Councillor calls for tourism instead of residential housing expansion
A Gulf coast councilor has urged colleagues to reject a proposed housing development on land currently home to a chicken farm in Brisbane’s east and push for tourism, sport and recreation to be developed instead.
Redlands councilor Rowanne McKenzie will table a motion at a meeting next week asking the council to vote for acting mayor Julie Talty to write to the deputy premier in support of an inquiry into adding land at Mount Cotton to the province’s urban footprint.
Landowners in the area include Warren Pryde, owner of the local newspaper, Dirk Karreman, owner of Karreman Quarry, and Darwalla, a poultry company that part-owns Golden Cockerel.
Developer Stephen Williams of Wingate Properties and Adam Souter, director of Redlands firm Fiteni, have approached the council about the project, but their projects are not necessarily linked.
Fiteni is largely developing housing and McKenzie was pushing to exclude this from any projects in the area.
“Approximately 90 percent of the municipality’s rate revenue is generated from residential properties, creating a heavy reliance on households to finance basic services and infrastructure,” he wrote in a note attached to the motion published along with the meeting agenda.
“At the same time, more than half of the local workforce leaves the city every day to find work elsewhere.
“This combination limits the city’s ability to build a balanced, resilient economy and constrains long-term financial sustainability.”
The area is already home to Sirromet Winery, which also functions as a venue for major music events, further cementing it as an area on which tourism-based development can be built.
The motion also stated that the land was not supported by basic infrastructure, particularly sewerage, which has been the subject of new developments at the council in the past.
Late last year, council members said taxpayers of this masthead must spend at least $35 million a year to offset sewer costs, and a Fiteni-related development called Shoreline was only able to connect to the sewer system last year after being approved without it in 2015.
The State is currently reviewing the South East Queensland Regional Plan; It’s a process McKenzie hopes the land around the chicken farm will be a part of.
There was speculation that the area might be targeted as a priority development area by the state government; There are currently three of these in Redlands, including a major residential development in the Southern Thornlands.
The regional plan review comes as the state government pushes for more housing projects in south-east Queensland to boost supply and improve affordability.
The region’s population is expected to grow from the current 3.8 million to 6 million by 2046.
The council will vote on the motion on Wednesday.
Williams and Souter have been contacted for comment.
Start your day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.
