Water bombers for Esperance?
ESPERANCE Shire hopes to reduce its carbon emissions.
Council voted on Tuesday to an “aspirational” target of a 43 per cent reduction by 2030, compared to 2019 levels; and net zero by 2050.
In his report to Council, Shire Asset Management director Mathew Walker said the Shire needed a better understanding of its baseline corporate carbon emissions to fully understand where its emissions were coming from.
This included emissions from contractors and sources “not easily identified”.
“Capturing carbon emissions over consecutive years may be required to accurately document our emissions to investigate and identify reduction options,” he wrote.
Mr Walker said there were factors outside the Shire’s control in its endeavour to reduce our carbon emissions.
“Electricity consumption which accounts for 46.3 per cent of our emissions, is largely dictated to us by Horizon Power and their proportion of renewable power supplied,” he wrote. “And our requirement for Transport Fuels, which accounts for 49.9 per cent of our emissions, mostly from plant and fleet.
Sanctuary zones
RECFISHWEST chief executive Andrew Rowland has questioned the location of no-take sanctuary zones to the east and west of a popular beach launching site for boats at Duke of Orleans Bay.
“It’s the only and last boat ramp on the West Australian coastline before you hit South Australia which is 700 kilometres away,” Dr Rowland said.
“The current set of proposals has a sanctuary zone and no fishing sanctuary zone only three and a half kilometres off that boat ramp and another one not too far around the point to the west.
“These are highly accessible and have been enjoyed for people that visit the Duke for generations.
Dr Rowland branded the proposal “illogical”.
“We can see no justification, when there’s so much space out there to deliver what the government’s seeking without impacting on historic access and amenity for many people,” he said.
The WA Government’s draft marine park chart shows an offshore sanctuary zone of about 30 square kilometres starting about 3.5km east of the caravan park.
A special purpose zone of about 15sqkm is located between the sanctuary zone and the shoreline around Membinup Beach car park and 4WD track.
A larger sanctuary zone is proposed west of Thistle Cove.
The Weekender understands a boat ramp was gazetted for the beach by the caravan park, but never built. It remains a popular beach launching site for boats.
Draft Marine Park plans include no-fishing zones within a few kilometres of the Duke of Orleans caravan park.
Shire cat laws stymied
ESPERANCE Shire is unable to stop domestic cats from breeding with strays or preying on wildlife as State legislation does not allow it.
Council is pushing the WA Government to allow it to make a local law restricting cats to the owner’s property.
In January 2023 Council had adopted a Cat Local Law which included a penalty for owners of straying cats.
It also made cat owners liable if their pets preyed on native wildlife; or excreted or urinated outside the owner’s property.
Shire CEO Shane Burge said the WA Government would not accept these provision as they were inconsistent with the WA Cat Act.
“We needed to change our local law to then remove that from our proposed local law,” he said.
“Council have now done that and accepted the new local law that’s gone through.
“However, the Council still feels quite strongly that that’s an important issue, and they still want to advocate for changes to the Cat Act to allow local laws to be made which restrict cats to people’s properties.”
Mr Burge noted that the State had budgeted funds to control feral cats which were a major destroyer of native wildlife.
“The main issue that we have is that if domestic cats are able to roam they are able to then breed, and so that’s adding to feral cats in this state,” he said.
“That issue is a significant issue: if we can contain domesticated cats that eliminates that.
“Also domesticated cats do prey on native fauna.”
Water bombers for Esperance?
WISHING to upgrade the Esperance Airport runway, council has awarded a design tender.
Shire president Ron Chambers said work would also be done on a business case to back up the best design option for the expanded facility.
“Once we’ve got that in place we can start looking for funding as to how we do that,” he said.
Shire chief executive Shane Burge said Council gave the $300,000 design tender to the firm Airport Consulting Group.
As part of the process, Mr Chambers said they would approach the WA Government to see if the airport could accommodate large water bombers, which were currently based at Busselton airport.
“In helping to fight a fire, the closer you can get that aircraft to the fire the more effective at can be,” he said.
Permanent arts home for Ravy
RAVENSTHORPE District Art Group now has the opportunity to take a peppercorn lease on the Dunn Street premises it has used for some time.
Last week Council approved a draft lease agreement for The Fitz gallery and the pottery space at 28 and 26 Dunn St for the operation of a community arts space.
The Ravensthorpe CRC had occupied the buildings before moving into the new Ravensthorpe Cultural Precinct just next door.
Nature dictates where we fish.
AN Esperance angler questions the need for fishing bans on beaches such as the one at Barkers Inlet.
“These beaches have great natural protection as they are inaccessible for large periods of time during the year,” he said.
“Once it starts raining the track is closed or too wet to get in.
“At other times the South East winds will blow huge amounts of seaweed into the bay and this also makes it unfishable for large periods of time.”
Mr Waideman said this was the case over the past weekend when several Esperance Land Based Fishing Club members tried to fish at Barkers Inlet as part of the club’s periodic “venue”.
Rangers on patrol for illegal camping
ESPERANCE Shire was quick to hose down reports on social media of Shire rangers waking up illegal campers at local car parks and asking them to leave early Friday morning.
Illegal camping, according to the spokesperson, is a recurring issue, particularly during peak visitation periods.
