Pathetic NSW Government response to West Yamba concerns

This question was asked by Sylvia Hale MLC of the NSW Minister for Planning Kristina Keneally on 26 March 2009 (session 54-1) and printed in Questions & Answers Paper No. 92.

West Yamba LEP

1. Given the Mid North Coast Regional Strategy has identified West Yamba as a low lying area, are there major development constraints in the face of climate change impacts, specifically flooding and inundation, in West Yamba?
   
2. Will consideration be given to the latest climate science and sea level rise predictions when assessing the draft West Yamba LEP Amendment based on new data contained in the Government's Draft Sea Level Rise Policy Statement and coming out of the Copenhagen conference?
   
3. Clarence Valley Council has determined that residential development can be safely achieved by filling the West Yamba floodplain to half a metre above their projections of the 2090 maximum flood level, basing its calculations for safe floor levels on the 2007 International Panel on Climate Change predictions of less than 59cm. However, new predictions by scientists meeting in Copenhagen in 2009 estimate sea level will rise to double the level of the 2007 predictions. Should the Department and councils such as Clarence Valley Council therefore be revising their estimates of sea level rise and therefore the West Yamba LEP?

It took just on five weeks for this pathetic reply to come back on 29 April 2009 and to be printed in a Questions & Answers Paper on 5 May 2009.

Answer—

1. The Mid North Coast Regional Strategy identifies West Yamba as a site that requires issues to be resolved prior to rezoning. The Strategy requires that the issue of flooding needs to be resolved to determine the future development potential of the site.
   
2. –3.The draft Local Environmental Plan (LEP) will be reviewed against the Government's draft Sea Level Rise policy and the floodplain studies undertaken by Council.

Not good enough Minister Keneally, just not good enough.

In light of the problems highlighted in How serious is local government about protecting against climate change impacts? Not very it seems, if it is Clarence Valley Council, later in Is Clarence Valley Council being honest with NSW Planning Minister Keneally over proposed West Yamba development? and the letters you have received from concerned individuals/community groups, this answer was insulting to Yamba residents in its brevity and obfuscation.

This is the road in and out of Yamba, Minister Keneally.

Are you getting the picture yet?

Photograph from Google Images