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The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) has at last put the Draft Plan of Management for the ADI Site Regional Park out for public comment. The proposed name is the Wianamatta Regional Park.

Here is the link to the NPWS website to view the PoM and also details of how to make a comment on the plan. Comments must be received by 1 July 2007.

Dogs maul Kangaroos at ADI Site. Residents want Kangaroo suffering to end now.

Residents in Western Sydney are calling on the NSW Government to immediately address the suffering of Kangaroos at the St Marys ADI Site following the revelation that 15 Kangaroos died after being mauled by dogs there last week. How the dogs gained access to the Kangaroos, which were being kept in a holding yard by the sites developer Delfin Lend Lease, is unknown but human intervention is highly probable.

Lend Leases sterilisation program involves herding the roos into compounds, then being darted with a tranquiliser, then operated on and sterilised then released with open wounds into holding yards to live out their lives. Some roos may be released into the proposed Regional Park

“This case again highlights the failure of the developer’s massive sterilisation program and residents are now calling on Bob Debus, the Environment Minister, to step in and relieve the suffering of the Kangaroos”. Said, Geoff Brown, spokesperson for ADI RAG.

“It is time for the NSW Government to admit this sterilisation experiment that they approved has failed and can never be implemented humanely. We don’t want anymore Kangaroos needlessly subjected to surgical sterilisation. If they are going to dart them with a tranquiliser then the most humane thing to do is then euthanase them on the spot, no one wants them subjected to further misery which is what will happen under this current plan. Bob Debus needs to decide how many roos he intends to keep within his proposed Regional Park and then quickly deal with the remainder.”

“This dog attack is only the latest example of the failure of the sterilisation plan. Holding large numbers of roos in a confined pen was a disaster waiting to happen. The RSPCA should once again be investigating Delfin Lend Lease and if there was human involvement in allowing the dogs to attack the roos then these people should be found and dealt with by the law.”

“We understand that the RSPCA and WIRES have similar concerns to us about Delfin Lend Leases disastrous Macrofauna Plan and have made them known to Bob Debus.”

Surgically sterilised female Eastern Grey Kangaroo - dirty wound dressing still attached

NSW Planning Minister approves Delfin Lend Lease request to declare all of ADI Site a Release Area.

Arthur Ilias of Delfin Lend Lease revealed that Frank Sartor, the NSW Planning Minister, has approved a request by the developer that all remaining development precincts on the ADI Site be declared Release Areas.

The original plan by the NSW Government was that precinct releases would be staged and that DLL would have had to have proved that their previous precinct developments had met all the performance objectives outlined in SREP 30, EPS 2000 and the St Marys Development Agreement before any further precincts were approved to be released for development.

Frank Sartors approval means that the NSW Government is no longer interested in knowing if the development is up to scratch and simply wants to fast track the release of land in Western Sydney.

A website is up and running covering the latest environmental battle in Western Sydney that being the rezoning application of IFC Capital Ltd to allow development of the 181-hectare former Air Services Australia Site at the Northern Rd Cranebrook.

IFC have been collaborating with Penrith City Council Planners for over a year to get their rezoning application ready and they have recently lodged the application with Council. The Cranebrook site is very significant land and the campaign is calling on Council to reject IFC's rezoning application and instead zone the site for conservation. The land should be acquired by the State Government, using the $315 million Growth Centres Conservation Fund, and put into the hands of the Department of Environment and Conservation so that it can be properly managed as some type of Park.

Delfin Lend Lease call on NSW Planning Minister to declare remaining ADI Site Precincts Release Areas

A Penrith Council Report on the 24th July 2006 has revealed that Delfin Lend Lease has written to Frank Sartor the NSW Minister for Planning in March 2006 seeking that he declare all remaining Precincts within the Blacktown and Penrith Local Government Areas as Release Areas.

If the Minister does this then Delfin Lend Lease can then proceed to lodge Precinct Plans with Penrith and Blacktown Councils at will. They will likely push forward to try to fast track the development of the 230 hectare Western Precinct which borders the Northern Rd at Cranebrook. Development of the Western Precinct will threaten 230 hectares of regenerating Cumberland Plain Woodland, an Endangered Ecological Community listed at State and National levels. Development of this Precinct will mean that the public will no longer be able to see the wild Kangaroos and Emus from the Northern Rd.

