In 2004, City of Sydney Council purchased the Tabernacle and said it would be used as a multi-purpose community facility.

“The Burton Street Tabernacle, a large and prominent Victorian building, will provide an opportunity for enhanced program-based activities across our local government area, provided by the City in its own right and in partnership with other bodies,” the then Lord Mayor Lucy Turnbull said in a media release.

Another Council statement at the time promised that “once refurbished, the Tabernacle building will be available for a number of different purposes, including community facilities, recreation activities for various ages, cultural and arts uses, theatre and public meeting facilities.”

But today, building restorations and refurbishments are yet to be complete, leaving the building unused.

Andrew Duckmanton, President of the Darlinghurst Business Partnership, said he was supportive of the council takeover of the building and its plans to use it as a community facility. “To me, that makes sense as a strategy. Because if you want to make this into a cultural quarter, which is what Clover has embarked on since 2006, you clearly need to have more culture than discos and a couple of schools,” Mr Duckmanton said.

His initial optimism has now turned to disappointment, after seeing the building unused for so many years. “This is beyond shocking, because they have taken what could have been six years of really strong growth in Sydney and they’ve turned it into [sic] stagnant.”

Lesley Dimmick, who has been managing TAP Gallery across the street from the Tabernacle for 16 years, said she has seen Council’s neglect of the building first hand.

“We saw the roof fly off one morning – the whole roof almost landed on top of us when it landed on top of several cars in front of our window,” Ms Dimmick said.

“They took an awful long time to fix the roof. When the roof was just tarped, every time it stormed it would come off and we’d ring the council and tell them that the rain was going through the roof and it was going to get damaged.

“The roof should have been repaired immediately and it’s still sitting there unoccupied. It’s been empty for six years, since Lucy Turbull bought it.”

A City of Sydney spokesperson defended the council saying major refurbishment had been completed. “Significant work on the Tabernacle is complete, including internal refurbishment, stabilising, waterproofing, general repairs, a new Welsh slate roof and copper guttering, repairs to the stained glass and tuck-pointing the façade,” the spokesperson said.

“The next stages of preservation works involve removing salts from the brickwork (desalination) and plaster restoration.

The City is also preparing a concept design for the adaptive reuse of the building as a theatre and cafe/gallery, the spokesperson added. “Construction work for this will begin early 2011 and it is anticipated that the Darlinghurst Theatre will relocate into the Tabernacle from Potts Point in 2012.”

Mr Duckmanton said the council could no longer be trusted with its “spin-doctored” promises.

“They (the council) are inept. Incompetent to me, is one of those words that suggests somebody gave you a plan and you just didn’t do it. It just suggests that they’re unable to do something they’re supposed to do. These guys are inept. They have no ability to actually think of the things and run the projects properly. This is beyond a joke.”

by Ehssan Veiszadeh

“All of my events there was food leftover and I knew that if there was food leftover at my events, there was also food leftover at my colleagues’ events around town,” said Ms Kahn.

So in 2004, she decided to act by establishing OzHarvest. The idea was simple: collect leftover food from restaurants and use it to feed hungry people needing a meal.

“I thought, what I knew is there was leftover food and I also know that there are people who are hungry. And so if I could create the missing link between that food and those people it would be a good thing.”

Although initially her motivation was to stop food wastage, later she would learn of the massive impacts leftover food had on the environment.

“We’ve just recently had a study done on our carbon footprint and, yes we’re feeding people which is fantastic, but we saved the equivalent of 1,400 cars from driving on the road. That’s the equivalent of our carbon footprint. It equates to $180,000 in carbon offsets.”

Most of the food provided to OzHarvest comes from corporate boardrooms and caterers.

The food collected from these events is of high quality and untouched. “It’s very important to clarify that we are talking about excess food that is completely fit for eating,” Ms Kahn said.

“We are not talking about people eating half a steak and somebody else eating the rest of that steak. It is the piece of steak that hasn’t been touched, that had been taken out, perhaps been marinated, perhaps intended for use that night, but never got eaten.”

In the last six months, Woolworths and ALDI have agreed to take part in the initiative. This has provided OzHarvest with a more reliable source of high quality food. “Collecting from supermarkets on a daily basis certainly gives us great quality and very good supply that our recipients are really enjoying.”

Earlier this year, Ms Kahn was recognised for her work after she was awarded Australia’s Local Hero.

