Pearls of Wisdom 12 Monthly Mailbag

Keep only those things that speak to the heart.

Merry Middle-Class Christmas

Words Pearl Bullivant Photo Ty Kwondo

In an act of charity and reconciliation, Pearl had intended devoting her Christmas column to those who are most “in need” - people like Gina Rinehart, whose atrocities towards humankind have left her loveless in the world of sport sponsorship, and Andrew Thorburn, whose religious persuasion along with his gig as NAB’s notoriously ambivalent CEO have rendered him unemployable. However, befitting my COVID Ambassadorship, Pearl has opted to concentrate on the good people of the Eastern Suburbs, who in this time of inflationary pressure and rising interest rates deserve my undivided attention and guidance. If I can prevent even one reader from turning to a life of white collar crime in order to fund a Christmas holiday in Aspen, I will be greatly satisfied that my job is done.

An ideal Christmas would be one in which people embody the spirit of the dude called Jesus. Advent would be a time for love, joy and humility rather than a retailer’s countdown of consumer frenzy. Christmas retail spending would not be used as a gauge of a healthy economy and Christmas Day would be a day of gratitude and reflection rather than 24 hours of gift envy and FOMO, preparations on a perfectionist scale and mentally exhausting social expectations. Today’s inflationary and mortgage pressures can provide us with an opportunity to rethink Christmas (particularly in a multi-faith Australia) and reassess our lifestyles moving forward into 2023, and this is where Pearl is here to help.

This isn’t Pearl telling millennials to stop dining on avocado smash (but please don’t complain about the cost of living if your regular brekkie is a $40 Uber Eats order), this is about helping peeps establish priorities (like a $1.50 avocado on homemade sourdough with Aeropress coffee). Happiness comes from embracing minimalism, shedding those onerous things you don’t need (like multiple investment properties and vehicles, gym memberships, private schooling and luxury vacations) and being grateful for, and content with, what you have - your face, car, house, phone, etc. - without the need for an upgrade. As well as being happier and less at the mercy of economic cycles (and the ensuing media hysteria), you can also view this ‘reset’ as reactionary and disruptive, middle-class-style.

Imagine, darlings, if we ceased focusing on our appearance and began appreciating the reflection in the mirror, imagine being content with a house sans luxury fittings and designer furniture - we could put the companies that exploit insecurities out of business. By refusing to engage in the rampant consumption extolled by the media, we can focus on our physical environment and mental wellbeing. And, while we are minimalising our lifestyles at Christmas, let us Marie Kondo our Yuletide gatherings. Forget the ‘how to deal with difficult people’ courses of the early 2000s - if your in-laws don’t spark joy, don’t suffer their putdowns and misery during the Christmas season, Kondo them from your life! Remember, “the happiest people don’t have everything, they just make the best of everything.”

Merry middle-class Christmas, darlings!

The Beast's Monthly Mailbag

Words The Good People of the Eastern Beaches

Waverley Cemetery Is No Place for Dogs

Dear Beast - God help us if prodog, anti-Boomer ‘Harry from Clovelly’ (Whinging Boomers, Letters, The Beast, July 2022) crosses paths with anti-dog-offleash, possible but not confirmed Boomer ‘Sam from Clovelly’ (Naive, Ignorant, Entitled, or Just Plain Dumb? Letters, The Beast, August 2022) down on the Clovelly promenade. The ensuing dog-leash related rage would be cause for concern.

Don’t get me wrong, I love a dog as much as the next person. They are part of people’s families and companions to many. We’ve looked after our neighbour’s dog and we love it. Heck, some of my best friends are dogs. Having said that, and although I am not a Boomer, I am with Sam on the off-leash thing and there is one place where I really think we need a doggy re-think. That place is Waverley Cemetery.

Waverley Cemetery used to be a dog-free zone. Then, during the first COVID lockdown, they opened it up to dogs on a leash and it’s stayed that way since. I know my neighbours and friends love to walk their dogs there, and who could blame them? It’s such a beautiful, peaceful place. The problem is that it’s now treated as an off-leash dog park by most dog walkers. I counted 20 dogs off-leash there last Sunday while on a short walk.

