Endangered tree clearing prompts ECCO call for new Orange City Council rules

Environmentally Concerned Citizens of Orange (ECCO) is calling for the introduction of more stringent council processes in response to this month's decision to greenlight a subdivsion on Maramba Road.

"This is just another example, in a long history of residential subdivisions in Orange, where remnant parcels of native trees and shrubs, and even individual trees, are sacrificed to allow the developer to maximise the number of blocks, and hence profitability, in a subdivision", ECCO President and former councillor Neil Jones said.

"[We're] appalled ... there is absolutely no justification for approving the destruction of these trees when the subdivision could have been redesigned with minimal loss of the total number of blocks, had the proponents and Council been willing to negotiate a compromise."

Subdivision of 33 Maramba Road - owned by Orange Asset Holdings Pty Ltd - will create 19 new lots, with 13 to be accessed by a new private road. About 1000 square metres of native vegetation including endangered Box woodlands will be cleared.

"It is in an elevated part of East Orange, containing pockets of increasingly rare box and red gum woodlands. The threatened trees on the ridgeline of the subdivsion, also add significant scenic amenity value to the area," Mr Jones said.

"ECCO is calling on Council to put in place stricter tree preservation conditions when approving developments, which go further than the current preservation orders, to ensure that important vegetation and biodiversity in our suburbs is protected."

A report from council staff recommended approval, and said: "The proposed development is not considered likely to have an adverse impact on the extent or composition of Box Gum Woodland such that it would be placed at risk of extinction in the locality.

"It will contribute to a Key Threatening Process for the Box Gum Woodland but the total area to be affected is a very small percentage of the Box Gum Woodland present."

Council voted nine to three to greenlight the subdivision at its May 16 meeting. Councillors David Mallard, Mel McDonell, and Deputy Mayor Gerald Power opposed approval.

"For too many years Orange has worried too much about how things are going to affect developers," cr McDonell said at the time.

"Developers are going to develop. At the end of the day they don't have to live there. They sell the lots off and they go and make their next several million. We have kowtowed to developers in the past which is why we don't have footpaths in areas that should have.

"This is something we need to take a stand on. Yes it's just a few trees, but what the point in having principles if you don't back them?"

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