In June, PPCC Inc. was represented by the Secretary, Olwen Bawden; the Treasurer, Stephen Calvert-Smith; PPCC Inc. member, Stephen Morey; and myself at a launch in Geelong by Geelong Environment Council Inc., and chaired by the Hon. Barry Jones, of the GEC's proposal for a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve for the Shores of Western Port Phillip and the Bellarine Peninsula. 

More recently, PPCC Inc. has responded to moves by the Victorian Channels Authority (VCA) to investigate the feasibility, and environmental effects, of a proposal to deepen Port Phillip shipping channels, including the entrance channel through The Rip, to cater for the increasing draught of ships needing to enter the Bay. Alan Clark alerted us to the opportunity to meet the Ports Minister, Hon. Candy Broad MLC, at a Chelsea Consultation Session. The Senior Vice-President, Janet Ablitt, the Treasurer and myself had 15 minutes to discuss with her our Committee's 2-page submission Alan had drafted, and which she had received a week earlier. Present advising her were Mr Doug Miller, Manager, Port Phillip Coast, of DNRE, and Mr Tim Muir, the Harbour Master for Melbourne and Geelong, who also represented VCA, and discussed the deepening proposals informally with us afterwards. Ms Broad was impressively emphatic in declaring to us that the Government would not permit deepening unless it was firmly satisfied that there would be no significant environmental harm. It did occur to us that we were meeting in the low-lying electorate of Carrum, which the ALP won only with the support of Green Party preferences! 

Earlier this month I attended a VCA presentation in which a VCA consultant reported that the increase in the mean higher high tide level would not exceed 20 mm as a result of the proposed deepening, yet it was agreed that in many aspects of the proposal there was still a very great lack of information, which would be needed before a fuller picture could be presented. I suggested some extra information that we would require, and it was accepted that that was necessary, and would be forthcoming. 

Bayside Council is well underway transforming the historic Brighton Sea Baths Building (now on the Australian Heritage Commission’s National Estate database) into a 190-seat commercial restaurant and constructing a large car park for almost 200 metres along the edge of the Bay’s spray zone to the south of the building, rather than primarily on the sheltered inland side already cut off from the sea by the building, as we proposed to VCAT at our appeal earlier this year. Some 5000 m³ of a vegetated coastal bank from the foreshore to as deep as 3 m has now been removed. 

The Committee of Management has been working on a Draft Policy on "Bathing Boxes and Similar Structures on Foreshore Land", which it is hoped will be available for presentation to the April 2002 General Meeting. 

Unfortunately Len Warfe ceased to be our hardworking Senior Vice-President, and a PPCC Inc. member, on 1st July 2001, as the Member Organization he had represented did not renew its subscription. Janet Ablitt was elected as his replacement as Senior Vice-President, but her previous position as Junior Vice-President remains unfilled, as does Len's Committee position. Alan Clark, our immediate past President, and a diligent and most important figure in the recent history of Port Phillip Conservation Council Inc., has decided not to stand again for the Committee, and he will be greatly missed. With those changes, the earlier loss of Stephen Morey, a former Secretary and President, from the Committee, and my announcement that I will not stand as President in 2002, it is obvious that there are major opportunities for fresh people, and action, in PPCC Inc., and those of us departing hope that those opportunities will be taken up enthusiastically.