There are three good reasons to keep dogs out of the cemetery. The first is respect for the dead. Dogs are defecating (crapping) and urinating (pissing) all over our friends and relatives who have passed. It is disrespectful.

The second is that the cemetery is a place of quiet reflection. People seek to remember their relatives there in a peaceful environment. Dogs are naturally inquisitive, meaning they run up to anyone they see. They will bark at their owners and other dogs. As a result, at many times, it is no longer possible to contemplate life and one’s departed friends and family in peace.

The third is that the cemetery is a biodiversity hotspot in Waverley. It provides rare and invaluable habitat for such species as the superb fairy wren, white-browed scrub wren and the New Holland honeyeater. I have even once seen a sacred kingfisher in the coastal fringe vegetation of the cemetery (unbelievable but true!). Dogs in the cemetery, leashed or un-leashed, have a significant negative impact on this bird habitat haven and its biodiversity. Birds are driven away by the scent of dogs and dogs chase birds causing them undue stress. I have not seen superb fairy wrens within the cemetery all year, which I believe is due to the presence of dogs.

To be clear, dog owners need places to exercise their dogs, and Waverley Council rightly provides many dog off-leash and on-leash areas for this reason. Calga Reserve, right next to the cemetery, is one such area. However, for the reasons above, Waverley Cemetery should not be such a place and should revert to being a dog-free zone.

Stephen Lightfoot Generation X Bronte

Pearl Needs to Do Better

Dear Editor - Pearl, in ‘Leaders of Business Feign Concern for Child Welfare’ (The Beast, November 2022) displays ignorant woke left bias in focusing her criticism on big business for criticising the management of COVID-19 in Australia.

There are several more suitable targets for criticism, in particular controlling state governments and health bureaucracies, and a supine federal government.

They were all alarmed by the initial death toll in aged care facilities. The vaccination roll-out was too slow and not sufficiently focused on the over 70s. In addition, quarantine facilities were mismanaged, especially in Victoria.

Health bureaucrats then connived with willing state governments in a series of control orders, including mask mandates when they knew that masks were relatively ineffective for controlling viruses, school closures when it was apparent that children were only mildly affected by the virus, and lockdowns that disadvantaged those less-well-paid workers who could not work from home such as those in hospitality, services and construction.

The death rate for NSW is instructive. Of 3.55 million confirmed cases to 22 October 2022, just 5,430 people died (NSW Health Data). This is a death rate of about 0.15 per cent. That translates as 1.5 per thousand infections; a serious issue but hardly threatening national life.

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In fact, the median age of those who died in NSW was over 84 years old. Few under 70 died. COVID-19 was an infection that killed mainly the very old and those with major comorbidities. Sad as those deaths are, but writing as a person in their late 70s, I suggest that this should not have been used as an excuse to shut down the nation.

I think there is a strong case to be made for the dismissal of all the governments, Labor and Liberal, that participated so enthusiastically in suppressing human rights. There is a strong case for the termination of employment of all the senior health officials in every state.

How do we ensure that this shameful episode in national life is not repeated? I hope that readers of The Beast consider how they can have some impact on this matter.

Chris Bellenger Clovelly

Electricity Charges

On receiving a demand for payment of $2,523 for three months’ supply of electricity to a one bedroom unit totally unoccupied due to COVID restrictions, replies from Energy Australia ranged from, (a) there must have been a prior incorrect meter reading for which a more recent reading is compensating; (b) major works were carried out in the building and/or someone broke in and hacked my supply; or, (c) there was a faulty device chewing up the power in my absence.

Each of these reasons could be discounted by a historical examination of previous readings, there being no such renovations or repairs in any of the 12 units, no evidence of the steel security door being breached or third level windows being entered, and the only item switched on was a 220 litre refrigerator using under $100 per quarter of power.

The meter readings were verified as correct and the possibility of inexplicable surges causing an increase in usage of 9,473 per cent compared to the same quarter of last year was dismissed. An employee warned that 98 per cent of past requests for meter checks revealed no faults and that the cost of these approximating $1,140 is then payable by the consumer. Obviously a major deterrent, the conclusion is that the power must have been used by someone and the account holder remains responsible.

