Get the Facts - Planning process for site confirmed

Redland City Council was not asked at its general meeting today (17 August, 2022) to approve earthworks and the “first stages” for the Birkdale Community Precinct (BCP) site.

Reporting of that as published on couriermail.com.au at 6.40am on Wednesday 17 August 2022 is incorrect.

At today’s meeting Council endorsed a community engagement summary report for the Draft BCP Master Plan and confirmed the preferred process for statutory planning of the site.

The $34 million mentioned in the article is a $34.5million carry over of capital funds not spent last financial year and is across all of council capital works. As it is a carry over there is no additional cost to ratepayers.

A total of $147,922 from the $34.5 million carried over will be used for restoration work at Willards Farm this financial year.

In the 2022/2023 Council Budget, $12.7 million was already allocated to fund the next stage of Birkdale Community Precinct.

The couriermail.com.au article also incorrectly reports that the Federal Government “gave the land to Council”. In fact, Council purchased the land from the Commonwealth in late 2019 for $4.1 million to bring it into public ownership.

Further still, the article incorrectly refers to the 45-page community engagement summary report as an “in-house” report. In fact, it was completed by a third party external engagement expert.

The article also gets the year of the engagement campaign wrong. It was this year (2022) not last year as reported. Council held an extensive five-week community engagement campaign from 30 April to 6 June 2022 to gather community feedback on the Draft BCP Master Plan.