MANAGING our coastal environment is a huge challenge.

For Port Stephens residents the long delayed third stage of Council’s Coastal Management Program, which was recently announced, is proving to be very welcome.

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The consultation program should afford multiple opportunities for input.

However Port Stephens community advocate Nigel Waters told News Of The Area, “Some members of the community have serious reservations about the preference of Council for ‘drop-in sessions’ which allow only for one-to-one interactions.

“Many people interested in issues benefit from hearing other people’s concerns.”

He and others are advocating that group presentations and Q and A sessions are a much more efficient way of conducting consultations, with an option for people to engage privately in conversation with Council staff as an extra, not a substitute.

“Agency and Council staff are understandably concerned that ‘town hall’ style meetings can favour noisy minorities, ‘exclude’ or intimidate less active people and can be difficult to manage, but that is a challenge that should be accepted as part of the job – most such meetings are well-behaved!” Mr Waters said.

The Stage 3 consultation on the Coastal Management Program builds on work done in 2019 through a series of presentations and productive workshops.

“At the last series of consultation most of the community agreed with the identification of the three major risk areas – coastal erosion, inundation and wind-blown sand – and we look forward to hearing what expert input Council has received in the more than two years that have elapsed since the last public statements,” Mr Waters said.

“The need to address some of these coastal zone problems is becoming increasingly urgent, and is being compounded by the impacts of human-induced climate change, including more frequent and intense storms and sea-level rise.

“Council’s response to climate change, progress on sustainability and emissions reduction, and on the Coastal Management Program, have all been much slower than is desirable, at least partly due to staff shortages, but also, we suspect, due to a lack of priority given to environmental matters relative to other areas of Council’s work.

“Council has also appeared to be risk averse when it comes to compliance monitoring and enforcement action, particularly in relation to tree removal, land clearing, unauthorised foreshore works and use of public land, and outside advertising.”

Far from being negative, community groups are being encouraged by recent signs of changing priorities, and renewed commitment to action on environmental matters, at least at the strategic and policy level.

“We have welcomed the new Environment and Climate Change policies, Communications and Engagement Strategy, and some improvements in the Tree Management policies,” Mr Waters said.

“The establishment of new Communications and Engagement, Environmental and Heritage Advisory Groups are also a major step forward.”

By Marian SAMPSON