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At
home on a tip site
By Carmelo Amalfi
The
West Australian, May 14, 2003
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Not
happy: Village owner John Sanders says there are no health issues at the
South Fremantle site.
THEY
have few rights. They are not allowed to eat vegetables grown in their
gardens or sink a bore. They have to pay much more for power than the rest
of the community, pets and public meetings are frowned on and the earth
under their mobile homes is sinking.
They are
Fremantle's dump dwellers, a mostly elderly community of retired public
servants, nurses, teachers, engineers, authors and painters living on one
of the State's forgotten and badly polluted tip sites in South Fremantle.
In 1985, the
Fremantle council sold part of the tip to a company which used the land to
provide America's Cup visitors with affordable, temporary accommodation.
Less than a metre
of sand separates today's more than 120 residents from Rubbishville on the
corner of Cockburn and Rollinson roads.
Houses and
caravans at the Fremantle Village and Chalet Centre have to be raised off
the ground and ventilated to avoid a build-up of potentially explosive
methane gases generated by decomposing wastes collected by the council
since 1959.
Decades on, State
authorities which approved this residential anomaly are having second
thoughts. And owner John Sanders is not happy about it.
Invited to join a
new Government working party to decide the future of his family business,
he accused the Health and Environmental Protection departments of trying
to shut him down over bogus concerns based on a lack of evidence and
alarmist activists.
"There has
been permanent residency on this site since day one," Mr Sanders told
The West Australian. "The authorities approved
it, Fremantle council sold it and there were no conditions placed on us to
change how this park was run. If they want to shut me up, that's fine, but
they won't because there are no health issues here. There is no methane
risk."
Mr Sanders, who
has managed the site for nine years, said environmental experts he hired
two years ago found there was no risk to residents.
Asked if the
"independent" report raised the risk of a methane explosion, he
said: "Yes, it says if there is an explosion, it would be
catastrophic. But it is unlikely. It's a rare event, plus there are things
that we are doing on the site to minimise such a risk. People are more
concerned about being kicked out."
Last year, Mr
Sanders applied to the council to erect a caretaker's house and tennis
courts but was told he could not because methane gases could build up
under the new structures.
In 1986, CSIRO
scientists hired by Fremantle council reported high methane concentrations
at depths of 1m to 1.5m and warned that construction, including capping,
could cause a "build-up of potentially explosive gas".
Health Department
acting director of environmental health Brian Devine confirmed issues to
be addressed by the working group included the risk of a methane explosion
and subsidence. He did not believe residents would be forced to leave the
site.
"The
department is not supportive of developments on former landfill
sites," Mr Devine said after meeting residents on April 9 and
visiting the site on April 19. "It's fair to say the site was not
followed up after the America's Cup and it was allowed to grow. If there
was an explosion, you would have a problem. That's why we're doing the
review."
He added the South
Beach ecovillage being developed next door in Cockburn could present
methane problems if the project acted as a gas trap on the western edge of
Mr Sanders' site.
Without a gas
barrier between them, there was the risk of methane moving laterally from
the tip into the multi-million-dollar ecovillage site.
"Fremantle
council has a duty of care to protect its neighbours," a leading WA
environmental consultant warned. "There is a potential for methane
gases to migrate towards the new houses, yet there has been no move by
council or the developer to put in a protective layer."
Ecovillage project
manager Mike Hulme said he was not concerned with pollutants such as
methane leaching into the development. "The feedback from our
consultants is there is no problem," he said.
Residents vow to fight on the
beach
URBAN development
is closing in on the "villagers" at Fremantle's only caravan and
chalet site near South Beach.
Residents said
they were not going anywhere and would fight to stay on their prime patch
of former landfill tip by the sea.
Most
"permanents" - more than 100 people in 54 mobile homes or
caravans - own their dwellings but not the land. They are tenants.
New dwellings can
cost over $100,000 plus about $100 a week in site fee and water, power and
gas.
Most said they
knew they were moving on to a former tip when they signed on the dotted
line, believing that if it was OK with the authorities, it was safe for
them. Others found out after they moved in.
"More plants
have died than lived here," a resident of years said. "A few
years after we moved in, we were advised not to grow vegetables and wear
gloves when working in the garden. I have to build up the soil."
But she and other
residents were reluctant to talk to the media.
"It's hard
for us to say anything, people are too afraid to," she said.
"Section 64. People can be evicted just like that."
Residents come
under the Residential Tenancies Act and the Caravan Parks and Camping
Grounds Act. They can be evicted within 60 days of getting notice, without
a reason. And dwellings must have wheels.
"We have
development closing in around us," a resident with a home on 16
wheels said, referring to the ecovillage development next door from which
dust and noise blow in. Light fittings and shelves tremble every few
seconds as trucks brake on Rollinson Road.
"We feel very
vulnerable. We have been robbed of our voice," another said. A quote
to move was $20,000.
"For many of
us, this represents a lifetime of savings," she said. "What will
happen to our investments?"
The uncertainty
was showing in some elderly residents who, like her and her husband, were
attracted by the promise of a "secure and independent lifestyle"
by the sea.
"It makes me
mad to watch older people getting more grey over this," she said.
"People will not leave."
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