Local musicians and performers will be donating their talents to help save
the St Clair Recreation Park in a fundraising event at the Governor
Hindmarsh Hotel this Sunday 10th October 2010.

The event will also be the launch of a mayoral and council election campaign
by members of the Save St Clair Committee.

Artists include rock-cabaret group Tongue ‘n Cheek, The Adelaide Ukulele
Appreciation Society, bluesman Anthony d’Antonio, 70′s gurs Flashback and
the infamous Lord Stompy on harmonica.

All proceeds from the event will aid the Save St Clair Council election
campaign.

Note from Kirsten Alexander about the above event:

The St Clair group are having a show at the Gov on the
10th October at 1pm to support independent candidates running for
Charles Sturt Council positions – it costs $20 per person or $30 per
couple, children are free. It should be a really fun afternoon with
lots of local musicians throwing their support behind it, so please
help us by coming along and by spreading the word to your friends and
networks.
Thanks and Regards Kirsten Alexander
Enquires can be made to Kelly on 0405 385 117

Hi Everyone – below is a copy of an invitation to attend a rally at St Clair Oval on this Saturday 7th August. We have extended this invitation to all of the other groups that we are aware of that share our concern over the loss of open space amid the rampant development focus of the current government. Please do your best to come along to St Clair Oval on Saturday and bring banners, signs etc telling the government how you feel about being ignored.

We are also holding an information session for prospective Council candidates immediately following the next Council meeting on 9th August. The Council meeting is at 7pm and the information session will be at 8pm at St Margarets Church Hall on the corner of Port Rd and Woodville Rd. This will be a SCRRA Committee meeting rather than a general members meeting (just to try to keep numbers workable), unless you are planning to run as a candidate for Council please do not attend this meeting; however we would love to see you at the next SCRRA Members meeting to be held after the Council meeting on 23rd August at 8pm.

We would also like some feedback from you on an alternative plan for St Clair incorporating much more open space than those proposed by Council and the LMC. We will have copies at the rally for you to look at and comment on. A representative from David Ridgeway MLC will be there, as will Stateline and hopefully Today Tonight and ABC News will be able to make it too.

Details of rally are: 12pm at St Clair Oval, Woodville Rd on Sat 7th August

An invitation from St Clair to a Rally to Save Our Open Space – Stand Up Against Development Happy Government before the Bulldozers Come to Where You Live!!

Developers are funding the government and the government is raping and pillaging our precious open space and rural land to pay them back the favour!!

The government clearly did not learn anything at the last election and has continued on its merry way at St Clair, Cheltenham, Glenside, Mt Barker, Gawler, Mt Pleasant, McLaren Vale and on and on and on!!! They have not listened and do not care!!!

While the Federal election is in full swing, this is your opportunity to show that you do care about open space and that you vote!! Come along with your group’s signs and banners and join us at St Clair in a show of solidarity and concern.

Sausage sizzle provided, and lots of community spirit!! See you there!

Regards Kirsten Alexander, SCCRA Chair

I attended the above workshop arranged by Council at the West Torrens Football Clubrooms on Wednesday 21st April 2010.  There were around 80 people in attendance, with each of the 9 tables of around 8 people having 2 Council staff, plus a number of other Council staff & members, including the Mayor Harold Anderson and the CEO.  The workshop was led by a Gilbert Rochecouste, employed by the to guide us in, I believe, accepting Council’s unmovable point of view.

The workshop commenced with  Mr Rochecouste providing a summary of what was proposed.  His view was that the precinct would be revitalised (with an additional 2,000 new residents & 4 new roads into Woodville Road – which he omitted to mention), by new shops, restaurants, cafes and markets as well as “Indian Traders” (what the?), & multi-story high density housing.  Mr Rochecouste claimed that such developments worked internationally and were warranted in the St Clair development to draw people to the Woodville Road precinct, with a particular target being those on the south side of Port Road (e.g. the QEH district) who currently had difficulty utilising the area.

The workshop progressed with a number of by-table discussions, wherein thoughts were gathered on participants’ vision for the area, and then compiled into lists by council staff.

Some of the key issues raised were:

