Case studies of coastal councils
Shire of Augusta - Margaret River, WA: Under pressure and seeking scientific solutions
Statistics
- Area of coastline: 30 km
- Population: (2001 census): 11 031
- Rate revenue: $6.6m
- Total revenue: $13.3m
Background
The shire lies 290 km south of Perth and covers an area of 2370 square kilometres. The Coast Road and the Great South Western highway link Perth to Margaret River, making the shire easily accessible from Perth for weekends. The Shire is well known for its wineries, beaches and surfing. Much of the shire is taken up by National Park, however the parcels of land in private ownership are under significant development pressure, with over 600 development applications received by council every year.
Council's Statutory Planning section has undergone difficulties with staff retention. Council's limited planning staff are under significant pressure to process applications and operate under the existence of five outdated town planning schemes. Many planning application decisions are questioned or taken to court, putting significant pressure on council resources. Adding to the stress on the environment are around half a million tourists a year, creating a burden on the small population to provide the necessary services for visitors, and to protect the fragile coastal ecosystems of the region.
What are the critical coastal zone management issues?
Population growth- Like other coastal shires in the south west region, Augusta-Margaret River has experienced rapid population growth recently, leading to pressure for land to be subdivided and developed.
- Demand for residential land has been largely driven by absentee landlords and investors, leading to concerns of inflated prices and a shortage of affordable housing.
- Tourism rates show 551,000 domestic visitors stayed overnight in the Shire during the 2002/2003 financial year (Tourism WA, Published 21 October 2004).
- Very high tourism rates coupled with a low rate base makes it very difficult for council to provide sufficient infrastructure and protection to the coastal environment.
- The fragile limestone cliffs of the region are put under pressure from large influxes of tourists at peak times. This increases the risk of cliffs collapsing.
- New planning instruments and other resources are required to assist council to deal with the current pressure they are under from developers.
- The region has experienced an influx of fishermen from the Western Rock Lobster Fishery. Council and the State Government do not have adequate control mechanisms in place to manage environmental damage from fishers, conflict between recreational and professional users or infrastructure to support the professional users.
- A strong demand for recreational boating users with inadequate and/or non existent infrastructure.
- The absence of reticulated water and particularly sewerage services in coastal communities presents a pollution threat and impacts on water quality.
- Growth in resident and visitor numbers has placed a strong demand for upgrading existing infrastructure and providing new infrastructure on the council. In addition to the need to cater for growing numbers of people, the population demographic is changing which is changing the community's expectations of the type and quality of infrastructure provided.
- Infrastructure within developments is provided by developers with some contributions made toward upgrading roads immediately in the vicinity of larger developments. However Council is left with the challenge to fund a significant portion of infrastructure needs.
Why was the council used as a case study?
The Shire of Augusta-Margaret River is under huge pressure from developers and tourism. The shire has a relatively small budget and therefore low capacity to provide the level of infrastructure required. Council resources are stretched trying to deal with development applications and providing measures to protect the fragile coastal zone. Investment by council in coastal zone management activities has occurred on an ad hoc basis in the past. Council has not had access to adequate resources, including scientific information to assist with decision making. To address this, community groups and the council have recently joined forces to undertake planning activities in a bid to deal with development pressures.
Council has also embarked on a partnership program with CSIRO based on the Regional Development Futures framework developed by CSIRO. Through consultation processes with the broader community, a tool will be developed to provide the Shire with increased confidence that its policies will be firmly based on community expectations and values. Through CSIRO, Council has access to scientists, including social scientists and modelling experts, who are developing a decision support tool to assist with future town planning decisions. The Council was chosen to highlight the importance of looking for new ideas, no matter how big and out of reach the problems seem and to demonstrate how partnerships can assist in this process.
Council has recently developed a draft Local Planning Strategy (LPS) and District Town Planning Scheme (DTPS) that over time will replace the five existing outdated town planning schemes. The LPS and DTPS were recently advertised and Council is considering the submissions.
The Shire is developing a Biodiversity Conservation Strategy to conserve, protect and enhance the biodiversity of the Shire. The relevant outcomes of the Strategy will (when completed) be incorporated into the district town planning scheme. Also, through the State Government's Coastal Management Plan Assistance Programme (CMPAP), Council has recently adopted a coastal management plan which provides an overall plan for managing it's six Shire coastal reserves.
Council initiatives to address the issues
Development of a coastal management plan
The council was successful in securing a state government grant to develop a Coastal Management Plan. The plan integrates previous planning for coastal reserves, identifies areas where further detailed planning is required and outlines an action plan to guide council expenditure on coastal reserves. The plan addresses coastal management principles, the natural environment, human use and legal requirements for coastal zone management at a state level. Recommendations are made for safety, coastal risk, public awareness and structural works.
The plan has recently been approved by council and grant applications will now be made to implement the measures outlined in the plan. Council will work with community groups to obtain Coastwest and National Heritage Trust (NHT) grants which will combine with council funding to implement some of the measures. In addition, proposals outlined in the plan will be reflected in Council's Biodiversity Conservation Strategy.
Council still lacks adequate scientific information to assist with decision making. A geotechnical survey is required to effectively map the unstable limestone cliffs of the region. Funding sources, such as the NHT, are currently being negotiated in order to undertake this work. Once this information has been collected, a management program will be developed and on-ground works could commence.
The community was heavily involved in the development of the Coastal Management Plan and are consequently highly motivated to implement the strategy and develop concept plans to address recommendations outlined in the Plan. Council has formed committees to progress the recommendations and these committees include community, local and state government representatives.
Lessons learnt
Development of the Plan allowed strong community participation and has provided Council with a long term strategic plan outlining priority areas for investment and funding.
