By CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
GREATER Dandenong councillors are prepared to vote against their own endorsed Green Wedge Management Plan to pave the way for a proposed housing estate at Keysborough Golf Club, according to councillor Peter Brown.
The council has advertised for a planning scheme amendment C143 to rezone the golf club’s land to Green Wedge A – which contradicts the council’s recent support for the housing estate.
The rezoning, in fact, entrenches the area’s rural character and retains massive subdivision minimum lots of four hectares.
Defenders of the Green Wedge spokesman Barry Ross welcomed the council’s apparent change of direction.
“We are particularly pleased that the Keysborough Golf Course will receive stronger protection through the rezoning to Green Wedge A Zone and the change to the local planning policy,” Mr Ross said.
“Hopefully, this will put an end to the moves to have the course taken out of the Green Wedge and carved up for housing”
Mr Ross said it would be interesting to see how the State Government responds.
Planning Minister Richard Wynne has the final say on the golf course land’s fate and Amendment C143.
Last year he reiterated his opposition to excising the golf course from the green wedge.
The amendment was proposed in the council’s 2014 Green Wedge Management Plan, and endorsed by a slim six to five majority by councillors.
Cr Brown said that councillors – including himself – were not aware of the “devil in the detail” at the time of voting for the GWMP.
“I didn’t see inside the detail was a shiny pair of handcuffs,” he said.
Since then, Cr Brown said a “substantial” majority of councillors backed a submission for the State Government to include the golf club in the urban growth boundary.
That would pave the way for an Intrapac housing estate on the 76-hectare site, and the golf club gaining $40 million and a state-of-the-art home in Pillars Road, Keysborough.
Cr Brown conceded that even if councillors altered lot sizes as part of Amendment C143, the final say rested with Mr Wynne.
To make a submission, go to http://www.greaterdandenong.com/document/29739/planning-scheme-amendment-c143.