• The development would totally change the heritage character of the Woodville area, something that was not favored.
• The increase in traffic into Woodville Road from new roads in the development, noting that all who lived there would not necessarily utilise the train station for transport to and from work, given that the rail network access to major employment centres other than the CBD was limited.  Each participant was asked to prepare post-it notes with the 3 major opportunities and  3 major negatives.  By a significant majority, traffic increase was the major concern, with the post-it notes covering over 40% of the window space allocated to stick them.  In summarising the 11 major issues identified however, Council staff produced a point sheet which just simply omitted to include that major issue, that is until I approached staff to rectify that anomaly.  If council does not even take record or notice of the most prominent of concerns, what hope do we have in being listened to and our concerns and opinions being taken notice of and acted upon by this Council?
• The lack of parking facilities.  One Council staff-member suggested the potential for underground parking, however that was quickly ridiculed by those at my table based upon the high ground-water table, which would ensure flooding of any underground parking development with some certainty.  Interestingly, I noted a conversation between one council staffer and a participant wherein the participant suggested Woodville would soon be beachfront.  The council staffer suggested his view that existing coastal suburbs were indeed at risk. If this is the case, what are Council doing about it?
• The security risks to children playing on St Clair Reserve (or what’s left of it), noting that the new high story TOD will overlook  playing and playground areas and form a barrier that Woodville High students must pass through on the way to the train station.  The sort of people that will live in this type of development must be considered in my view. As the high density housing will not have yards for pets or children, the likelihood of a typical family-oriented development is nil.  We must question just what type of people Council are targeting to attract to this area, given they most certainly won’t be families.
• Alarmingly, there was a suggestion by one group that a major shopping centre should be incorporated in the development (where will the space for that come from and how could it compete with West Lakes and Arndale?) and that Woodvile Road should be closed for markets. There was reasonable support for a market atmosphere generally, with stalls and the like.  It was also noted there were no hotels or drinking places in the area, and some support was heard for such facilities.
• Our group strongly supported a full and extensive and fully transparent engineering, roads and planning study, noting the high risk of flood in the area, particularly given that Cheltenham Racecourse, which should be a wetland in its entirety.
• Support was voiced for a significant “buffer zone” between the TOD and Woodville Road, primarily for the safety of children walking from school to the train station.  A council staffer suggested a corridor with a width of a mere 2 metres, grossly inadequate.
• Strong support was voiced for a low density development, which by council’s definition is still comprised of buildings up to 3 stories in height, which is by no means low density. Also that buildings maintain the heritage character of the Woodville area, rather than a Mawson Lakes type development or the dog boxes that no-one wants at the Quays in Port Adelaide.
• There was a call for the plaques council had removed from St Clair Reserve being returned and that significant trees be retained, noting that many had already apparently been poisoned.
• Strong support was maintained for retention of the St Clair Reserve as is, given that Charles Sturt had one of the lowest ratios of open space of any Council in Australia.

During the proceedings, a council staffer started filming participants, until I voiced my objection, as did the participant sitting next to me.  I requested that the video be deleted, however have no assurance this occurred.  For council to video us without authority is a serious breach of privacy in my view.  Our Mayor and CEO did not participate in discussions, but stood or sat at the rear of the room along with what I can only call were a number of “heavies”.  Other council staff and Mr Rochecouste milled around tables listening in on discussions and offering less than helpful opinions.

In summary, this was yet another attempt by a council that will not listen to the opinions of residents and ratepayers, to whitewash the real issues and to justify the corruption of the heritage of Woodville in favor of new residents, who won’t be families, who have never paid a cent in rates.

The heritage character of the suburb is in serious risk, as is the safety of children near such a development, and the resultant effect on traffic in Woodville Road will simply be horrendous.  Its all about a pack-em and stack-em development on a park that was given to the people, but stolen by the council. They are merely engineering a future slum in my opinion.

Why can’t council address the area the other side of Torrens Road and the housing opposite Arndale Shopping Centre which is ripe for development and refurbishment? The area is also in dire need of much more green space, something the City of Charles Sturt is determined to take from us all. Let council develop a Village there, instead of stealing our pristine park (which was never theirs to take) while giving us much less valuable contaminated land in return.

This proposal is all about stealing from existing ratepayers and residents and making money to their detriment.

Mark Walker

Note: Council will hold 3 more events as part of this review process:

1. Monday 17th May 2010 7.00 to 9.00pm at the Civic Centre
2. Wednesday 19th May 2010 7.00 to 9.00pm at the above venue
3. Saturday 22nd May 2010 2.00 to 5.00pm at Council (Open Day)

Phone 1300 116 747 to register attendance – all are encouraged to come along and voice their opinion and to fight for our heritage and open space.

Hi everyone – apologies for not being in touch for a while; we have been busy making plans for the SCRRA AGM on 24th May (there will be notices out via the post on this shortly asking for nominations for the committee and providing an outline of some amendments that are proposed to our constitution to tidy a few things up) and we have also been getting our letter-boxing campaign up and running again in advance of the Council Elections in October (more about that later).

We have also had a few meetings with Council and government representatives over what is planned at St Clair. There is not much to report so far from these meetings other than that we have continued to raise questions that they do not apear to have fully thought through and a further meeting is planned on the 29th April with the Council and LMC CEOs at which we hope to get some answers. We will keep you posted and please come along to the SCRRA AGM so that we can give you a good update. (Please let me know if you don’t receive a notice in the next week or so).