The award has allowed to her to lift the profile of OzHarvest and has given her the platform to encourage ordinary people to do their part in easing the food wastage problem.

“Perhaps by taking lunch from home once a month and donating $10 to OzHarvest, they would be providing 10 meals for 10 city people in need. How awesome is that? Such a simple way of doing it.”

by Ehssan Veiszadeh

Lord Mayor Clover Moore reacted to the State of Australian Cities Report 2010 by calling on the Federal Government to finally act on the challenges facing Sydney.

“For more than three years the Lord Mayors of all Australia’s capital cities have argued for a formal agreement between Federal, State and City government, based on the successful model from Vancouver Canada, which would help to deliver specific projects in line with agreed national outcomes,” said Cr Moore.

by Ehssan Veiszadeh

On Monday Councillors faced four community members who each had three minutes to speak on Council’s late-night trading research. [I was the first speaker, summarising points made in comment 'Late night trading debate now in black and white'.]

The next three residents called for Council to further restrict alcohol trading. Jo Holder (Darlinghurst Residents Action Group) said residents had suffered “a remarkable deterioration of quality of life affecting the densest residential area in Sydney”. At one point there had been only one all-night venue, now there were 30, creating unacceptable street noise as patrons migrated between Kings Cross and Oxford Street late at night on weekends.

Carole Ferrier (2011 Residents’ Association) was disappointed with Council’s response to public comment on the research. There IS over-saturation, she said, and the streets were out of control with “masses of people milling about after 1am” in Kings Cross Road. She cited a recent photograph in The Sunday Telegraph showing a blood-splattered take-away shop after a man had been slashed in the neck with a broken bottle.

Dimity Talbot said she lived in the Wintergarden units, located “at ground zero in Darlinghurst Road” in the Cross. She complained about over-saturation of venues, crowds streaming through the streets and “souped-up cars with stereo systems thumping,” a problem that late-night road closures in Woolloomooloo had not really solved. She called for more Council rangers on weekend nights, “concentrated in our area and concentrating on our complaints.”

Councillors reassured the speakers that they were serious about solving their problem but said their powers were limited – they didn’t write the liquor licensing laws and the courts had overruled some of Council’s attempts to refuse venues.

Several called for changes to law giving Council more power. Clover Moore promised more research to “provide solid evidence” that things were out of control. She said Council was up against big vested interests, a pointed comment with representatives of liquor accords and the AHA watching from the gallery.

Chris Harris (Greens) called for research to establish an objective measure of over-saturation. He wanted the city mapped showing the concentration of drinkers. “If we can show that one area has, say 1,000 drinkers per metre and the rest of the world has only 50, we can declare that this area is over-saturated,” he said, cautioning that this was a crude summary of the concept. “Then we can say that Kings Cross and Oxford Street are atypical and we won’t be approving any more DAs until that density evens out.”

Cr Harris said Responsible Service of Alcohol laws were a joke and called for “a whole bunch of enforcement people checking that RSA was enforced, especially in troublesome venues.”

by Michael Gormly

Almost the most fun a council nerd can have (with their clothes on) is to make a submission to Council and then, months later, read a point-by-point response to it in black and white.

It’s where two universes meet, where one’s personal world-view intersects with that of a large bureaucracy and the resulting tear in the space-time continuum allows a glimpse into alternative realities beneath the surface of spin and counter-spin.

For some arcane reason the City of Sydney last year invited responses to research it had commissioned to quantify the idea of ‘oversaturation’ of liquor outlets, a concept the anti-alcohol lobby has floated in recent years in its drive to curb the night economy.

The City had leapt on the bandwagon and used the argument to oppose an application to turn the old Hungry Jack’s in Kings Cross into gastropub Springfields, now demised.

But the Land and Environment Court rejected the City’s argument because there was no quantifiable evidence of ‘oversaturation’.

Hence the research in two parts, one studying selected evidence and attempting to link concentration of venues in Kings Cross, Oxford Street and George Street with rising ‘alcohol-fuelled violence’; and the other a vox pop of residents interviewed on the street, aimed at establishing a perception of oversaturation.

