Congratulations to the Factory Community Centre and Babana

Congratulations to the Factory Community Centre and Babana Aboriginal Mens Group for becoming finalists in this years City of Sydney Business Awards.

Barangaroo review – affordable housing and a skate park?

This week, after much anticipation, the report of the review into Barangaroo was released to the public.  My Greens colleague David Shoebridge and Australian’s for Sustainable Development  (a group of which I’m proud to be a part) have made plenty of comments in the media about the various wins and losses the report contains, such as a recommendation to remove the hotel in the harbour but leave the grossly expensive  headland park as planned and pass off many of the controversial decisions to the good graces of developers Lend Lease. 

I want to talk about two other issues covered in the report that have received less attention – housing and the planning of Barangaroo Central.

Waiting for Godot in public housing

Housing NSW (HNSW) is a body in disarray, with levels of organisation and an ability to communicate with clients far below the standards that one should expect from a government department.  Indeed, standards are below even what one would expect of a local landlord, and tenant frustration is palpable.

Government departments are busy places and it’s understandable that sometimes when you call you’ll have to wait a while to talk to someone.  However HNSW take it a step beyond this.  Whether you want to report a maintenance issue or need to speak to a client service officer about feeling threatened by your neighbours ringing up generally results in you being answered by a message that says HNSW is too busy to talk and that you should call back later.  But ‘later’ hardly ever comes, you can call all day and just keep getting the same message.

I know residents of public housing buildings that need to report urgent maintenance issues who have to call at 1am to get through.  Then when you finally do get through the call ends up being lost in the system half the time and nothing ever gets done.

One recent example of this occurred with a tenant in Redfern whose limited mobility resulted in access difficulties in their home.  It took over 6 months just for their situation to be assessed.  Another 6 months have since passed and still no action has been taken, with no indication given on when any action will occur.

In another case a high rise apartment building owned by HNSW had been experiencing flooding on and off for two months as a result of leaking pipes on the upper floors.  When contacted by my office the relevant maintenance staff were unaware of the issue, despite multiple calls from residents over a two month period.

Internal organisation within the department is abysmal.  Inquiries are constantly referred to other parts of the organisation but as soon as you get onto the new part you have to start all over again explaining the situation.  The left hand doesn’t know what the right is doing.  This results in so much duplication of effort on the part of both residents and HNSW staff – I guess that could be one explanation as to why they’re too busy to answer the phones.

The incredibly high turnover rate of staff who interact with tenants also adds to the mess.  It takes each staff member a few months to come to terms with local issues but it seems as soon as they’ve done that they end up being shuffled off to another area and you get a new staff member who has no idea what’s going on.  It makes it near impossible for anything to get done.

With over 43 000 people on the waiting list for housing in NSW the waste of time and resources is heartbreaking.  One of the first tests of our new state government, who in opposition loved to cry out that they would ‘stop waste’, will be to see whether or not they can go any meaningful way to fixing the mess that is HNSW.  Lets hope that the transition between governments doesn’t simply result in another set of delays – tenants have had enough of waiting for Godot to arrive.

Social engineering in Redfern Waterloo

The Redfern Waterloo Authority (RWA) have grand plans for the “urban renewal” of the two suburbs that they oversee and recently exhibited the 2nd stage of the Built Environment Plan for the area.

While there certainly are some interesting opportunities for renewal in the area, I am concerned about a number of aspects of the plan, most significantly the attempts at social engineering on the site.  The area has historically had a very high concentration of public housing tenants but the new plan will see 700 public housing dwellings shifted off-site to a yet to be determined location and replaced with affordable housing – pitting the poor against the very poor.  An additional 3500 private dwellings will also be built.

These concerns, plus numerous other issues relating to things such as building size and density, transport and traffic are detailed in my submission to the RWA on behalf of the South Sydney Greens.

Glebe ‘Affordable Housing’ Project

The planning controls for the ‘Glebe Affordable Housing Project’ were presented to Council last Monday night.  Under the guise of providing affordable housing this project will sell off public land and cram hundreds more units into the streets of Glebe.

