Toowoomba developers want reforms after retirement resort project held up for eight months by council

The hold-up of a housing project for eight months by councillors has been met with outrage from Toowoomba’s development sector, which is calling for reforms.

A proposal for a retirement village off Hursley Road in Torrington by Torrington Project Pty Ltd.

Developers have slammed the Toowoomba council’s planning process after a housing project worth more than 300 lots was held up for eight months by councillors.

The local branch of the Urban Developers Institute of Australia has written to TRC chief executive Brian Pidgeon to express its concern over delays to Clifton Lifestyle Pty Ltd’s 312-dwelling retirement resort off Hursley Road in Torrington.

The land lease development, which was classified as code-assessable (therefore nearly always assessed by officers) under the council’s planning scheme, was “called in” by four councillors in December last year for a special meeting only held last week.

Reasons for the call-in were not stated, there was no public opposition to the project and the application was endorsed unanimously at Wednesday’s meeting.

In an ironic twist, the development was only classed as code-assessable due to the subject land being included in a council temporary local planning instrument (TLPI) in 2022 to free up land zoned as “emerging communities” for housing.

The delay has incensed members of the development sector in Toowoomba, with one source arguing the situation was “verging on scandal”.

Land developer Rob Weymouth. Picture: Nev Madsen.

UDIA Toowoomba president Rob Weymouth said the letter to Mr Pidgeon, drafted prior to the meeting, called on the council to improve transparency around the calling-in process.

Mr Weymouth said the number of councillors required to call in a project for a meeting should increase from four to six.

“We think there should be six councillors, because at the moment, only four are needed and that’s not a majority,” he said.

“We’d like to know the reason for (calling a project in) and the councillors who called it in.

“If they want to call it in, the councillors should own up.”

Mr Weymouth said the decision to call in a code-assessable application “sent a message” to the development industry at a time when housing stocks in Toowoomba remained low.

“It’s the wrong thing to do — it’s code-assessable, there were no submitters,” he said.

“Code-assessable applications should go through if they meet code.

“In the middle of a housing crisis, this is the wrong decision to call in an application.

“We watch these things and know what’s happening, and it sends a message to the industry.”

Councillor Kerry Shine. Picture: Kevin Farmer

It’s understood there are several more projects that have been called in by councillors that are due to face special meetings before the end of the year.

Councillor Kerry Shine said he would consider developing criteria a project would need to meet before it could be called in, highlighting how other councils required a certain number of submissions from the public first.

“The first step would be for councillors to discuss it — I’ll bring it up there and see what Nikola (Stepanov, general manager of planning) might recommend we adopt,” he said.

“As soon as possible”; Developer to start work on retirement resort in 2025

Despite the delays, Sydney developers Richard Volpe and Kenny Phillips of Clifton Lifestyle say they are ready to move ahead of the planned Torrington retirement resort by the start of the year.

Mr Phillips said he and his business partner were hoping to get the project under way “as soon as possible”.

“We will be preparing to go to tender over the coming months,” he said.

Mr Phillips also said the assessment time frame was “in line” with the pair’s expectations for the development.

“We therefore don’t consider this to be a delay – just part of the process that we had always anticipated in our planning for the project,” he said.