The research, unsurprisingly, was said to support the anti-alcohol agenda and Clover Moore triumphantly lugged it around community meetings. Since then Cr Moore’s War Against Kings Cross etc has proceeded in leaps and bounds, with the State legislating a freeze on all liquor-related development in our entertainment precincts, weekend blockades of streets feeding the Cross, unrelenting clawback of conditions previously granted to venues and a consistent campaign against late night food outlets.

My reading of the research, however, revealed some apparently gaping holes in the evidence, and I responded accordingly when Council invited comment.

I pointed out Figure 28 which asked locals how Kings Cross might be improved. Only 16 percent of the 190 surveyed wanted fewer pubs and clubs, even though 50–60 percent named alcohol-fuelled fallout as the worst aspect of living in the area. I concluded that the other 84 percent might indeed think as I and my friends do – that we choose to live in an entertainment precinct because we like it despite the fallout.

At the time, 16 percent was Malcolm Turnbull’s popularity rating as opposition leader – it’s not a sound basis for political leadership or a sweeping anti-nightlife policy.

So I read Council’s response to my comment with bated breath:

“The… Study does not attempt to infer the reasons behind certain responses, as this would only be speculative. The questions were also asked in different contexts: as the 16% were unprompted it cannot be inferred that 84% do not want restrictions.”

There you go then.

Several comments (including mine) mentioned that the research had used alcohol-related violence data only up to 2006. It was said to show a rising trend, supporting the venue-saturation theory. In the three years after 2006, however, the floorspace of big pubs and clubs in Kings Cross increased by a capacity of over 3,000, and if saturation point had been reached in 2006 as the study attempted to show, violence rates should have risen exponentially if the theory was sound. However senior police at community meetings over the same period consistently reported fewer and fewer assaults.

This rather pulls the rug from under saturation theory, and refutes repeated claims by the anti-alcohol lobby that “alcohol-fuelled mayhem” was “out of control and getting worse”.

Council replied to the comments: “The data used in the NDARC Study was the most complete and up-to-date data available at the time…”

Maybe, but it was still out-of-date and completely misleading.

Reading the 31-page report was even more fun for its insight into everyone else’s submissions.

Darlinghurst Resident’s Action Group (DRAG) topped the comment tally with no less than 74 responses. Among other things, DRAG asked for anti-clustering rules, whereby a business of similar type is forbidden to open within a certain distance from another. Council applies such a rule to adult businesses in Sydney, with a 75-metre buffer. The previous South Sydney Council exempted Kings Cross from this rule, for obvious reasons, but the City slapped it on to the Cross in the hope that if a strip club or sex shop went broke, the premises would have to stay vacant until another type of business took the lease. This has indeed happened a few times since, which is probably why Police raided Kings Cross sex shops a few years ago and confiscated all the X-rated videos.

Council’s rebuttal of the DRAG request: “Clustering activity in commercial centres generally reduces migration through surrounding areas…” thus apparently contradicting their own adult premises policy.

Currently, 2am lockouts and other restrictions are imposed on the “48 most violent” pubs in Sydney – none of which are in Kings Cross. But DRAG wants the sanctions applied to all venues in high-density areas.

DRAG also thinks that footpath licences should be frozen; that saturation points should be determined through an annual petition of residents; that Council properties should not be leased to venues in saturated areas; that the City should forbid the conversion of (for example) banks to pubs; that multiple venues in the same premises be banned; that bottle shops should cease trading earlier in saturation areas, and small bars should not be approved at all; that other businesses that feed into late-night venues should be banned; that trial periods should be reduced in length; that all licensing approvals, including for restaurants, should be decided by Councillors, not staff; that all such DAs should be reviewed by independent panels including residents, health and church groups, but excluding the liquor industry; and so on.

Many of DRAG’s suggestions were opposed in the Council response.

There were 30 submissions. Most independent submissions and resident groups supported the research but business and liquor organisations were critical.

But Council’s report on the research said any shortcomings pointed out in submissions were minor and did not affect the conclusions of the research, and Council would continue implementing policies along these lines. So there you are.

by Michael Gormly

Kings Cross - a swinging late-night place to rendezvous way back in 1964

Sydney’s event will be held in Martin Place, where participants can help to raise much needed funds to help care for blood cancer sufferers.

Marketing Manager for the Leukaemia Foundation in NSW and ACT, Christine Campbell, said the World’s Greatest Shave is the group’s most important fundraiser.

“We don’t receive any government funding so we rely on [the] community, businesses and fundraisers like the World’s Greatest Shave to actually exist,” she said.