An artists impression of the new, high density estate, to go between Wentworth, Bay and Cowper streets in Glebe.

I have many times spoken out against this project and below is the speech I gave to Council, setting out my reasoning for this.

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Calling the development an Affordable Housing Project is a real misnomer as less than a quarter of the housing will be new Affordable Housing, while public housing increases by a meagre 19 units, bringing the total to just under half the planned dwellings.

Selling off half the estate under the mantra of “social mix” is really just a verbal piece of trickery to justify the ongoing plans by Housing NSW (HNSW) to divest itself of housing over the next 15 years by transferring existing units to community housing providers or selling the land to the private market – this at a time when over 43,300 people are on the waiting list desperate for affordable social housing.

Social mix is an unproven dogma that is contested among academics and is in its detail greatly insulting to the majority of housing department tenants who are now faced with uncertainty about the future of their tenancies and their landlords.

In the background papers on this item it is claimed on page 9, point 14 (c), that the proposal would:

“improve tenant satisfaction, economic participation and educational opportunities for social housing tenants through integration of affordable and market housing into the development and connecting the development with the surrounding community.”

I would challenge this claim on every point and ask how social mix will change economic participation and educational opportunities for the social housing residents who will move into the new development. It is more likely to create pockets of inequality as private developments come with indoor pools and gyms which will be denied to the public housing section.

Even more insulting is the claim that it would connect social housing residents with the surrounding community as if they weren’t already a part of the community in Glebe.

The whole mantra of social mix is an insult to all the housing NSW residents who have successful tenancies, do not cause trouble and do not need to be integrated into a community they are already part of.

Rather this idea of social mix destroys existing communities, moving residents out of their homes and into new dwellings which they may or may not prefer. The policy is to make only 2 offers to residents who are being relocated and often the new unit is far from the same standard as what the tenants already have.

We must remember that many of these residents have been in the estate for more than 30 years and losing their homes is a hugely stressful experience for them.

It is also worth noting that only around 10% of residents return to these new developments as the stress of moving is just too much for many people who after a few years are just starting to put down roots in their new areas.

 I’ve got no problem with building better housing for public housing tenants nor for the creation of more affordable housing but when we look across the City at HNSW larger plans what we are seeing is a decline in public housing in the name of affordable housing which is a very poor outcome for both the very poor and those on low incomes.

The break up on this development should be more public and affordable housing not more private housing as there are plenty of sites that can supply private market properties such as Harold Park and the Carlton brewery site.

Sadly what is happening as the inner city becomes more and more gentrified is that social housing estates are being treated as social eyesores and the regeneration of housing estates is being driven by factors more to do with money and government targets than the true needs of the existing HNSW residents.

 At no time during this process were HNSW residents consulted on what they would like to happen to the estate.  Rather they have been treated like property with no input into their fate or the fate of what have been their homes for many years.

Finally I am very concerned that HNSW will use the City of Sydney’s 2030 target of 7.5% public housing as a justification for lowering the number of public housing units in the area from its current position of 10.4%. I believe this will not be in the spirit of what the City was hoping for with its affordable housing plan.

I believe that in supporting these changes we will be giving tacit support to HNSW’s land sell off and providing the planning controls that will make it happen. Thus I cannot support this project.

Despicable state of Coogee housing

Lack of maintenance in a public housing estate is posing severe risks to the residents’ health, both physical and mental.

In response to complaints from residents I went to inspect the estate in question in South Coogee with Greens MP David Shoebridge and Mayor of Randwick Murray Matson.  We were shocked by what we saw.

There are units and hallways with exposed electrical wires.  There are properties where facilities as basic as toilets, showers and stoves are broken and have gone months without repair, leaving elderly and disabled residents to live in appallingly unhygienic conditions.  In one particularly concerning case a resident with both physical and psychological disabilities had a toilet that was not working for several months, resulting in them having to use a bucket in its place.

There is rubbish piling up in bins on the nature strip because garbage trucks can’t get access to them in their current locations, leaving it to rot for weeks on end.  The situation is so bad that tenants have had to go to the Consumer Trader and Tenancy Tribunal or get court orders to have things cleaned up.  Or they’ve had to privately pay out from their own meagre incomes to have cleaning done because Housing NSW (HNSW) won’t do its job of keeping things in order.

