MITCHELL Shire councillors have rescinded a planning permit for a multi-dwelling subdivision on Kilmore’s George Street only a month after approving it.
At the most recent meeting, councillors called the decision back after multiple councillors said they had misunderstood both the lot sizes and number of dwellings the block would support, as well as its position within Kilmore’s equine precinct.
The 2525-square metre block at 33 George Street would be home to five dwellings in addition to an existing dwelling on the property under the subdivision plan.
While councillors voted to approve proposal at the February meeting, several criticised the plans and said State Government regulations had forced their hands.
Most of the councillors conceded if they had voted against the proposal, the applicant was likely to win a challenge at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, VCAT.
But at the March 20 meeting Cr Louise Bannister moved to rescind the permit, and said it should be brought back ‘for further discussion’.
Cr David Lowe opposed Cr Bannister’s motion, calling it ‘unfortunate’.
“We’ve not been presented with any new information that we didn’t have when discussing it at the last council meeting and I believe this is setting a really unfortunate precedent,” he said.
“We all stated at the last meeting that there was a high probability that if we rejected the application, it would go to VCAT and would be overturned.
“Nothing has changed except that we have now run out of time and the applicant can go to VCAT anyway.
“All we [will] have done is waste another $5000 or $10,000 of ratepayers’ money to achieve nothing when we end up in VCAT.”
Cr Chisholm said he understood Cr Lowe’s position but had been unaware the property was located within Kilmore’s equine precinct when he voted.
Council has vowed to undertake planning work for the future of the equine precinct, and Cr Chisholm said ‘further exploration’ of the area was needed.
“Sometimes you’ve got to make a stand. Possibly Cr Lowe will be right and we’ll lose this one, but we’ve got to make a stand as a council,” he said.
“This is setting a precedent [where] every application that comes will try to maximise the block yield of their development, and that’s a poor outcome for Kilmore and a poor outcome for the shire.”
Cr Rob Eldridge opposed the rescission motion, disagreeing with Cr Chisholm’s view that council needed to make a stand.
“We have gone against so many applications and been creamed at VCAT for a lot more marginal than this in the past,” he said.
“At some point we have to … say ‘are we representing the best interests of the community by going in against something that is a clear lost case at VCAT?’”
Cr Bannister said council rarely rescinded planning permits and had clear cause to do so.
“This council uses rescissions very sparsely and they are there in the governance rules,” she said.
“There was discussion on this item in the last meeting in which councillors were talking about things that weren’t part of the item. They were discussing the number of [dwellings] that were proposed there incorrectly, they were discussing land size for that housing incorrectly.
“This has been brought back because the discussion was incorrect. It’s been brought back to show that councillors care about ensuring decisions are made on correct information provided and correct information discussed during these meetings.
“It’s unfortunate regarding the timelines for VCAT, however we have to ensure that when an item is discussed incorrectly, we pull ourselves up on it and say ‘let’s bring it back and make sure that discussion is correct’.
“Otherwise, we’re going to lose confidence from the community and those we make decisions on.”
The motion of rescission passed, with councillors Bannister, Chisholm, Nathan Clark, Rhonda Sanderson and Mayor Fiona Stevens in favour and councillors Lowe, Eldridge and Bob Cornish opposed.
