Tweed Shire Council opts out of state Rural Land Sharing Communities policy

One Northern Rivers council has take a big step forward in making changes to rules around rural land sharing communities.

3222 Kyogle Road, Mount Burrell sold for $2 million on June 19, 2020 and is part of an area slated for a rural land share community.

What was once designed as a way for like-minded residents to share land, has become a way for developers to exploit a policy.

That’s the reason why Tweed Shire Council is removing the permissibility of Rural Land Sharing Communities through amendment to the State Environmental Planning Policy.

The decision was up for discussion at Thursday night’s planning committee meeting.

Councillor Katie Milne said there were big issues with the decision.

“The biggest problem we’re facing with our housing crisis is we have so much land zoned up in the Tweed Shire … so many years ago that has just been land banked for decades and not developed,” Ms Milne said.

“This is a really big failure of the state government planning system.

“(There’s) no requirement for developers to proceed with their land.”

She said about 30,000 people could be homed in there types of developments.

“We’ve got this problem that what was supposed to be a provision to provide for some sort of intentional communities, low cost communities in the rural lands, has been exploited for just standard dwellings,” she said.

She said the council wouldn’t be giving up on Multiple Occupancies (MOs), just the way the state provides them.

Councillor Pryce Allsop said there was a lot of land in rural zoning that was not great for farming on and would be good to create housing on.

“I think there is an opportunity to come up with a set of criteria and rules that would better suit rural land settlements for MOs,” Mr Allsop said.

“There are no doubts a lot of failed MOs haven’t held to their brief.

“There are many MOs in the shire that are still working well.”

Concerned about the gap in time between removing the state policy and implementing a local policy, Mr Allsop moved an amendment to defer the item until council hadincorporated into their rural land strategy guidelines, rules and refinements to the existing planning rules and regulations surrounding multiple occupancies.

The amendment failed with councillors Allsop and Polglase in favour.

Mayor Chris Cherry mentioned there had been a number of development applications that have gone to court over rejection because they didn’t comply with the intent of the SEPP.

“Our neighbour councils, Kyogle, Byron, Lismore, they all do allow rural land sharing but they are not part of the SEPP,” Ms Cherry said.

“They’re out of the SEPP – but put in local planning provisions.

“I think we’re staying true to what the community wants by removing ourselves from the SEP and pursing local conditions.”

The recommendation that the planning proposal to prohibit rural land sharing communities within Tweed Shire Council be forwarded to the Department of Planning, Industry and Environment to be finalised was passed with councillors Allsop and Polglase against.

The recommendation has a saving provision for existing development applications and to any DAs received prior to the proposed amendment being finalised.