However these aren’t the most worrying things we saw during the inspection.  There is also a massive asbestos contamination risk in at least one building.  HNSW carried out tests for asbestos contamination but has so far refused to release the results of these tests.

Whether or not the building is actually contaminated many residents believe it is.  This is having a severe negative affect on the mental health of many of them and some are taking extreme measures to protect themselves from what they feel are very serious risks.  One resident has gone so far as to cover all of her possessions in plastic sheets, as shown in the photo, and has lived with them untouched like this for years now.

HNSW needs to release the results of these tests immediately.  If the buildings are safe to live in there is no reason to hide this fact and having it confirmed would seriously boost resident morale.  However if the buildings aren’t safe the residents are at serious risk of contracting fatal illnesses and it is HNSW’s legal and moral responsibility to act on this straight away.  Whatever the case they have no excuse for maintaining this secrecy.

David Shoebridge is following the matter up with the Housing Minister but as yet he has received no response.  Murray Matson will also be pursuing the matter through Randwick Council.  This is a dire situation in which doing nothing is not an acceptable option.  We will be following up this matter vigorously through all available channels until we have a resolution.

Protecting inner-city squatters

There has been a lot of media attention this week about a controversial move by the City to evict squatters who have taken up residence in an empty building in Redfern.  The issue is summed up well by this article in the Inner West Courier, which quotes both myself and fellow Greens Councillor Chris Harris voicing our opposition to the plans.

Clr Harris and I have both been in discussion with the squatters, who seem very reasonable and have agreed to leave if the City is genuinely planning to put the building to other uses.  While it may be too late for this group the issues raised by this case are worth giving some consideration.

While the City aims to be as efficient with it’s use of buildings as possible, and has a good track record on allowing temporarily empty buildings to be used as artists studios and the like I think there is more that can be done, particularly in the field of housing the hundreds of homeless people who sleep rough in the City every night.  When Council resumes next year I will investigate the possibility of making it easier to grant caretaker permits to squatters.  This will mean that these buildings are put to good use housing those who otherwise have no home but will ensure those who occupy them are responsible for keeping the buildings in good order.  Hopefully we will be able to extract some sort of positive outcome from this difficult situation.

Living in fear in 21st century Australia

An unacceptably large number of public housing tenants do not feel safe in their own homes because of the conduct of their neighbours.  The problem is widespread across the state and of particular concern for older women, single mothers, people with disabilities and people from a non-English speaking background.

The problem certainly isn’t new, however in recent months the number of people coming to me with complaints about it has increased dramatically.  I recently got a report that the state government housing provider Housing NSW (HNSW) had given tenancies to two young men with substance abuse issues and a history of violent behaviour in a building where all the other occupants were frail elderly women.  These women can hear the sound of the young men’s aggressive behaviour from inside their apartments and are afraid to even walk the hallways of their own building at night. 

Another elderly lady with limited mobility has become cut off from her family for similar reasons – her son won’t bring her young grandchildren to visit as he fears for their safety in the high rise building that she lives in which is populated, once again, by people with aggressive behaviour issues.  I’ve also recently been told of a young pregnant woman being repeatedly assaulted by her neighbours and a woman with a physical disability housed in an estate where all the other occupants are men, many of whom have mental illnesses that cause them to act very aggressively at times.

These are just a few examples of the recent cases that have been bought to my attention of people living in fear in their own homes because of the poor housing allocations made by HNSW or its contractors.  Everyone deserves a home, including people with metal illnesses, substance abuse issues or who have done time in prison.  However it is essential that when these people are assigned to homes consideration is given to who their neighbours are and what needs they have.  At the moment HNSW does not seem to do this at all – their “anti-social behaviour strategy’ is hardly a strategy at all and they have no official policy to address the issue.

