities, such as universities.
Given the importance of public access to Council information, together with Council’s obligations under the GIPA Act, it should (theoretically at least) be a straightforward process to access the data and assumptions used by Council as the basis of their successful application for a $200,000 NSW Government grant to develop a planning proposal based on the draft BBMP which claims to deliver 8,000 new dwellings. The grant conditions specify that grant content and information are subject to provisions of the NSW GIPA Act.
However, in this case the gap between legislated theory and Council practice has proven to be a yawning gulf.
Councillor Mayne originally asked for the relevant data and assumptions as part of QoN 25/001 at the 27th May Council meeting, with Council Staff responding that the information would be included in the probity report, which we are still waiting for.
Following Council’s response to Councillor Mayne’s QoN, on the 16th June 2025 I made an informal request for provision of the relevant data and assumptions at a meeting with Council staff, and was verbally advised that this would be expedited. However, I was subsequently advised that I would need to prepare a formal GIPA request to access the information. I submitted that request on 11th July 2025.
Having not received any information within the 4 week response time specified in the GIPA Act, I contacted Council and was advised that a revised decision date of 22nd August would now apply. I contacted Council again on the 1st September indicating that I had received no information, and was then advised that I had to agree to a revised due date of 11th September.
After agreeing to this extension, I eventually received correspondence from Council on the 11th September advising that they had agreed to release the requested information. It then took another 18 days for Council to provide me with this information.
It had taken nearly 3 and a half months for Council to provide information I had originally been advised would be expedited on the 16th June.
Then, after examining the information supplied by Council I discovered that the data and assumptions had not been supplied, with the relevant officer’s statement indicating :
“No, there are hundreds of pages of data that can lead to conclusions. All you need is a calculator.”
This patronising response is unsatisfactory coming from an organization that is legislatively required to be working with and for the community. It falls far short of the transparency and openness required under the GIPA Act.
Given this failure of due process, I am now formally requesting that Council provide the data and assumptions which have informed its estimates of additional dwellings in the draft BBMP.
In future, Council needs to be more transparent in relation to the strategic planning documents placed on public exhibition so that the community can easily identify and access the information sources used and test the analyses and assumptions made in these documents. In this respect, draft BBMP fails miserably. It contains no references and few clues as to where the information has been sourced, what assumptions were made and how its conclusions have been derived.
In the isolated cases where comparison is possible, significant contradictions or inconsistencies are readily evident. For example, the supporting studies available on Council’s BBMP webpage all utilise 20-40 year time horizons (as specified in Council’s Request for Tender), whereas the stated time horizon for the BBMP is 75 years. No explanation is provided in the BBMP for this significant discrepancy.
All strategic plans should clearly acknowledge sources and provide web-links etc where possible. This is standard practice in any serious strategic planning document.
It would also be a significant step forward in relation to transparency and public communication if Council were to progressively provide access to the information it compiles during work on the draft BBMP. For example, last week’s agenda papers indicated that Council had commissioned and received a geotechnical analysis of the draft BBMP site, yet this study is not available on Council’s web page. Access to this study is vital so that interested community members and potential developers are better informed about the suitability of sites proposed for high-rise development in the draft BBMP.
Finally, Council needs to facilitate access to submissions on publicly exhibited documents. The 10 page consultation report on the draft BBMP included in last week’s agenda papers was highly selective and clearly insufficient in scope and scale to do justice to the volume and variety of feedback Council received during the exhibition period for draft BBMP.
Respondents should be given the choice to put their submissions in :
i)anonymously, or
ii)with personal details redacted, or
iii)with full disclosure of all details.
This approach is already common practice with many other government agencies and institutions and it would be a major step forward in addressing the current lack of trust and transparency associated with Council’s public consultation processes.
In this presentation I have highlighted significant problems with Council’s public information access and strategic planning processes together with some suggestions for addressing these shortcomings. ABE trusts that the suggestions outlined above will be adopted as a priority, as befits this key element of implementing transparency and accountability in governance.
Thank You,
Brett Stevenson,
Co-Convenor, ABE ( A Better Eurobodalla)