You may have heard there was a “community day” at Cheltenham recently on the new “Actil Park”; those that were able to go can report that there were generally more Council “green shirts” in attendance than there were residents (at what cost we can only imagine!!). I have attached a copy of the feedback sheet (and my email below) that I have forwarded to Michelle Mader at the Council, to describe some of the things that we value about St Clair Park and our opposition to the loss of it as open space. I am sure that there were others who also handed in their thoughts on the day!

The Council will also be consulting next week on the “revitalisation” of Woodville Road – this includes the TOD on St Clair – so please feel free to go along to their “visioning workshop” on the 21st April and tell them exactly how you feel about the proposed TOD apartments on the park!! It will be held at 7pm at the Woodville West Torrens Football Clubooms off Oval Ave at Woodville South. We have made no commitment to contribute to this as an organisation as we do not agree with what they are doing at St Clair, however you may want to go along and have your say about it!!

Please let us know if you are interested in getting involved in the campaign to get better representation back onto the Charles Sturt Council – we would be happy to hear from you! We will also be cranking up our fundraising again and getting the cake stall etc back into action – stay tuned!!

Lastly – thanks very much again for your help and good wishes during the election campaign; I am pleased to report that we did give them a scare, and we were also successful in helping to get another independent candidate into the Upper House; Kelly Vincent of Dignity4Disability – we wish her all the best!! The Community Voice Coalition is alive and kicking and we intend to grow this as an avenue for grassroots community groups like ours to support one another and campaign for more accountability and honesty in local and state government.

All the best and hope to see you at the AGM, if not before!! Please don’t forget the Council meetings are on every 2nd and 4th Monday at 7pm; it is always good for them to know that they are under scrutiny!! Also stay tuned to the Save St Clair Recreation Park!!! Facebook page or CharlesSturtRatepayers.org for regular updates.

Thanks & Regards……..Kirsten

PS Email to Charles Sturt follows….

Michelle – you and Natalie received much of this feedback from us at the meeting, but I thought it would be useful for you to have a written copy of it too. I have not bothered to repeat all of the questions that we have raised previously (and I look forward to discussing these with the two CEOs), but in this feedback sheet I have concentrated on what I know the residents value about St Clair Park in the vain hope that someone, somewhere in the Charles Sturt Council administration actually does care about what we think.

The residents we represent are totally opposed to the use of St Clair Park as anything other than open space. You only have to look at the previous referendum held by Council in 1964 on St Clair Park to know what the result would be today if you had truly put this to the residents of Charles Sturt. There is no reason to suspect that the answer would be any different today and all the pretty pictures and propaganda in the world from you and the LMC are not going to change our minds about apartments going on our park; surely you can not blame us!!

Regards…….Kirsten Alexander

PS I realise that this is slightly after your cut-off date, but I trust you will accept a late submission from us, as you did from the LMC in relation to the land swap…

There is a visioning workshop next Wednesday night the 21st April from 7pm-9:30pm at the Woodville West Torrens Football Club.

You need to register to attend and you can do that by ringing 1300 116 747 or email village.woodville@lmc.sa.gov.au.  Apparently it is being run by a man called Gilbert Rochecouste and it says he has worked on some of the most challenging and complex communities and projects in Aus and overseas with great success! I am not sure what that is saying about us??????

After having a meeting with the council tonight they are saying we should attend just in case the TOD goes through and then at least we get a say! My view is we shoud probably attend just to keep letting them know we are OPPOSED to the TOD BEING BUILT ON OUR PARK. This is not over – far from it,  the reports will not go in until September and then it will need to go through many more processess. We have council elections in the meantime and we need to vote out the councillors who have voted for the landswap.

Kelly Thomas

The following letter sent to us has been forwarded to The Advertiser & other newspapers for publication, as well as TV channels (other than Channel Nine as Google gave a warning that it’s site may harm your computer, which may have been a temporary aberration attributable to hackers, detected malware or a virus):

Letter to The Editor
30 December 2009
I challenge you, Premier Rann, Treasurer Foley, Attorney General Atkinson, Minister Hill & Ministers Maywald & Gago to a debate on national television.  The only condition I seek is the full protection of Parliamentary Privilege; not that I intend to disclose anything but facts & my opinion of them.