Penrith Council, predictably, decided at it July 24 Meeting to support Delfin Lend Lease in its decision to have all precincts declared Release Areas. Council put together a lengthy Report which is quite useful as it has a timeline of Delfin Lend Leases development approval process and discusses - from a pro development perspective - a range of other issues such as job creation etc.

Complaint lodged with ICAC - State and Local Government Committee ignoring Delfin Lend Lease jobs rort

ADI RAG lobbied Jackie Kelly in the lead up to the 2004 Election for funding to assist in protecting the ADI Sites conservation values. She agreed that there should be adequate protection for the flora and fauna spared from development and committed to provide $1.1 million for a feral/vermin proof fence around the Regional Park.

Little did we know that at the same time the NPWS was organising their own fence around the Regional Park. Their fence appears to be linked to the Macro Fauna Management Plan and is being funded by Delfin Lend Lease. It appears this fence is primarily for the purpose of keeping the Kangaroos out of the Regional Park. So this explains why they rejected Jackie Kelly's$1.1million offer. The little info we have about the NPWS fence is that construction is underway on part of the site and it is very much a vermin proof style fence with a floppy top and can flex (absorb an impact) if hit by a Kangaroo. We doubt very much if this fence will be a permanent fixture considering the Macro Fauna Plan only has a limited life (finished once the Kangaroo numbers have been cut to nothing).

NPWS ridiculed the vermin proof fence in 2004 claiming it would block wildlife movements across the site. They even used Koalas as an example of an affected species yet earlier that year they were arguing that there were no Koalas in this area.

The story below from the Western Weekender (30/6/06) adds to all this confusion by concluding with a statement by Alan Shearan, the ALP State Member for Londonderry, that the NSW Government now supports the construction of the fence. So now we have duelling fences. This reads as if the State has jumped on board with Jackie Kelly but it is more a case that Alan Shearan is only now announcing the NPWS fence that has been a secret for several years. They are even flogging our original suggestions that proper feral proof fencing enables the reintroduction of some fauna species to the site.

We do need to find out from the NSW Government exactly what is going on with this fence. If you are up to it please write or phone Alan Shearan or Bob Debus. If this fence has nothing to do with Jackie Kelly's $1.1 million then we need to get the Feds to spend that money on another conservation initiative in Western Sydney.

ADI RAG members witness the signed $1.1 million fencing commitment by Jackie Kelly

Latest Penrith Council Report raises more questions about ADI Site development

Penrith Councillors were presented with a report about the status of the 30.3 ha Dunheved Employment Precinct at its Policy Review Committee meeting held on Monday the 22nd of May 2006.

The Report was very interesting in regards to claims that Penrith Councils legal advisors claimed that the Federal Government appears to be saying that the ADI Site is still contaminated. Also, it reveals that Council intends to enter into separate deals with Lend Lease to build a possible link road from the Dunheved Precinct to Dunheved Rd. Also that Council may sell off some of its land holdings in that area to raise the revenue to fund this link rd and to further development in the Dunheved area.

Below is a link to a copy of the Council Report and a letter sent to the Mayor and Councilors seeking further explanation of some of the matters raised in the Report.

Business as usual at ADI Site - NPWS Kangaroo cruelty investigation clears developer

A group of journalism students from the University of Western Sydney have stolen the march on the Sydney media to reveal that the NSW Government has no real concerns over Delfin Lend Leases treatment of the Kangaroos at the ADI Site. The students revealed on their news program that the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service met with Delfin Lend Lease on Monday the 1st of May 2006 to investigate allegations that their population reduction program - sterilisation of the Kangaroos - was inhumane. NPWS spoke with the developers veterinarian and inspected Kangaroo enclosures on the site.

We knew that this closed door investigation would be a farce and that Delfin Lend Lease would only get a slap on the wrist from the Government. From the interview NPWS appear to be only concerned with stopping Kangaroos escaping from the enclosures. None of the serious issues raised below appear to have been considered.

It doesn't take Einstein to work out that Delfin Lend Lease would have gone around the place and cleaned up the evidence (below) prior to the NPWS visit.

More evidence proving we need to stop Delfin Lend Leases inhumane sterilisation of the Kangaroos at the ADI Site

See the latest video footage showing the inhumane treatment of ADI Site Kangaroos here

We again visited the ADI Site and have gathered further evidence that Delfin Lend Leases Macrofauna Management Plan - a plan to drastically reduce the number of roos on the site so that urban development can proceed- is an absolute failure and is grossly inhumane.

