25 May 2014
Ferry fee increase: assistance with submissions
A large number of them wanted to go home, think about the subject, and then prepare their own submission and either mail or email it themselves. If anyone requires further assistance they should ring: Carol or Dennis Marsden on 5156 0016.
Submission forms and full details are online at:
http://www.eastgippsland.vic.gov.au/Your_Say/Draft_Revised_Council_Plan_2013-2017_and_Draft_Budget_201415
Submissions on the draft Revised Council Plan 2013-2017 and draft Budget 2014/15 must be received at Council’s Corporate Centre, 273 Main Street Bairnsdale by 12 pm on Friday, 30 May 2014.
Anyone making a written submission should indicate whether they wish to be heard in support of their submission. Anyone wishing to be heard is entitled to appear in person, or by a person acting on their behalf, at a meeting of a Committee comprising the whole of Council with a quorum being five Councillors, which will take place from 2.00 pm on Tuesday 10 June 2014 at Council’s Corporate Centre, 273 Main Street, Bairnsdale.
After considering submissions Council will formally adopt the Revised Council Plan 2013-2017 and Budget 2014/15, with or without amendment, at a Special Council Meeting to be held at the Corporate Centre, Bairnsdale on Tuesday 24 June 2014 at 6.00 pm.
22 May 2014
RICA June meeting
This will be the last meeting before the winter break (July and August). The RICA Committee encourages all members old and new to come to this meeting and then stay afterwards for a sausage sizzle.
We also would like to invite others from the greater Raymond Island community to join us for the sausage sizzle at 1.00pm. If you would like to attend the RICA meeting to se what we are about, please come along at 12.00pm noon.
The sausage sizzle will be provided - please bring your own drinks.
Abbey Planting Day
Sunday June 1, 2014 @ 2.30 pm.
All are welcome
Ferry fee increases
I recently learnt of the proposed increase to fees associated with the Raymond Island Ferry. I also understand there is a push from the Raymond Island community to challenge this increase. I would like to offer my support for this cause as well as my own thoughts on the matter.
While never a resident of Raymond Island I have visited the island frequently since I was a young boy (over a quarter century) as my family maintained a holiday house on the island. The Ferry is more than a mode of transport and to view it as mere infrastructure with attached running costs is myopic. Its an institution central to the character and feel of Raymond Island.
Its why the proposed increase in fees elicits such a strong emotional reaction from so many people. And not because people do not accept they should pay for services they use. But because there is no method to the increase. They see something they hold dear being treated as mere infrastructure with attached running costs. They are being asked to foot a massive increase in fees that they don't see as justified. The fact remains that a failure to adequately plan financially on the part of the Shire is not the fault of the residents and visitors to Raymond Island.
Has a feasibility study been undertaken with regards this increase? The law of diminishing returns springs to mind here. The Shire needs to put in place a transparent process for determining the level of fees and appropriate regular increases so that people are aware they are coming and can budget for them in advance. Not be hit with such a large increase with little warning.
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We are concerned about cost of the Ferry to island because we are pensioners and we travel to the island to meet our friends how live there.
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My husband & I own a holiday property at 23 Second Avenue, Raymond Island. Our family have owned property on the island for over 80 years so RI is not only important to us but has a history and emotional attachment.
The proposed increases are unreasonable and unfair. Our children are young and married with a family and don't have the financial resources to pay for the proposed high cost of the ferry.
Why should we pay our rates, support the economy and build a lifestyle and not have the basics like access to our property by our family. it is a sad day when our families stop going to RI.
The cost for the second family car is outrageous. We are discussing the basic use of accessing our property for our holidays. My husband often has to attend work so we need to take 2 cars. maybe, the council should consider charging all families in their municipality for having 2 cars. You are taking away our personal right to have a second car. You have no right and we are disgusted in the revenue raising attempts by the council.
I sincerely hope you see your way clear to abolish any thought of this proposal.
Yours sincerely
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Might the Council consider a fee for non residents (i.e.tourists), as walk-on passengers.to supplement the ferry costs, rather than slugging the locals.
We don't have a shop, we don't have a school, we don't have pub or post office, and sometimes we don't even have a bloody ferry.
A tourist would pay $5 or $15 a family to see the flora and fauna that, on the whole, are looked after by rate-paying Islanders.
Surely the residentS of a rate-paying property have a right to free access to their property, or at worst, a nominal charge, as now.
What do they expect us to use? A flying fox???
Get real East Gippsland Council.
18 May 2014
Ferry fees increase
A huge ferry fee increase is proposed.Be at the RICA Hall next Thursday 22 May or Saturday 24 May.
