The Wonder of Woolies

The wonder of woollies that causes many residents distress can possibly be explained by the apparent injustice of the process preceding the decision. The speed with which all community aspirations were swept aside in order to deliver a new shire office building was bound to be recognised by the residents as a demonstration of inequity in both planning and complete lack of self-determination for the residents. 

Woollies will never fit within the articulated requirements of the resident community. There may be some residents who aspired to have a branch of Woolworths in MR but if those persons were present at any of the community engagement sessions organised prior to the rapid sale of the Townview Terrace site they could not have been in the majority; as there are no traces of any desire to emulate the corporate high streets of larger towns in the records we have available.

No trace either that when the community have been engaged and recorded their views that they hankered after having a powerful symbol that would satisfy the shire customers. My own opinion is that most of the customers conducting business at the shire offices are residents, and most would most probably prefer low rates.

The next few paragraphs record a brief history of planning for the town centre of Margaret River.

In 1996 there was a “visioning day” when people were asked to engage and contribute ideas as to how the Margaret River town site could develop and be improved. I don’t have any details of how many people attended, but I do know that a fresh faced Ray Stocker continued to encourage community input in 1999.

The output from his steering group does not appear to have stood the test of time as nobody seems to know precisely what it was, nor have I records of how many people or how many days effort might be invested here.

However a few years later in 2002/03 one hundred people spent 4 days visioning and then turning that vision into some form of outline plan, a total of 400 man days. As Ray Stocker was one of those who attended we can imagine that the previous community engagement was not wasted.

At the end of this 4 day process, called an enquiry-by-design EBD meeting, there were diagrams, bullet points, lists of requirements, artist’s impressions, and Margaret River had a town centre plan. A plan that was such a model of the open and transparent process planning should follow, such an exemplary example of how an enquiry-by-design ought to be conducted that the WAPC keep it proudly displayed on their website;

Margaret River

This all did happen. It was the reality, those 100 people really did attend, did spend those hours and days together arguing and deciding on what their vision was.

As a vision for the town centre it may not have been perfect in every way, but it was their vision and to me it appears disrespectful to those 400 days of effort to throw the whole plan away without apparently asking the community how they felt about it?

16^th October 2009 the shire announced that it was borrowing approx $15 million dollars to construct brand a brand new office building.

New Admin Buidling

Within the business plan there is no reference to Ray Stocker’s community engagement in planning the MR town centre, and no reference to the EBD process.

Within the Admin Centre Business Plan there is a reference to staff needing to work in close physical proximity. This was given as a justification for the new building. It is laughable, and demonstrates no understanding at all of how large multi-national corporations are capable of functioning over different continents and time zones effectively.

The claim that the new offices will be a “powerful symbol” is just sad when the local economy is depressed and so many within the community can never aspire to own a home here. The shire business plan states that such a building is needed to meet the expectations of the “our customers”.

Who are these mysterious customers?

It is made clear that these customers are a separate group to the residents, they are not the people who actually live here, they are not the people who wasted their time describing the town centre they wanted first to Ray Stocker and then to the Enquiry by Design facilitators.

And so we are left wondering, “Who are they?”

Did Woollies just appear fortuitously at a time when the shire needed to sell the old site, or was the decision to build a new shire office made so that the site could be available? Or was the debt incurred by building the new offices a “poison pill” to stop another shire wishing to amalgamate?

Whatever the reason, the community will always wonder why there wasn’t any 4 day Enquiry by Design needed in order to dispose of the community vision in favour of Woolworths.

There is no point in accusing the community of being harsh judges. They have had their vision for the MR town centre completely trashed.

When we are asked what we want, engage in what appears to be a democratic process, and are subsequently shown the results, what response would a rational human anticipate? How would any rational human be expected to behave when none of the promises are then delivered?

I am aware that the EBD process is non binding, but surely the man on the Clapham Omnibus, or the Sydney Tram, or the MR surf board, expects some result from his efforts? And surely civic leaders, both elected and professional, should recognise that continually asking what we want and then delivering something else does not encourage an engaged community.

The wonder of Woollies isn’t that people “demonise” and focus on the wrong target; the wonder is, that with planning and democracy within this shire failing to such an extent, there is no rioting on the streets.

Maybe Linton Hodsdon, Barbara Maidment, Lyn Serventy, Nick and Donna Dornan, and any others who were at the EBD can give us some comments on the planning for MR town centre, past and present?