We have had correspondence from and spoken to ex staff of Delfin Lend Lease that have revealed information about what is going on out of site of the public.

We saw post operation holding yards littered with carcasses and bones, faeces littering the yards, faeces in feed tins and amongst feed on the ground, inadequate fencing and parched dry paddocks. We saw one male roo dying before our eyes, stuck within a thicket of Blackberry

Below is correspondence received from an ex Delfin Lend Lease employee refuting the claim by DLL that the Macrofauna Management Plan is being humanely implemented. It appears to justify the arguments we have been putting to Bob Debus, the NSW Environment Minister, since August 2005.

Dear Sir/Madam,
I was recently employed as a veterinary nurse/kangaroo management officer at the ADI site in St Marys. I thought that i would be working in an environment exhibiting the humane treatment and capture of kangaroos, with a humane goal in the future. However, after a few days i realised that this was not the case. Let me tell you a few things i observed in the week that i was working with the management team, and these figures are fairly conservative:

- 75% of captured females had pouch young which were taken off the teat forcefully, if they didnt release the teat they were euthanised and then removed. All hairless joeys were euthanised regardless of size. Given the season, the amount of pouch young encountered was high.
- I saw in a recent newspaper article that post capture myopathy estimates were approximately 5%. From what i saw it was at least 10-15% (which doesnt include the euthanasing of joeys), I witnessed broken necks from inadequate capture cages, kangaroos trying to jump over large fences and getting caught, broken bones from poor darting ability which resulted in euthanasia of the kangaroos, kangaroos dropping when darts hit them from stress, drowning of released kangaroos, lack of food in overpopulated release area meant 2-5 kangaroo carcasses were found each day, blackberry bushes in release area catching many kangaroos which bled to death from the thorns (when suggested the bushes be removed i was told they wouldnt be).

It seemed that every simple question asked about improving the welfare of the captured and released animals was too complicated as i rarely received an answer. I dont regret leaving. I have worked with kangaroos and love them as much as i love my own pets. I believe that the overseer (delfin lend lease) has requested that the kangaroos be treated as poorly as possible so as to maximise the reduction in kangaroo populations.

What is going on there is terrible, and many animals are suffering unnecessarily for the sake of profit. Personally i think that kangaroos are very prone to stress myopathy and there cant be any guarantee that each kangaroo capture will go the same. Kangaroos are very prone to heat stress (as you would know), and i did have a conversation with a few workers regarding work through the summer. They said that many more kangaroos were dying due to the heat, regardless of time of day. From the lend lease guide to kangaroo capture, it is stressed that capture activities should be conducted during the early hours of the morning when temperatures are around 20 degrees C or below. Clearly during summer the morning temperatures would have been significantly higher than this. I was working in conditions where the temperatures rose to around 30-35C degrees C about 1-2 months ago at around lunchtime (12 noon). I also expressed this concern when i quit.

Anyone upset about this issue should phone the office of Bob Debus the Environment Minister to find out why he is not sticking to his commitment - that this process would be humane.

ADI RAG recently visited the ADI Site and found a dead female Kangaroo, drowned in a pond, with a tranquiliser dart still in it.

Download movie footage of the Kangaroo find here 2.1mb right click mouse and choose: save target as

The horror stories we have been hearing about Delfin Lend Leases implementation of its Macrofauna Management Plan appear to be true following the discovery of a deceased Kangaroo within the Western Precinct (Penrith LGA) of the ADI Site.

The Roo had drowned in a large dam and had suffered head injuries, probably as a result of ramming fences in its attempt to escape from Lend Leases people that were darting the roos for sterilisation.

This animal suffered an horrific death and anywhere else where an animal was chased down, shot and then left to die in agony would have been a gross act of animal cruelty.

Anyone upset about this issue should phone the office of Bob Debus the Environment Minister to find out why he is not sticking to his commitment - that this process would be humane.

Planning Minister, Frank Sartor, approves amended ADI Plan. State Government spin machine trumpets environmental win for Western Sydney residents

More than 300 hectares of rare Cumberland Plain vegetation faces the bulldozer following the decision by NSW Planning Minister, Frank Sartor, to gazette an amended zoning plan for the ADI Site (SREP 30). See amended zoning map here

The Minister received many submissions calling on him to exercise his planning powers to protect this vegetation. Follow this link to see ADI RAG's submission - 3.12 Mb

The Minister for Western Sydney, Diane Beamer, announced today the wetland area known as the “secret garden” is now formally included in the 900-hectare regional park on the former ADI site at St Marys.