Raymond Island Ferry Fees
The proposal to make property owners pay for a second vehicle pass is a breach of our rights of access to our house - and my understanding is that the Shire received money specifically to provide the islanders with free ferry passes.
We have a right to get to our house for free like every other ratepayer in the Shire.
Your Mayor's comment on the radio "that’s the dilemma we as a council have so do we continue with the free access for all residents, which means that every resident in East Gippsland and Shire pay for that service or do we have a full user pay, or do we have something in between that’s a reasonable imposition on everybody and a reasonable cost to everybody" seems reasonable on the surface - but is it going to be applied across the board?
As a Raymond Island resident, my rates have just paid for the Bairnsdale library - but I don't use that - and rolled my eyes at the expense.
My rates are paying for the work at Mallacoota - but I don't use that - and rolled my eyes at the expense.
Are either Bairnsdale ratepayers or Mallacoota ratepayers going to be charged extra for their "optional use - don't have to use to get home every day" facilities?
To say that there must be some arbitrary "user pays" for the Ferry is ridiculous. You are talking about a service which provides access to our houses - we don't have an alternative to use.
Raymond Island brings many many thousands of tourists to the East Gippsland area who come purely for the koalas.
Has that annual income has ever been assessed? I bet the revenue generated and benefit to the business owners and tourism industry in this shire would far exceed the cost of running the ferry - so in a way, the island is already paying for the ferry!
The $20 cost of the ferry to the island is not only going to penalise visitors of families who live on the island (my own elderly mother who lives in Bairnsdale has stated that she will no longer be able to visit if these fees go ahead), but may also have an impact on the number of visitors to the island - has a full cost benefit analysis been done on the doubling of the ferry fee?
By the way - can you imagine the uproar if public transport trip fees in Melbourne were doubled?
As a community we came together to discuss these outrageous proposed increases in the ferry fees and intend to fight them every step of the way.
Our precious Lakes
Martin Richardson sent through the link to a short video on Youtube - put together to describe the Ramsar values of the Lakes in accessible language, with colour and movement.
Watch the video in a new window.
11 May 2014
Landcare working bee at the Wedge
As the photos show we had a great day at The Wedge recently.
A team of 10 Landcarers had a great day at The Wedge recently. They arrived to take on one hour's mulching and some watering. Later they spent almost as much time chatting over a cuppa.
Almost all trees on the site have now been mulched - thanks to Doug Livingstone of Safe Trees for supplying the mulch.
A team of 10 Landcarers had a great day at The Wedge recently. They arrived to take on one hour's mulching and some watering. Later they spent almost as much time chatting over a cuppa.
Almost all trees on the site have now been mulched - thanks to Doug Livingstone of Safe Trees for supplying the mulch.
Mother's day
Bek Zizman sent through this lovely photograph, taken during the week, of a very cold and wet mum keeping her baby warm with a cuddle.
Myanmar presentation
Val Quirk, and Coralie and Peter Foxton are giving a photographic presentation and talk in the hall about their experiences in Myanmar, at the orphanage. Wednesday 28th May, at 7.30pm.
All welcome.
8 May 2014
Warwick Hall interviewed by ABC Radio's Kath Sullivan
| Kath |
The Raymond Island Community
Association. Welcome to ABC Gippsland Warwick.
|
Warwick
|
Good morning Kath.
|
Kath
|
OK. How much does it currently cost to
catch the Raymond Island ferry?
|
Warwick
|
There are a number of price
structures, as residents of the Island currently within our rates the cost of
access to the ferry for the first two vehicles is covered so we pay our rates
like everyone else and we get a pass for two vehicles. What’s proposed in the
budget is that we’ll get one pass and for the second we’ll pay $200. For
subsequent vehicles we’ll pay $500 now that’s per year, that’s a new charge.
Every day access, if you were to go down to, if your mother lived on the
island you went to visit her at the moment it would cost you $10 to take your
car across and it’s proposed in the budget that it will cost $20 so they’re
pretty significant increases. Increases for heavy vehicles, currently if
someone brings a truck over to deliver a fridge, or a washing machine to a
resident on the island it costs them $14 for that truck if it’s
less than 20 tonnes, the budget proposes it’s going to cost $30, that’s a 114% increase and of course the operator of the truck is not going to absorb that cost, that’s going to be passed onto the resident of the island. These increases are very significant and they do concern us. |
Kath
|
When was the last time the fee for the
ferry went up?
|
Warwick
|
Oh Kath, you’ve got me there, I can’t
be sure but I would say it’s been a couple of years.
|
Kath
|
And could you recall any indication of
what the increase might have been the last time that the fees were raised?
|
Warwick
|
Over the last, since the ferry has
been operating, the fees have regularly increased and we have, the residents
of the island have no issue with increasing in fees as CPI increases. In
general average increases within this proposed budget are between 2 and 5%.
