Dubbo councillor Tina Reynolds said she would not be swayed by scare tactics after Cr Allan Smith warned they could be personally liable if the risks of a planning proposal were not adequately addressed.
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Councillors discussed the Daisy Hill planning proposal application at the recent Planning and Development Committee meeting.
The proposal was to change land, bound by Pinedale Road to the north, Torwood Road to the east, Peachville Road to the west and Eulomogo Road to the south, which is currently zoned as Large Lot Residential to smaller lots.
Cr Smith said councillors could be held personally liable if the rezoning was approved without confronting the potential salinity problems.
“I’ve been in this council long enough to see the affects of salinity on infrastructure... where within a very short period of time when community had little information about a development in a saline area infrastructure was put in place with the best intent at the time and quite a considerable amount of infrastructure has now perished in a very short period of time,” he said.
Cr Smith said the reports to date about the salinity had been contradictory and the safest way to avoid liability on the issue was to reject the proposal.
However, Cr Reynolds said implying councillors would be personally liable, was using scare tactics.
“When I’m sitting around these council chambers I don’t want to have scare tactics that this could be personal liability on myself,” Cr Reynolds said.
“I was always under the impression that council has insurance that would cover us if anything did happen, and cover us personally as well.”
Cr Smith said Dubbo City Council also faced liability, the cost of which the community would be forced to wear if a wrong decision was made.
“It puts a risk in place that we have to address so that when those properties are developed and sold in good faith to the mums and dads of this world that want that type of property they know within all good faith the risks have been addressed and in 20 or 30 years time those major infrastructure problems are not going to occur in or around their properties and devalue their properties.
“I can’t make a clear judgement on my concerns on this issue on the information that’s been supplied by both parties that’s so contradictory.
“How is a layman supposed to make an informed decision when the information is so far apart? It can’t be done.”
The Daisy Hill proposal aims to subdivide the land into 153 6000 metre-square lots, 112 lots of 1.5 hectares and 20 six hectare lots.
A decision about the rezoning proposal will be made at council’s ordinary meeting Monday April 27.