2017-10-13 Special Meeting

SPECIAL MEETING AGENDA                                                              13 OCTOBER 2017


EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This report provides Council with an overview of a long term environmental project that has been
progressing over the last 9 months. This report doesn’t finalise the project. Rather, it proposes
that Council provide “in principle” approval to allow the project to proceed further to a more detailed
stage involving the development of formal contracts and agreements. Those agreements would
need to come back for Council’s consideration prior to their finalisation.
This project seeks to provide regional scale environmental protection of lands in the Ringtail and
Yurol forest localities that preserve both current State forest land and also convert significant
parcels of pine forest into long term conservation tenure. Hardwood plantation areas that are
currently subject to potential logging are also proposed to be protected. If this project comes to
fruition, there will be an additional 2,400 ha (approx.) of land incorporated into the long term
conservation estate of Noosa that will provide strategic environmental connectivity from the Ringtail
area to the Yurol/Pomona area. It not only protects current environmentally important land but will
also add to the bank of environmental land by including land to be rehabilitated from current pine
forestry practices. While providing broad scale connectivity to existing National Parks, this project
also has a significant potential benefit for biodiversity and specifically, the long term health of our
local koala population.
This project is very complex with multiple State agencies, Council, a timber harvesting company
and a local conservation NFP involved. The land tenure and tenure pathways are also quite
complex involving Planation Licence Areas, State forests, proposed Conservation Parks,
requirements for rehabilitation and ultimately, tenure pathways to National Park status. This level
of complexity also means that this project is not without risks and this report identifies the potential
risks and costs with this long term project. Like any decision, Council will need to weigh up the
potential benefits of this project (which are very significant in the context of long term environmental
outcomes) against the potential risks and costs. As CEO, my recommendation is that Council
proceed with this project because of the long term environmental benefits for our region. It is
arguably the largest and most significant environmental protection project in recent history.
However, in doing so, Council also needs to recognise that any project of this scale and complexity
does come with risks and costs.
At this stage, the recommendation is to proceed “in principle”. Why is this recommendation being
made at this stage? There are some sound reasons for doing so.
1.     Having a non-binding Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) will allow the parties to outline
       their intent and general framework for the project without getting bogged down in the details.
       The MOU sets the framework for the development of the detailed transactional documents
       (Deeds of Agreement etc). Those documents will need to come back to Council for
       consideration and adoption;
2.     The timing of this project is coming up against the potential calling of a State election when
       the State government may go into caretaker mode. An “in principle” MOU would allow for an
       announcement of the parties’ intent which would increase the likelihood of this project arriving
       at a successful conclusion; and
3.     Having Council review this project at this stage will enable consideration of the outcomes
       that we are seeking to achieve and how we can mitigate risk in such a complex project. That
       will enable these issues to be addressed during the development of the transactional
       documentation.
The report sets out in some detail the background of this project and its progression to date. The
intention is that at this stage, the matter remain confidential to allow for the appropriate protocols
for an announcement by the State Minister for Environment to occur. However, as this is such a
significant project, it is important that all of the information be ultimately available to our community.
It is therefore proposed that the matter remain confidential until the project has been announced
by the Minister. Once that occurs, this report and all attachments should no longer be confidential.
Similarly, it is intended that the further report to Council on the transactional documents (Deed of
Agreement etc) would be provided to Council via our usual process (i.e. in open session, not
confidential session).

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