I wish to debate you all on the following issues within South Australia:
* Water policy & the River Murray, including related taxation;
* Desalination vs Storm water recycling & purification & expansion of existing water storage facilities with reverse pumping back to the Murray in times of overflow;
* The impact of desalination on power use (see rail electrification below) & the coastal environment;
* The missed opportunity at the recent Premier’s conference to put water use of our river Murray water (being used by the eastern states to grow rice & cotton) on the table as a priority;
* TOD’s;
* The proposed light Rail system & public transport in general;
* The impact of rail electrification on CO2 emissions & potential blackouts to households during peak electric power use periods (see desalination above);
* Revocation of Community land at St Clair & the Barossa;
* Councils increasingly ignoring their constituents on issues like land revocation, Chelsea Cinema, Cheltenham Racecourse and other local issues;
* State Government & Councils refusal to ban “donations” from developers – we the taxpayers & ratepayers donate far more in the way of taxes, duties, GST & rates, allegedly resulting in South Australia being the highest taxed state in Australia;
* State Government’s position in declining a need for an Independent Commission Against Corruption in this State, which refusal allegedly has the strong support of Councils like the City of Charles Sturt;
* Freedom of speech, Internet censoring & media reporting in general, from a State perspective;
* The proposals for the former Mitsubishi site & the former Clipsal site;
* Mental Health facilities in this state and the impact of the Glenside redevelopment on our capacity to care for the mentally ill.  Included in this would be reference to existing government policy to relocate the mentally ill to within the community (mostly in substandard facilities like cheap pubs and community housing) without allegedly the provision of proper care and rehabilitation activities;
* The alleged singling out of “bikies” as an illegal group, noting the vast majority of crime in this state appears to emanate from other sources;
* The proposed “Marj” (Royal Adelaide Hospital) redevelopment;
* The proposed redevelopment of Adelaide Oval;
* Government’s previous push to close Country Hospitals in favour of 4 “Super Hospitals”;
* The state of our City & Country roads – e.g. Goodwood Road, South Road & roads to the mid-north, when fines, registrations & taxes are purportedly allocated for such purposes;
* The financial position of this State; recalling that Treasurer Foley previously advised at the height of the Global Financial Crisis that SA had suffered financial losses. I have witnessed nothing subsequent to this than ad nauseum grandiose announcements on how you, our State Government, will spend our money in the billions.  Is the money there or will we see increased taxes akin the water rate rises to pay for a desalination plant nobody wants (or needs)?;
* Treasurer Foley’s plan to import skilled labor from the Phillipines as opposed to increasing re-training & education facilities for the unemployed and those who have lost their jobs during the GFC;
* The ability for a labor dominated Council like the City of Charles Sturt to command the protection at their meetings numbering in the 10′s of Police Officers, at least 2 paddywagons & 6 police cars + 2 designated Police Negotiators & then lock out all but 30 or so selected ratepayers to public meetings;

I could go on but guess you all get the idea. Hell, I’ll even let you bring along the alleged 130+ taxpayer funded media staff contingent under your command to back you all up. Hey, why not bring along our City of Charles Sturt Mayor Harold Anderson & Councilor Sykes (who allegedly works for Mr Atkinson) for good measure?

I have never been a Politician, a lawyer or held community office.  I am a self funded retiree with some experience in the finance industry. I will stand totally alone in a debate with you all. Will you all stand accountable & debate only one?  If you do not, I can only accept that you all fear only one thing – the truth.

Mark Walker
West Lakes

Important Meeting next Monday evening.

Where:            Woodville Primary School, Evans Street Woodville South (click for Map)

When:             7.30pm on Mon 30^th November 2009

Please come along and have your say at a very important meeting of the St Clair Reserve Ratepayers Association where we will be discussing strategies on where to next in our campaign to save St Clair Reserve Woodville.

Our Pristine Reserve being exchanged for a contaminated site.

Councillors for The City of Charles Sturt last night (9th Nov 2009) voted in favour of revocation of the community land occupied by St Clair Reserve in Woodville. This land is earmarked to be made available to developer/s for high density housing. This decision was strongly opposed by hundreds of Ratepayers present, who have been refused a consultative process they believe is their absolute right.

This land was reputedly bequeathed to the people of Woodville in memory of those who fought and died in World War II – “Lest We Forget”.

Councillors have clearly forgotten their obligation to Ratepayers to act on their behalf, rather than that of a higher authority.

Thanks to the efforts of Councillor Grant, a submission to Council that saw requirement of a re-vote in 2 weeks was made. This allows little time for Ratepayers to group to fight against the proposal, which would see contaminated land (the former Actil Factory site, which is nothing more than a dustbowl) replace our pristine existing reserve.

The Alexander family enjoying the existing Reserve

In the Mayor’s own words: “HAROLD ANDERSON: This is a brilliant idea by the City of Charles Sturt. The council is committed to it. Some people will say it’s not so good. We got advice that it’s very, very good. So we are going to do it. But we have to go through the consultation process, and that’s what we are doing. I’m confident that it will come out in favour of our proposal.”  Source:  ABC Stateline

Note to Mr Anderson: Please make public the evidence you claim to possess that Ratepayers and the majority of the community are in favour of this proposal.  Anecdotal evidence suggests the opposite!

Welcome to all Ratepayers of the City of Charles Sturt

This site has been established to provide a medium for all Ratepayers to have their say about Your Council, Your Representatives, Local Issues and the actions of Council that affect us all.