Our rates like everyone else in the Shire are going up 4.9%but the magnitude
of these increases is significant, they’re greater than that, that’s where
we’ve got some concerns that we’d like the Shire to consider.
|
Kath
|
Are you happy with the current service
that you receive from the Raymond Island ferry?
|
Warwick
|
Yes we are, the current contractor
does an excellent job, the Shire does a good job. There will always be
niggles, there’ll always be some complaints of course like any service it’s
not perfect but generally speaking the majority of residents are happy with
what we currently
have, we have no issue with Shire about the service, or the operator of the service, our issue more is that this proposes that access to our homes will become will become more expensive than it currently is. |
Kath
|
What do you think would be an
adequate, or appropriate fee increase for the services?
|
Warwick
|
Well it’s difficult to see why any
increase, if it should occur, would be more than the increases that we’re
seeing for other items in the budget and that’s CPI plus a little bit so as I
say, on average our rates are 4.9% so something in the order of 2 to 5% would
be consistent with the other increases, generally speaking, that are in the
budget and there will be people that will object to any increase but that
would be something that would be a bit more reasonable.
|
Kath
|
Have you raised these concerns with
Council?
|
Warwick
|
Well we haven’t directly, the proposed
budget, the draft hasn’t been out for all that long and we’ve only become
aware of it in the last several days. As the Raymond Island Community
Association, which has members from the island, we’ve been contacted by many
residents
who expressed a great deal of concern about that and so we had a public meeting on Monday for people to voice their concerns, or talk about the issue, and a lot of people turned up a pretty consistent point of view that these proposed increases are unreasonable and inconsistent with the rest of the other budget increases and will have a significant effect on the costs of access of residents and our visitors, our families, to the island. |
Kath
|
How many residents are on Raymond
Island at the moment?
|
Warwick
|
There are around about, don’t hold me
to the exact number, there are around about 460. The demographic on the
island is changing, we’re getting many more young families moving in with
young children and these people, the kids are going to grow up and these kids
are going to have to go to work in Bairnsdale or somewhere else and they’re
going to need a car to do
that because there’s no other option and you can see that if these proposed increases went through a family of mum and dad and three kids, all of whom are going to have to have a car because there’s no option it would cost them about $1700 a year to go home every night. We think that’s a bit rough. |
Kath
|
Warwick Hall, we’re going to follow
this one with a bit of interest, thanks for your time. Warwick Hall is the
president of the Raymond Island Community Association. Happy to listen to his
concerns about a proposed fee increase for the Raymond Island ferry is Councillor Mark Reeves, Mayor of the East Gippsland Shire Council.
Councillor, thanks for your time this morning. Why is the fee for the ferry
being raised 100%?
|
Mayor
|
Morning Cath, look it was good to hear
Warwick and the feelings of the community because I understand there was a
community meeting on Monday evening, and he’s correct, the draft budget is
out for public consultation and it’s very important that people do interrogate
that. Now a few years ago, about four years ago, there was a great deal of
community engagement about access to Raymond Island and discussions around
whether the ferry should remain or some other alternatives and generally the
local people on Raymond Island quite animate with
the idea of the ferry, it is from our understanding, after consultation, a preferred method of access. If that’s the case we have a remiss in the council to make sure that it’s safe, reliable and compliant and we also understand that there’s a range of different views from residents. Now Warwick mentioned the fee structure that’s proposed, the annual fee for a non-resident is $500, the second car is $200, that’s proposed, but the first car is free. Now, at the moment, I need to put this into the context of the bigger picture, which is the total running costs to the island of the ferry. At the moment the ferry costs the Shire, and all residents, between $1.2 and $1.5m per annum in capital and recurrent costs to operate and the income proposed from this particular fee structure is about $300,000, it generates about $300,000. |
Kath
|
So everybody listening to you in Omeo
has just rolled their eyes and said why are their rates are paying for this
service for 400 odd residents
|
Mayor
|
Correct, and Cath that’s the dilemma
we as a council have so do we have so do we continue with the free access for
all residents, which means that every resident in East Gippsland and Shire
pay for that service or do we have a full user pay, or do we have something
in between that’s a reasonable imposition on everybody and a reasonable cost
to everybody. It’s a great dilemma.
|
Kath
|
Mark Reeves, why don’t you just build
a bridge?
