'Diverse range' of people support Regand Park petition, Dubbo Regional Council notes

Cr Josh Black was the first to speak on motion. He wanted to "kill off" any notions that "rabid left-wing, tree-hugging greenie environmentalists" were the only ones who wanted to keep the park and not turn it into a football field.

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"Reading through some of the names... there's people who I know that are active members of the National Party, there's business people there, there's an extremely well known stock and station agent in Dubbo [who] signed that," Cr Black said.

"That petition and who signed it... [a] great number of people that I know, are not rabid left-wing, tree-hugging environmentalists that also want to see that land retained as passive open space for the whole community."

He said it wasn't just "one sub-section of the Dubbo community" who wanted to see Regand Park retained as a passive recreation area for public use.

Cr Richard Ivey said he had found the petition "very interesting". He noted the number of people not from Dubbo that had signed the petition which including their addresses from other cities and states.

He said their participation was "quite relevant" to the Regand Park debate.

"It shows the number of people outside Dubbo who actually visit Dubbo, that goes to show what an important city Dubbo is. It does attract people over a short period of time from such a wide area," Cr Ivey said.

"The other important thing that should be taken into account is that, those people, even if they didn't actually know what Regand Park was or what the debate was, they did appreciate the idea that it was an area of riverine land and there was move to protect it for environmental purposes.

"I think that's important."

Next to address the council was Cr Matt Wright who disclosed his non-pecuniary conflict of interest in the matter. His property bordered Regand Park, but did not necessarily the subject land or overview it and so he remained in the room to have his say.

He echoed Cr Black and Cr Ivey's observations of "diverse range" of petitioners. He concluded the discussion by encouraging people to participate in current consultations and give input regarding "what they do want" instead of what they didn't want to happen.

He said he was a little "disappointed".

"We're undergoing a master planning process at the moment which is calling out for the community not necessarily tell us what they don't want but what they do want," Cr Wright said.

"I know this petition talks about maintaining public, open, green space but what does that mean to the community? What do they wanna see?

"My understanding is that we've got a consultation in place at the moment where community can put forth their ideas through the portal and on our website and... there's only 350 members of public who've taken the time to tell council what they do want to see..."

He said there was little time left for the community to review the spatial concepts and give feedback "in a more elaborate form" rather than signing a particular petition.

"I want to hear what the community do want in that particular piece of space so we can have something that is proud and we can utilise in the future," Cr Wright said.

The Mayor thanked the councillors for their comments and clarified that the online survey would be open for community feedback until the October 4.

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