“This year we’re hoping to raise thirteen and a half million [dollars].”

There will be plenty happening as part of the event, Ms Campbell said.

“What we’re doing is inviting everyone in the public to come down and shave or colour their hair from 8am to 10am, we’re also going to have some live entertainment,” she said.

“We’re also doing another shave between 12pm and 2pm … Sydney Hilton are going to be selling muffins in the morning and we have 2Day FM coming in at lunchtime.”

Several NRL players will also be in attendance, including South Sydney’s Jamie Simpson, himself a lymphoma survivor.

Ms Campbell said money raised would go towards providing much needed support services for patients.

“We have a support service team who look after the patients and provide education groups, support groups as well as one-on-one counselling,” she said.

“We [also] have free patient transport between the patient’s home and the hospital, and we have free accommodation in Westmead and Waverton, and in Canberra and Newcastle.”

Ms Campbell said a recent study had found blood cancers, which also include lymphoma and myeloma, to be the second-biggest cancer killer in Australia.

Celtis Australis trees, a native semi-deciduous variety, are regarded as a weed by many arborists and the City has a policy of gradually removing them from streets.

This follows widely reported public protests on March 1, when another section of the 200km cycleway was opened in Bourke Road, Alexandria.

“The Bulwara plan is poorly conceived and unnecessary” says Yimmy Seiffert, Chair and spokesperson of the Ultimo Village Voice action group.

“Bulwara Road is like a quiet country lane in the heart of the city. There is just 4m of road space for all users, excluding a single row of parking, that wider vehicles such as garbage trucks and delivery vans, already find it difficult to pass. Because mature trees partially block the pavements, many people prefer to use the roadway itself, especially wheelchair occupants and mums with prams. This works because all groups share the road space equally. Nobody has priority.”

“We simply want this informal ‘share’ status of the road to be preserved and the current 50kph speed limit to be reduced to further protect all road users.”

Neighbouring action groups have rallied to back UVV’s position.

The Council of Ultimo and Pyrmont Asociations, CUPA said it “stands with UVV in opposition to the Council’s plan as presently conceived.” Elizabeth Elenius, Convenor of Pyrmont Action, said in a written protest to Sydney Councillors, “Locals appear united in their desire for Bulwara Road to be a shared precinct, as is the de-facto situation now, and to be a 40kph zone, with retention of the eight car parking spaces [that would be lost under the new plan].”

“We all support in principle COS’ aims to build a cycle network across Sydney,” continued Seiffert. “But we have a viable shared traffic system in place, so why waste taxpayers’ money?”

Residents say there are already problems with cyclists who ride south illegally up Bulwara Road, ignoring speed limits and “No Entry” signs. “They don’t warn pedestrians – which is also an offence,” one man complained. “Sanctioned two-way cycle traffic would just make it worse.”

Following announcement of the plan at a public meeting last October, COS allegedly sent letters inviting public comment to over 1000 local residents in early December, although not everyone in Bulwara Road received it. “The two-week period allowed for comment was exceptionally short,” says Seiffert, “ and it was inaccurate; this one-way section of Bulwara Road was described as in Pyrmont – not Ultimo. They said that Wattle Street is not a suitable alternative route, because it is “too busy”, even though a two-way cycle lane is already planned to run past Wentworth Park, and that the new cycle lanes will “connect to an ‘existing cycleway on Miller Street”, although everyone knows Bulwara road is dissected twice by major roads and there are no crossings.”

Pyrmont Action commented, “We are … very concerned about the discontinuous nature of the proposed Bulwara Road cycleway, noting that it is extremely dangerous to cross the Allen St off-ramp and Pyrmont Bridge Road.”

Opponents to the cycleway packed a City West Community Forum on March 3 to voice their concerns, but only three questions were accepted despite a sea of raised hands. Seiffert was able to demand an extraordinary public meeting to debate the proposal fully but received no reply from the Lord Mayor or Sydney Councillors.

UVV believes that Council had already made the decision before even announcing the plan. “It was a done deal. Residents have never been properly consulted about whether a two-way cycle lane should be constructed here at all.”

“Bulwara Road’s unique heritage character has been consistently eroded by bad planning decisions over the past 30 years. We are determined to challenge this one and action groups involved will be meeting to plan our next moves.”