PRAHRAN MASTERPLAN

The Prahran Master Plan

WHAT DO WE LIKE ABOUT THE PLAN?

A number of things are good. Essentially, overdue contemporary urban design and building practises are adopted:

1. New buildings have their orientation to the sun optimised; and meet current building standards for energy efficiency
2. Roofs are used for garden space and/ or solar panels
3. Most of the 2000 odd new units will have direct street entrances
4. In some new units, contemporary levels of access (or potential future access) for the disabled is planned.
5. A much more efficient use of these very valuable pieces of inner-city real estate. Specifically, a *** very large number of new housing units - eg, in Horace Petty – an increase in housing units of THREE times!
6. Community facilities appear to be commensurate with the BIG increase in unit numbers
7. Some on-site shops will be fitted in, and a café
8. Car parking is provided for. Possibly commensurate with the very big increase in household numbers. 
   
9. Many trees will be retained

In summary: the adoption of current, reasonable design principles.

However these improvements are only positives if they are equitably shared by all residents - both private and public. It should be made clear that there is no discrimination- direct or implicit.


WHAT IS NOT GOOD?

Most of the existing open public space will be built over.


So far, so good.

WHAT IS LACKING?

Some specific concerns
* At a recent community consultation session it was stated that the walk-ups are targeted for demolition and the high-rise conversions will require that the tenants  be relocated.

* Further, Melbourne University urban geographer Dr Shaw said “it appeared the estates would lose three- and four-bedroom units to be replaced by housing for singles”. This will displace families.
 
Despite the planning process being underway for at least two years, no statement of DHHS's intentions for the tenants who are going to be affected has been forthcoming. According to at least three attendees at a consultation session as recently as mid September, many of these important issues which will disrupt people's lives remain up in the air.


Dr Shaw has also stated (The Age, August 24) that: "introducing private residents would not necessarily increase their interaction with the public housing tenants. The whole rationale for introducing the public private social mix on these sites doesn't stack up".


The bigger picture
* This is a BIG collection of projects. Hence it is a golden OPPORTUNITY to address, at least in part, the chronic SHORTAGE of public housing. After all, that’s why the estates were created!

What is missing? 
THE BIG PICTURE – the Masterplan’s KEY QUANTITATIVE IMPACTS
* * Obviously, these projects are LONG-TERM. What is totally lacking from the Masterplan, is ANY projection of the corresponding long-term public housing DEMAND!


Pictures and good design principles - there are pages and pages of them. 
 
Also shown clearly is the large number of new units. For the precinct, new apartments (give or take a range) total around 2,000. 
 
There is a simple bland statement that in public housing units, there will be “no net LOSS”. . Why, when there is room for 2,000 ADDITIONAL HOUSEHOLDS, is there NO STATEMENT about using the project to provide any INCREASE in public housing??


WHERE IS THE RELEVANT ANALYSIS WHICH QUANTIFIES THE NEED FOR PUBLIC HOUSING?

The latest available (June 2015) DHHS data shows official waiting lists, eg:

• Within Prahran’s official DHHS area, waiting are 1805 official applicants, ie single households or families. Counting multi-person applicants, the number of people waiting, would exceed 1805.
  
• In the broader local region of DHHS’s South Division, the waiting list is over 10,000 applicants.
  

Across the state, there are well over 30,000 applicants are waiting for public housing.  Where, ANYWHERE - is the PLAN to address their needs?  
 
In this prosperous country, how many more years should people have to wait, for the basic need of housing - a roof over their heads?


And what of course, is NOT in the waiting lists, is the number of homeless people. Without a home. 

Surely, as land is available, a decent society endeavours to address that urgent need !?
 

Across the state, homeless people are estimated (per Homelessness Australia data) to number over 22,000. Where is the state’s Masterplan for them??

Victoria’s unfilled real need for basic public housing could well be more than 50,000 people.
 
That is at present. But it gets worse. 
 
