The battle to protect Kariong Sacred Lands

The community came out in force on Sunday to oppose a proposed housing development

The developer¹ plans on building 50 houses on an area of pristine bushland off Woy Woy Rd that is zoned C2 ‘Environmental Protection’ due to the endangered wetlands (hanging swamp), the presence of cultural heritage on and around the site—including rock carvings and an ancient, sacred tree—and habitat for many threatened species, including the critically endangered Swift Parrot.

The community gathering at Bambara Road, Kariong (which I attended) was led by Traditional Custodians Aunties Tracie Howie and Renee Sales, with locals participating in a traditional smoking ceremony. Many residents of nearby Narara Ecovillage, plus members of groups such as Permaculture Central Coast and Rising Tide, were there on the day.

Coast Environmental Alliance Spokesperson Jake Cassar said:

“We had such an incredible show of community spirit and unity. To see the broader community coming together again with the Traditional Custodians for such an important issue was just a great piece of Central Coast history to be a part of.

“We had hundreds of people attend over the duration of the 3-hour event and around a dozen guest speakers, including local conservationists, elders, and members of the Aboriginal community.”

Ursula Da Silva, a guest speaker at the event, said:

“[T]he flow-on effect of having rubbish, pollution, weeds, cats and dogs accessing the reserve, graffiti and potential vandalism to the cultural sites, will seriously impact the surrounding National Park forever.

“The Central Coast’s environment is being chipped away at piece by piece, meaning that if we don’t do something, it could eventually be left unrecognisable from the place we all know and love. We don’t choose to live on the beautiful Central Coast to be immersed in the urban sprawl.

“An option could be to end house hoarding as seen with the thousands of empty houses² currently sitting on the Central Coast. We certainly care about providing affordable housing. It just needs to be done in the right places where the impacts on our environment won’t be so devastating and irreversible.

“We are very much supportive of sustainable development, but there are many other options other than exploiting our most vulnerable and ecologically important Crown reserves.”

Kariong Progress Association President, Lisa Bellamy, was also a guest speaker:

“All we are asking is for the Government to abide by the laws that they created to protect our most vulnerable wild places and to not offer special concessions to private developers. We’ve had absolutely no support from our State Labor member Liesl Tesch on this matter, and we are hoping the community will remember this at the State election next year.

“I plan on taking this to the State election again next year by running as an Independent for the seat of Gosford. We have been desperately trying to work with our local members for many years and simply get ignored. So, when the elected leaders stop listening to the public, the public must step up and become leaders.”

Cassar said:

“After a nearly 7-year battle, we were told recently that a decision would likely be made at the end of September as to whether or not the area will be rezoned, so we decided to bring the community together in solidarity to show that we are still here fighting for a fair go for our wildlife and irreplaceable cultural heritage.

“We believe the cards have been well and truly stacked against us from the start, with it likely being decided long ago that Land Councils across NSW will have a separate set of rules applying to them when it comes to development in protected areas.

“[We] are doing our absolute best to stop the domino effect³ of the Government allowing DLALC to claim the majority of our Crown land and either develop it or sell it off with no regard for the impacts on our environment and cultural heritage.”

Community groups are establishing a legal fund to challenge any rezoning decision in the Land & Environment Court. To stay informed, join the Coast Environmental Alliance (CEA) group on Facebook.

Cover photo shows the Grandmother Tree (near the proposed development) courtesy of Aiyana Caposewa.

1. The developer is Darkinjung Local Aboriginal Land Council (DLALC), whose claims to the area are disputed by local Darkinoong and Guringai elders. According to several speakers at Sunday’s rally, DLALC was recently given $50,000 by NSW government expressly to promote this current development, in a blatant attempt to quash dissent. ↩︎
2. This number could be as high as 14,500 empty dwellings, according to one of the speakers. ↩︎
3. A successful rezoning here would set a dangerous precedent in NSW. There are rumours the state government is leveraging land councils to push their development agenda. ↩︎