Less than a 100 metres away an aged pensioner couple with no electric oven and just lights, a refrigerator, TV, radio and occasional heating devices, were hit with a demand for $3,272 instead of the usual quarterly average of $250. Stonewalled with the same spurious explanations given to me, they were obliged to pay up or have their supply terminated.

As they are also aware of someone else who received a similar outrageous account, it would be interesting to know if other Beast readers have been correspondingly targeted by this former state utility, now, despite its name, being China owned and headquartered in Hong Kong.

John Murray Coogee

Carpark Chaos

Anthony Maguire - Having just read your piece in The Beast I felt compelled to write to you (Competition for Parking Drives Randwick Residents Insane, The Beast, November 2022). I live in John Street, Randwick, across the road from the Tafe, Randwick Racecourse, the bus depot and the new Ambulance station! I think by now you will know where this is going.

If you want to talk about irate residents, come here and see what we all must contend with on a daily basis. At the bottom of King Street, adjacent to the Tafe and the garage, are storage units, horse transporters, flatbed trailers, dumped cars and boats on trailers, as well as people who park here from other areas and leave their cars all day!

We pay a fee to park but there is generally nowhere to park when my husband returns from work. He drives around for 30 minutes or so, sometimes longer, and then ends up parking at the other end of King Street.

Randwick Council won’t do anything about those that park in ‘no stopping’ zones. They want a letter first, by which time it’s too late! One can report all this but nothing ever gets done - it’s a permanent car park for everyone except the residents!

I have a ‘disabled’ sticker and there is only one disabled spot on King Street - that’s it! - which is used by people at Tafe, and most of them don’t even have a disabled permit to park there. I would also like to point out that on a race day it is ten times worse

So, if you think Frenchmans Road is bad, you should visit this area and see for yourself what the council won’t do here!

John Street Resident Randwick

Pick Up Your Poo

Dear Beast - Having been away overseas we look at our own enviroment with fresh eyes. Those eyes saw the Eastern Suburbs as having lost the war with dog owners and poo on our pavements - the coastal walk around Maroubra being the worst!

For every dog owner who is bristling with indignation right now, knowing they pick up their dog’s poo, there are the equivalent number of dog owners who don’t. It’s a disgrace! If you own a dog, you have a responsibility to look after it, including picking up its waste.

Oh, and those of you who pick up the poo and then leave the bagged poo on someone’s fence or hanging from a tree... REALLY?!

If you don’t want to pick up the poo or carry the bag full of it, then you shouldn’t own a dog. Get real!

Margy Coogee

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St Catherine's Student Number Increase

Dear Editor - When the Independent Planning Commission approved the St Catherine’s School development they imposed a cap on further student numbers, taking into account that St Catherine’s was already 120 students over their previously granted cap at the time of the commission’s meeting. The DA approval stated that St Catherine’s was only to increase its student numbers by 15 per year until 2030, and that increase was contingent on the school’s Operational Transport Management Plan being effective. Then, and only then, could they apply for an increase - it couldn’t have been a clearer directive (anyone can see how ineffective that plan is by simply being in the streets that border the school at drop-off and pick-up times). However, just recently, in The Sun-Herald on October 3, Principal Julie Townsend has given a real sob story that she can’t get sisters enrolled in the school because of this cap and she is planning to go the state government asking for an increase of 200 students to be allowed, now.

Of course there is no mention that St Catherine’s are recruiting students from China and Vietnam, an action which is impacting on the local sisters not being able to study at the same school.

Regards,

Cathy Davitt Waverley

Editor's Note

St Catherine’s Principal Dr Julie Townsend did not specifically mention sisters being turned away in the above-mentioned article (Sydney Private Schools Warn Students Will Be Turned Away Unless Enrolment Caps Raised, by Lucy Carroll and Daniella White, The Sun-Herald, October 2, 2022).

Here are the relevant paragraphs from that article:

St Catherine’s School principal Julie Townsend said her school wants to increase its longstanding cap of 1050 to 1200 after building a new performing arts and aquatic centre. The Waverley school plans to formally apply to the Planning Department to increase numbers but will need to prove it won’t increase traffic congestion.

“The school offers excellent education and student outcomes, and we hope the council and planning department would want to help, not hinder, reasonable increases to numbers,” she said.