Prahran’s Horace Petty Estate, which was completed in 1967, has provided a lifespan of close on 50 years. 
 
In just the last nine years, the same Homelessness data shows that the number of Victorians without a home has grown by more than 20 %. That’s an average increase of over 3 % pa. 
 
If that were to be miraculously be slowed to only 2 % pa – really only about the likely rate of population growth, over a conservative lifespan of only 30 years of lowcost housing, Victoria’s homeless will become over 40,000. At that rate, over 40 years – less than the current age of the estate – our homeless could become over 50,000.

If the current trend simply continues, over only 30 years, Victoria’s homeless will total nearly 60,000. Over 40 years, our homeless would become over 80,000.


Where is the Masterplan to address the needs of desperate people – those on the waiting list and the homeless?

THE BOTTOM LINE
(A) PEOPLE

The redevelopment of Prahran’s public housing estates, for the first time in more than five decades, provides a wonderful opportunity to address, ie decrease the chronic backlog of desperate people needing public housing. These people make up some of the most disadvantaged in our society. 
 
Our Government needs a decent plan to deal with the massive and burgeoning housing crisis. The Prahran Masterplan fails to address it.


(B) MONEY
There are of course important financial implications. Where are the numbers (or even ranges) for this aspect? No doubt, under 'commercial in confidence' they are not made available. So in the absence of public information, to assess this, our only option is to estimate this crucial information. What is the likely profit on the sales of the New Units and Highrise Conversions?

The Masterplan states "no net loss of public housing". It is not made clear whether the overall number of bedrooms will even be retained. 

Given the absence of any statement about what number of the new dwellings might be sold, let’s do a very simple scenario. 
 
What the land and properties would be worth ... Let’s assume a simple mid-point - that half the additional housing is rented out, and the other half is sold to private owners. 
 
If half the additional housing is sold, and there were say $50,000 average profit per unit sold, a calculation using the quantities from the Masterplan shows that the PROFIT could total between $48 MILLION and $67 MILLION. Being Prahran, that is quite easily conservative.

Whatever the profit turns out to be - and how much of the profit from the sale (?) of this PRIME REAL ESTATE - which (for now at least) is PUBLICLY OWNED by the Victorian Government - will be used to invest in a far greater percentage of public housing in Prahran - of the standards outlined in the Masterplan?

Gordon O'Reilly

 

  

QUAKER GROUP OPPOSES PUBLIC HOUSING STOCK TRANSFERS

We thank the Quakers for their support

The Religious Society of Friends - Northern Suburbs Meeting - sent us a message of support in which they urge the government not to transfer any more public housing properties to community housing organisations. 

Please read on.. 

   On behalf of the Northern Suburbs Local Meeting (NSLM)

of the Religious Society of  Friends (Victoria).

        

‘The meeting expresses its support for the provision of adequate public housing in Victoria. We note with concern the report in Fairfax media that in May 2015 the total waiting list for public housing in Victoria was 33,900 (The Age 10 July 2015). 

Given the extreme hardship caused by homelessness and housing insecurity we urge the State and Federal governments to ensure that the current stock of public housing is significantly increased in order to reduce the number of people on the public housing waiting list.

In particular, we urge governments not to transfer any public housing properties to community /social housing organisations. Instead we urge that additional funding be provided for public housing and community / social housing in order to increase the supply of affordable and secure publicly funded housing.’

The Religious Society of Friends – commonly known as Quakers - had its origin in England in the seventeenth century. It sprang from the religious experience of George Fox, but numbers of Seekers had already separated themselves from the churches and were meeting together for worship without any ordained priests or ministers, and without the use of any rites such as baptism or the eucharist. The basis of their worship was silently waiting upon God.

taken from their website            http://www.quakers.org.au/?page=A2

COMMUNITY HOUSING AND THE HUMAN RIGHTS CHARTER

You might be very surprised to learn this.

It is not widely known -and yet it ought to be ..
It is a matter of public interest.

