Council to decide fate of the eruv
MORE delays have beset the North Shore eruv due to a planning office bungle.
MORE delays have beset the North Shore eruv due to a planning office bungle.
A Ku-ring-gai Planning Panel meeting last Wednesday lasted less than 10 minutes, after panel member Lindsay Fletcher started proceedings by saying he didn’t feel comfortable forming an opinion without seeing the site.
He moved a motion that the matter be deferred so he could see the properties before making a determination on the 11 development applications.
Fletcher then blamed Ku-ring-gai Council, saying he didn’t have enough time to see the site because the panel was given short notice.
But Ku-ring-gai Mayor Ian Cross hit back, slamming Fletcher on Thursday morning and arguing his determination was based “on illogical and spurious grounds”.
He said the planning panel members should have asked for a site inspection and not wasted the time of council staff and hundreds of residents.
NSW Planning Minister Brad Hazzard disbanded the planning panel on Thursday afternoon, and a decision on the North Shore eruv was put back into council’s hands. Ku-ring-gai Council is not expected to decide the fate of the eruv until next month, but council’s development assessment staff have recommended that the eruv applications lodged should be approved.
David Guth, a member of the North Shore eruv planning committee, was left deflated after the events of last week.
“It was disappointing that the panel believe they didn’t have enough information,” he said. “We don’t see that anything has changed in the context and the application should still be determined based on planning grounds.”
JOSHUA LEVI
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