MEDIA RELEASE
Sandon Point Community Picket
16 September 2007

Residents protecting Sandon Point’s magnificent coastal environment and Aboriginal heritage will challenge NSW Minister for Planning and developers’ legislation this week. The fight for a coastal regional park at Bulli will continue in Sydney’s Land & Environment Court, 18 & 19 September, 10am.

Applicant Jill Walker and thousands of the surrounding community have fought a long-running battle to save this last Illawarra coastal floodplain and significant Aboriginal meeting place.  After the 2003 Commission of Inquiry recommended conserving a large area of open space including the heritage listed turpentine forest and floodplain, the Minister changed EP&A Act legislation.  This allowed Anglican Retirement Villages to join forces with Stockland in a Major Project Part 3A application for a mega-subdivision and nursing home that is ecologically unsustainable.

“Frank Sartor’s draconian Part 3A legislation must be stopped before he destroys every coastal village in the state.  The community should not have to fight against this dishonest government; but after the independent Commission of Inquiry report in 2003, the Minister simply moved the legislation goalposts, sidelining the community,” Jill Walker said.

Activist Jill Merrin agreed, saying, “This case has much wider implications than Sandon Point.  It applies to a whole body of state-wide over-development that does not meet ecologically sustainable principles.”

The Environmental Defenders Office (EDO) is acting for Sandon Point, and barrister Matthew Baird heads an experienced legal team whose successes include the Anvil Hill coalmining case, where Minister Sartor failed to consider future carbon impacts.

Contact: Jill Walker 0434 529 817,  
Legal Information: Environmental Defender’s Office Josie Walker 92 626 989