Recently there was a review into the Victorian Human Rights Charter.

Community Housing Federation of Victoria ( CHFV ) - the peak body for Community Housing Organisations has put in a submission in which they dispute whether the Human Rights Charter should apply to them.

CHFV claims that it was not the original intention of the Human Rights Charter, at the time of its introduction, that it apply to Community Housing Organisations. The peak body goes on to argue why the term 'public authority' should not apply to them.

Only governments and public authorities are legally bound to comply with the Human Rights Charter. Therefore this is an extremely disturbing position taken by the peak body of Community Housing which owns and /or manages over 18,000 properties in Victoria.

It is a legal argument of great significance and serious ramifications. After all we are talking here about people's right to housing.

If Community Housing Organisations are not deemed to be Public Authorities then they would be exempt from the need to comply with the Human Rights Charter when dealing with their tenants.

Depending on the outcome of the review, many vulnerable people who are presently living in Community Housing could lose the essential protection of the Charter.

In its submission to the Review, Legal Aid Victoria also discusses this issue and stresses the importance of the Human Rights Charter in protecting and enforcing the rights of disadvantaged people against powerful agencies. It gives an example where potential breaches of the Charter were brought to the attention of a Community Housing Provider which claimed that it did not consider itself to be a 'public authority' and therefore the Human Rights Charter did not apply to them.

Interestingly, one of the purposes of the Human Rights Charter Review is to decide on this very issue ie. 'clarifying the provisions regarding public authorities, including the identification of public authorities and the content of their human rights obligations.'

With so much at stake riding on this decision we can only hope that this 'independent review' is not about to weaken the Charter or its application…

In light of any future proposed mass transfers of thousands of public housing stock to 'community housing' businesses – the outcome of this review of the Human Rights Charter is also of great interest to public tenants.

In Victoria the largest group of people making up our public tenant communities have some form of disability- physical or mental. The government knows full well the documented level of genuine disadvantage of people living in public housing.

The government has a Duty of Care to its tenants and part of that duty is to ensure their ongoing protection under the Charter.

What is made abundantly clear in CHFV's submission is the tension experienced between their business interests on the one hand and their social obligations under the Charter on the other.

Friends of Public Housing Victoria has maintained all along that market based 'social' or 'community housing' is not the answer to providing housing for low income people and will not solve, but rather exacerbate the housing crisis. This is evidenced in countries where 'social housing' has been implemented and has failed, resulting in gross profiteering and an epidemic of homelessness.

Regardless of whether Community Housing Providers and Associations qualify as Public Authorities -and many would argue that they definitely do - they should nevertheless have voluntarily embraced their legal obligations under the Charter anyway, in line with progressive global trends.

Community Housing Organisations want to take over public housing properties and/or the tenancies of many people with high and complex needs – and at the same time they argue that they should be exempt from any legal obligation to comply with the Human Rights Charter by challenging their definition as a public authority …??

For heaven's sake, things just keep going from bad to worse in this country when it comes to the housing rights of people at the lowest end of the economic scale.

The outcome of this review will be tabled on 1^st October 2015.

We will keep you posted.

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In this blog we try to cover housing issues from the perspective of public tenants and in support of public housing. Many of these issues are not being covered in the mainstream media.

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Sources :

https://myviews.justice.vic.gov.au/2015-review-of-the-charter-of-human-rights

See Heading 'What other people have said'

Submission by Community Housing Federation Victoria

= submission no. 45 ( p.4-5 )

Submission by Victorian Legal Aid

= submission no. 93 ( p11.)

http://www.premier.vic.gov.au/review-to-strengthen-victorias-charter-of-human-rights

http://www.humanrightscommission.vic.gov.au/index.php/the-charter 

http://www.dhs.vic.gov.au/facs/bdb/fmu/service-agreement/4.departmental-policies-procedures-and-initiatives/4.9-victorian-charter-of-human-rights-and-responsibilities