On Tuesday 13th December, item 13 on the Port Stephens Council agenda had councillors debate a petition that was signed by over 500 local people. The petition opposed council’s plan to have two road crossings in the pathway design with the pathway starting from Seaham Road on the south side of BHD, crossing to the other side near Werai Cl then back again north of Tandara Rd. ie the petition supported the pathway remaining on the western side for the full length of BHD.

The council agenda included the recommendation that the petition be rejected and to continue designing the pathway with the two crossings.

Therese, who did all the hard work arranging the petition, was unfortunately unable to attend to speak to council during the public access session. However, Neil Ritchie did speak in support of the pathway petition. Many questions were then asked of Neil and council staff.

Once the formal meeting started, our west ward councillor Giacomo Arnott, successfully moved that item 13 be brought forward so those of us in the audience could hear the debate and then leave. The outcome was unanimously in favour of supporting the petition and to build the pathway on only one side of BHD!

So many thanks to Therese for conducting the petition and everyone that signed it, to Neil for speaking to PSC, to our west ward councillors for supporting us in the debate, and to council for their unanimous vote.

Here are the two most relevant pages from the draft council minutes. A link to the full minutes follows.

Here is the link to the minutes. Select “DRAFT 13 December 2022 – Ordinary Council Minutes – Pages 1-307” and go to Page No 245. (At some point the final minutes will be posted, but the page number may change). Note that the “Background” section relates to the recommendation to reject the petition.

So while there is still much to do regarding planning of the pathway and an acceptable Voluntary Planning Agreement to be negotiated between Hanson and PSC, that is good news leading up to Christmas. Hopefully they pathway will be able to progress early next year.