Ms Beamer said the “secret garden” in the site now known as Ropes Crossing, covers three hectares, including a man-made watering hole that provides habitat for local wildlife.

“Many residents were keen to see this special place protected, and the best way of doing that was to include it in the regional park zone,” Ms Beamer said.

The amendment to Sydney Regional Environmental Plan 30 was approved by Planning Minister, Frank Sartor, and gazetted this week.

“The amendment expands the park by 270 hectares to a total 900 hectares, which goes a long way towards addressing many concerns raised in submissions,” Ms Beamer said.

“It significantly reduces the amount of urban development possible on the site, conserves more vegetation and strikes a better balance between urban and conservation outcomes.”

More than half the 1545-hectare site is now protected from future development by proper zoning and land use controls.

“Londonderry MP, Allan Shearan and I have always pushed to conserve all parts of the site that are on the Register of the National Estate, along with many other areas we considered worthy of protection.”

“Given its proximity to urban areas, the secret garden will need to have special management measures in place covering issues including stormwater management, safety and habitat protection.

“I am advised these issues will be subject to further analysis during detailed precinct planning.” Ms Beamer said.

Mr Shearan said the addition of the secret garden into the regional park was an excellent outcome for the local community.

“Many people, including the local residents action group, have lobbied strongly to ensure Ropes Crossing has a significant regional park. The secret garden is now firmly part of that achievement.”

NSW Department of Planning puts amended ADI Site Plan out for public comment

After years of procrastinating the NSW Government has finally decided to publicly exhibit draft amendments to the Planning Instrument for the ADI Site, Sydney Regional Environmental Plan 30 St Marys (SREP 30). The amended plan is nothing new and reflects a commitment made by the Joint Venture (Lend Lease and the Federal Government) in 2002 that all National Estate listed parts of the site would be conserved in a 900 hectare Regional Park.

But the NSW Government spin machine is claiming it is they that are the saviours of this land and it is an act of good will by them that is gifting more open space to Western Sydney. The truth is that the plan that is being amended belongs to the NSW Government and it allowed 270 hectares of the National Estate and hundreds of hectares of Endangered Ecological Communities in unlisted areas of the site to be bulldozed. They have been dragged kicking and screaming to this position and it is all thanks to the fight put up by us the local residents. The NSW Government was still trying to reduce the Regional Park down to 850 hectares only a few months ago. ADI RAG lobbied DIPNR and DEC for several months leading up to these amendments. They have ignored most of our concerns but have finally realised that the public will not accept a Regional Park of less than 900 hectares.

Below is Frank Sartor's Media Release on the amended plan. It is amazing how they spin this stuff to make them look good.

The State Government has taken steps to expand a new regional park on the former ADI site in Western Sydney, Planning Minister Frank Sartor announced today.
Mr Sartor said the proposal to expand the St Marys park is now on exhibition for public comment.
“Under this proposal, the park will grow in size from 630 to 900 hectares – an increase of more than 40 per cent,” Mr Sartor said.
“The additional area will be rezoned from urban and employment uses to regional park, giving residents of Western Sydney more room to move.
“The expansion of the park will protect an extra 270 hectares of valuable Cumberland Plain Woodland listed on the Register of the National Estate.”
The 900-hectare park is a major addition to open space in Western Sydney, along with the 5,500 hectare Western Sydney Parklands stretching from Liverpool to Blacktown.
The amendment to Sydney Regional Environmental Plan 30 (SREP 30) will also reduce the site’s development potential from 8,000 to less than 5,000 dwellings.
SREP 30 was gazetted by the NSW Government in January 2001, zoning the site for regional park, regional open space, employment and urban development.
“We are committed to delivering a balanced outcome for this land, and have undertaken comprehensive environmental studies to guide the establishment of this sanctuary for the area’s fauna and flora,” Mr Sartor said.
The draft amendment will be on exhibition until December 21 at Penrith Council, St Marys Library, Blacktown Council, Blacktown Council’s Max Webber Library, the Department of Planning’s office at Parramatta, and the Department of Planning’s city office.

Comment on the ADI Site Regional Park Draft Plan of Management