Whilst initial planning activities are finalised and approved by Council, momentum now needs to be maintained to complete more detailed planning and to implement the action plan. Recent council elections resulted in a change in Council composition and may change the priority council places on implementing the Coastal Management Plan. Alternatively, opportunities may be created. The challenge facing both the Council and community it to ensure they build on the work that has already been undertaken.
The Shire has demonstrated that despite low budgets and competing pressures, it is possible to bring the community together and prioritise the coastal zone management activities. Continued community support is required to both raise the necessary financial resources and to implement the plan.
CSIRO Sustainable Futures project
A significant issue impacting on coastal zone management in all coastal councils is that of sustainable town planning. Rapid growth over recent years has placed pressure on the Shire's planning processes. In addition, population growth is anticipated to double over the next 25 years. Transparent, repeatable and community acceptable tools assist both council and potential developers to ensure development is undertaken in a sustainable manner and with minimal impact on the natural resource base.
Council has formed a partnership with the CSIRO to undertake a project looking at the community values of the Shire, the pressures impacting on the Shire and the economic drivers within the Shire. This information will be used to develop a systems dynamic model as a tool in town planning decision making. The project will be completed in September 2005 and will assist Council in dealing with increased population pressures and tourism growth, economic factors and changes in industry in the Shire.
The first two phases of the project looked into the extent and reasons for community participation and the historical drivers of change within the Shire. Community consultation was through oral history collecting, community workshops and interviews with individuals and focus groups. The project aimed to get a sense of values and issues that were important to the community. An historical profile was collected, highlighting where changes have occurred, the thresholds for resilience by the community and what their key values are.
The model is designed to assist with long term strategic planning for the Shire. The land use issues addressed in the model include settlement, nature conservation, landscape, agriculture, tourism, cultural heritage and resources. The model takes into account the social, economic and environmental activities of the region.
One of the major outputs of the project is a set of environmental, social and economic sustainability indicators to assist with monitoring change associated with the use of the tool. Amongst these are a series of healthy ecosystem indicators.
The tool is not designed to assess the impact of individual development proposals but is capable of simulating long term strategic policy options in terms of their likely broad impacts and trade-offs required between competing policy objectives. The model takes into account agricultural activities, water supply issues, it determines likely impacts of tourism and population growth and provides biodiversity and socio-economic indicators.
The project has a capacity building component, through the development of a community reference group, council training to run the model and collect data, and through public consultation activities. Initial data has been collected by Council officers and CSIRO staff. Council staff will then be responsible for collecting ongoing data needs and managing the data.
Lessons learnt
Planning must be strategic and long term. It is more difficult to react to pressures once they arrive. Having tools in place now to assist Council to meet future challenges reduces the pressures Council is likely to face in the future.
It must be emphasised that the Sustainable Futures Program will provide a tool only and it will not, by itself, show where development should take place in the Shire. Council staff will need to be trained in collecting and using data and the model to get maximum benefit from it. The Shire office currently has a high staff turnover. Hence succession planning procedures will need to be put in place to ensure the benefits the model can provide are realised in the medium and longer term.
The project has been very successful in engaging the community and building community and council capacity. It has created a strong partnership between the council and CSIRO. Council could not undertake such a project without the support they have received from CSIRO. This partnership has provided scientific resources to Council, contributing to their decision making tools.
The project has brought together a wealth of scientific and social information and data that Council can now utilise for other projects. Through the project, Council staff have accessed other councils facing similar challenges and have been able to learn from them, greatly increasing the capacity of Augusta-Margaret River Shire.
National Trust Appeal
The council has set up an AMRS Heritage Appeal within the shire, and has allocated two per cent of rate revenue (2002-03) for conservation purposes. Initially it was hoped that a further two per cent would be allocated in 2003-04 but this did not happen. A committee has been formed to advise on how the funds will be spent and Council has developed a Terms of Reference for their role. They will follow the priorities established in the Biodiversity Conservation Strategy and the Coastal Management Plan and will appoint a Board of Trustees to oversee the fund raising ventures to improve the tenure, scope and longevity of the Fund.
Priority is to establish effective governance and promote fund raising activities to encourage further donations by the community and local and national businesses. All contributions will be fully tax deductible and audited and are held with the National Trust. The Board of Trustees is currently being sought to assist with fundraising.
Lessons learnt
Utilising the National Trust Appeal to set up an account to run the project ensured that Council money that was set aside for the conservation fund was preserved. When Council priorities changed and funding in the second year was not forthcoming, the first years funding was still available for the project. As a result, the project can still go ahead. The Fund also provides an opportunity for increased community involvement in conservation activities, either through making donations or by developing project proposals and seeking funding.
Summary
The council has reacted to increased development pressures along the coastline by undertaking coastal, town and biodiversity planning and by working with the CSIRO to develop a scientifically based tool to assist with their town planning decision making. The huge demands tourism places on council resources and the lack of funding for infrastructure provision and management of reserves are some of the issues council is trying to overcome.
Whilst these three projects are in their early stages and implementation is yet to occur, the importance of being able to attract resources, including financial support and scientific data and tools through partnerships with state and Australian Government agencies as well as non-government organisations is crucial. Without these partnerships, none of the projects could have been undertaken and Council would not be able to achieve their goals of coastal zone management, sustainable town planning and conservation of significant areas. Partnerships are particularly important to a council with a low rate base, resource shortages and one facing significant external pressures, such as Augusta-Margaret River.
One of the first challenges to the new planning documents will be the new council. They may have differing priorities and funding for implementation may be reduced. At the same time, it may be an opportunity for the new council to reinforce their commitment to the projects and have actions fast tracked. Political processes at all levels will always be a factor in improving coastal zone management.
- Contact
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James Trail
CEO
Shire of Augusta Margaret River
08 9780 5255