While HNSW has detailed procedures for moving tenants who are in danger in their current homes they have no policies to prevent these situations from arising in the first place.  Prevention is far better than cure.  For elderly people or people with poor English language skills the process of applying for a transfer can be very daunting, many people worry that they will be evicted if they make a fuss and whoever you are, the process takes a long time.  HNSW needs to house people appropriately in the first place instead of waiting for a problem to crop up then going about the slow, complicated process of moving people.

I’ll be the first to admit that this issue isn’t a simple one.  One of the principles underlying the creation of public housing communities is social mix.  You don’t want to concentrate too many disadvantaged people in one spot lest you give rise to many more social problems.  Ultimately the solution will likely involve housing those with the potential to cause problems alongside those who are the least vulnerable in areas where support services and security are on hand.

It will also involve the creation of more seniors communities and other areas where groups of people more comfortable around others of their own demographic can be housed together and mutually support each other.

HNSW needs to seriously look at these issues and come up with a comprehensive set of policies for allocating people to properties in a way that creates as positive an environment as possible for all those involved.

In the 21^st century it shouldn’t be acceptable for people to be living in fear like so many are.  We all deplore domestic violence for this reason but seem to ignore the people who, in their own homes, are afraid of violence from elsewhere.

Marg Barry and a vision for social justice

On the 16th of September this year I was asked to give the introductory speech at the annual Marg Barry lecture, the theme being “The Revival of Social Justice”.  Marg Barry was a resident of Waterloo who campaigned tirelessly in the 1970′s for affordable housing and the creation of a just and sustainable community in Southern Sydney.  Her work saved a number of public housing estates in Redfern and Waterloo from being sold to private developers and in doing so she helped to preserve the communities that are so important to the residents of the area.

Sadly today the communities of Redfern and Waterloo are once again in danger.  The Government is chomping at the bit to sell off public housing and scatter the communities that live there in a massive social engineering exercise, so Margy’s fight is far from over.  Below is the text of the speech I presented at the lecture.

Latest Suicide a Wake-up Call

Below is the text of a letter that I sent to NSW Housing Minister David Borger today about a suicide that occurred at the Joanna O’Dea public housing building in Camperdown.  Let’s hope that this tragic event will spur the Minister to finally take action to improve the situation at Joanna O’Dea and other public housing estates in need of improvements.

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Dear Minister Borger

 I’m sure you will be as saddened as I to hear that last week a person jumped to their death from the Joanna O’Dea building in Camperdown, owned and managed by Housing NSW  (HNSW).  As you will be aware, I have had a significant amount of ongoing correspondence with the residents of this building since the adjacent block of land was announced as the site for the “Common Ground” Camperdown Project last year.  The residents tell me that this case is at least the 11^th time someone has jumped from the 10 storey building in the last decade.

 Joanna O’Dea Court has a large number of residents with mental illness or substance abuse issues.  For at least 20 years the residents have been pleading with successive state governments to have security features put in the building to help curb the shockingly high rate of violence, indecency and drug use that goes on in the building.  This, along with the lack of proper support from mental health services contributes to the vulnerable residents feeling afraid, helpless and depressed and sadly leading some to take their own lives.  It is tragically ironic that the latest suicide occurred just hours after myself and the Project Director of the Camperdown Project met with residents and HNSW finally promised to carry out a safety audit on the building.

 I am writing now to ask you, in the light of this tragedy, to publically commit to implementing the findings of the safety audit as a matter of priority.  Compared to the $12 million that has been committed to upgrading safety at the Waterloo Green housing estate and the $28 million that is planned to be spent building the Camperdown Project the cost of improving safety and security in Joanna O’Dea is a drop in the ocean.

 I would also request that you commit to allowing the residents of Joanna O’Dea in need of mental health or other support services to access those being provided as part of the Camperdown Project.  The tragic number of suicides that have occurred are strong evidence to show that many of the residents of Joanna O’Dea are as much in need of support as the formerly homeless residents to be housed by the Camperdown Project.

 Thank you for listening to my requests.  If you agree to these measures I think we will see a big improvement in the quality of life for the residents of Joanna O’Dea and some small amount of good may be able to come out of this latest tragedy.

 Regards

Councillor Irene Doutney

City of Sydney Council