|
Mayor
|
Well, as I said, there was community
engagement about four years ago that the consensus at the time was that the
ferry should remain but I think there are a number of councillors that, and a
number of us who would say look amortised over 20 or 20 years a bridge would
cost about the same per annum and we’d end up with no recurrent costs in the
future and I think that those conversations should be had
|
Kath
|
But you’d have no expense in the
future
|
Mayor
|
That’s right
|
Kath
|
You’re going to recoup around $300,000
from this proposed system, how much did you recoup from the current existing
system which would …….. those two cars?
|
Mayor
|
Considerably less than that, I don’t
have the figures in front of me but clearly it was
considerably less than that and our concern is that when we start we want to have a safe, reliable, compliant ferry. Every two years we need to slip that ferry, it needs to be surveyed, that costs a significant amount for rate payers and we spent a lot of money recently, a significant investment in the chains, the guides, the buffers, the engine replacement over time because if that’s our preferred method it has to be reliable for those people and there’s a balance about how do we make that reasonable impost across the Shire. |
Kath
|
When are you going to finalise your
budget?
|
Mayor
|
Well the budget is out for
consultation for the next four weeks, so three weeks from Friday, and we
welcome all residents, not just residents from Raymond Island, to interrogate
the budget and make submissions, that’s part of the process and we really
welcome that.
|
Kath
|
Mark Reeves, we’ll have to leave it
there, thanks for your time.
|
Mayor
|
Thanks Kath
|
Kath
|
Mark Reeve is the Mayor of the East
Gippsland Shire Council
|
Proposed ferry fees increase
RI community reaction to the Shire's budget proposal.Following public awareness of the East Gippsland Shire draft budget, the RICA committee was approached by a number of outraged residents asking what could be done to express the opinion of the islanders. A public meeting was called for Monday 5th May, attended by between 220 and 250 people, RICA members and non-members.
The issues were explained, essentially dramatic increases in costs of access to the island. Many residents’ opinions were expressed and notes where taken. A unanimous vote agreed that action needed to be taken and a working group has been formed to approach the Council with the residents’ concerns.
ABC Rural Radio interviewed a working group spokesman on Wednesday 7th and there have been interviews with the printed media.
The working group meets for the first time on the evening of Thursday 8th to formulate a response to the shire. The working group will keep all residents informed via the RI internet site and email/ letter where appropriate.
4 May 2014
Proposed budget hikes ferry fees
New RI Ferry Fees
Meeting Community Hall - 7.30pm Monday 5 May
The East Gippsland Shire draft budget proposes dramatic increases in the cost of access to Raymond Island.All residents and ratepayers are invited to a meeting at the Community Hall on Fifth Parade on Monday May 5th at 7.30 PM to discuss and develop a submission to voice our concerns.
The Shire will listen to the residents and ratepayers of Raymond Island. We must make sure our voices are effective.
1 May 2014
Raymond Island online community
If you have interesting stories or photographs that you'd like to share with other Islanders, send them to RaymondIslandNet@gmail.com.
Back from Myanmar
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| Baby girl with house father |
Our Voluntour trip to visit schools and an orphanage in Myanmar with ICC (International Children's Care) was amazing. The people were gentle, warm, welcoming. The countryside, lack of infrastructure, housing, poverty, has to be seen to be believed (and I have previously visited Cambodia, Vietnam, China etc.) Many, no most, people live in conditions I wouldn't camp in overnight, and yet they just seem to get on with life. Work! We don't know the meaning of the word here. Hard, grinding physical labour is just a part of the daily struggle to eat, survive. Three dollars a day is the going wage, if you like hefting 25kg bags of rice for 10 hours at a time in the heat or if you are prepared to engrave intricate lacquerware, day in, day out, sitting on a bamboo mat.
 |
| Love that Lego! |
The school requisites will be well used in classrooms of 90+ kids, grubby rooms, devoid of any form of inspirational charts, posters, teaching aids.
Some of you donated money and together with some extra of ours, we were able to buy the Children's Village's rice supply for the coming year, material to make the girls' school uniforms, (on treadle machines, no pins, tape measure) AND, best of all, a refrigerator - a first for the Village.
 |
| 'Aunty Val' swimming Burmese style |
Having a few spare dollars left, we asked the house mothers what they needed most. Can you believe they wanted coat hangers, plastic cups, knives, chopping boards and a potato peeler? Thse are things which we would just purchase without a second thought.
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| Painting one of the houses |
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| Children's bedroom |
For those interested, we have in mind to put on a little presentation, down the track. Please watch this space if you are interested.
Thank you all once again - Coralie Foxton, Peter Foxton, Val Quirk.
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