Townsend questioned whether strict caps were in the best interest of students if schools were turning families away. More parents were enrolling their children in year 5 to secure a spot, leaving little capacity for new students at year 7, she said.

The $50 Million Question: Bondi Pavilion, Sustainable Development and the Concrete Council

The ugly 33,000 Spanish terracotta roof tiles on the Bondi Pavilion make it look dated, already. It’s hard to fathom that Waverley Council has spent $50 million dollars on redeveloping the Bondi Pavilion and yet the state of our local environment is appalling. It’s actually extremely hard to find details of where this money ($50 million) came from but apparently it was from the sale of the Waverley Council Maintenance Depot at Alexandria (good luck finding any details about this in Council’s financial records).

Waverley Council’s annual income is $150 million (in comparison Woollahra Council’s income is $110 million and Randwick Council’s income is $175 million). So, where does Waverley Council’s money (rate payers’ money) go?

Employee costs are a staggering $70 million, and if you include contractors and consultants this expense is $78 million, making staffing costs 52 per cent of the Council’s total expenses (in comparison, Randwick Council’s staff costs make up just 38 per cent of their expenses and for Woollahra Council it’s 42 per cent).

Given the miserable state of our parks, who would know that Waverley Council spends $10 million on parks maintenance?

The United Nations defines sustainable development as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. So, spending $50 million, but not one cent on the local environment such as Bronte and Tamarama gullies (that Council destroyed and used as rubbish dumps in the ‘60s and ‘70s), is simply not sustainable development - it’s gross overspending and it is not fair on our future generations.

It takes a $50,000 grant from the NSW Government to excite Waverley Council, who recently proudly stated they would plant 400 trees. Whoopee! The fact is that Waverley Council should be planting 10,000 trees a year and allocating the funds to do so (perhaps by reducing their excessive staffing costs).

I now personally refer to Waverley Council as the ‘Concrete Council’. One only has to look at the lack of trees and shrubs in the new bike lane project at Bondi Junction. The few trees that have been planted such as London Plane trees are a poor choice for rising temperatures driven by climate change.

Oh, and I forgot to mention Waverley Council received almost $11 million from parking fines last financial year, which equates to over 90,000 parking tickets. That’s more than one ticket for every one of the 75,000 residents living in the Waverley Local Government Area.

Charles Hunter Bronte

Waverley Council's Response: Building for the Future

Waverley Council is extremely proud of its heritage restoration of Bondi Pavilion and everyone who worked on the project, including the employment it generated during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Pavilion will be a national and global leader in sustainability through innovative environmental technology and will soon be a certified 5 Star Green Star rated Australian Building of Excellence. Its 217 solar panels will generate 71 per cent of the building’s energy needs and 80 per cent of the structure was retained, preserving its heritage significance and retaining trapped carbon, and 90 per cent of the construction waste was recycled.

The 33,000 interlocking terracotta roof tiles are a nod to the original Spanish-style roof tiles installed in 1928 and our head contractor Buildcorp and our architect Tonkin Zulaikha Greer undertook extensive prototyping, sampling and mock-ups to develop a colour scheme that’s not only heritage to the building, but compliments our coastal surrounds, and has been achieved by randomly interspersing the various colours.

Council’s strong financial position and fiscal management enabled the Council to fully fund its restoration and conservation project without any external government grants or assistance during COVID shutdowns and restrictions, to conserve and transform the almost century-old building into a community and cultural centre of the future, built to withstand our hostile coastal environment, for at least another 100 years.

The budget covered the cost of building works, extensive landscaping and public domain works and government legislated requirements. This budget also covered a quantum of unforeseen conditions and costs including pandemic-related costs; Ausgrid costs, Sydney Water costs, the remediation of issues with contaminated soil and structural works.

Council did not take out a loan for the project, therefore does not owe any money on the building, which will generate significant income for Council that will be reinvested into providing our services and facilities to the community and eventually recoup the cost of the project.

The feedback we’ve received from residents, businesses, visitors and from across all tiers of government is that they love the Pav, and we hope you will come to love it as well.

Waverley Council

Waverley ¢

Please send your feedback to letters@thebeast.com.au and include your name and suburb.