Western Port
Western Port
realestate 26 May 2015
Wide open spaces > Page 3
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5973 6424 or email: team@mpnews.com.au www.mpnews.com.au At your service: Volunteers Wilma, Chris, Maryta, Peter, Sue, Ginny and Sam helping out at Second Bite Hastings. Picture: Gary Sissons
This helping hand offers a Second Bite STAFF at Westernport Mission Centre, in Frankston Flinders Rd, Hastings, are passionate about helping those less fortunate in the community and have a range of programs and activities to put their concerns into action. Food, fun, friendship is the name of the game at Messy Church, for children and their carers, 4-6pm Wednesdays. It is aimed at helping those not already involved in another church’s activities. It includes a welcome, creative time to explore the biblical theme through a story time, prayer, song and games. A sit-down meal together at tables is provided at 5.15pm. The Op Shop, 11am-3pm Mondays and Wednesdays, sells clothing, bric-a-brac and shoes. Everything is $3 or less. Donations of saleable items are welcome, as are volunteers. “We are here because there is a need,” ministry assistant Lorelle Vince said. This is evidenced by crowds of 40 to 60 customers gathering 1-3pm Mondays for Second Bite. “Anyone can come, including community centres and schools,” Ms Vince said. “It’s mainly fresh fruit and vegetables that’s already been checked and would otherwise be thrown out.” Westernport Mission Centre, is at 2036 Frankston Flinders Rd, Hastings, call 5979 2751.
Port planner slashes jobs Keith Platt keith@mpnews.com.au STAFF numbers have been cut to 14 at the Port of Hastings Development Authority. The latest cuts are in line with the Labor government’s aim of hearing from Infrastructure Victoria before deciding on a site for the state’s second container port. While falling short of formally abandoning Hastings, this latest move is
likely to leave a significant vacuum in the forward planning policies of the Mornington Peninsula and Frankston. The Port of Hastings Development Authority has all but been left out of the latest state budget and must rely on ever decreasing revenues from port operator, Patricks Stevedores. In the lead up to last November’s election Labor stated that its preferred location for a new container port was in Port Phillip, at Bay West near Geelong. The previous Coalition government had favoured Western Port and planned
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to spend $110 million over four years to plan for the container port at Hastings. Municipalities climbed aboard, with seven councils in south east Melbourne commissioning a study that put the total cost of the port at $16 billion. Frankston, which has promoted itself as being ideally suited to be the commercial hub of the proposed port, is this week likely to contact the Premier Daniel Andrews condemning the government’s lack of interest in developing a container port at Hastings. Mornington Peninsula mayor Cr Bev
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Colomb was not available for comment on Monday but, if the feelings of former mayor Cr Antonell Celi are anything to go by, relations between the shire and the Labor government may be strained. Cr Celi, when mayor, dubbed Labor’s plan for a new container port near Geelong “fundamentally flawed". Her decision last August to enter the battle over the site for Melbourne’s next container port came a month after Victoria University researchers issued a warning that Western Port may not be the best
option for a new container port. The Build it – but will they come? report cast doubts on the need for a port to accommodate the world’s largest ships. Undeterred, real estate agents at Hastings continued spruiking a coming boom and predicted an expanded port would bring jobs and prosperity. Last week the boom balloon fell flat as the development authority slashed staff to 14, from 32 at the start of the week and a high of nearly 100 a year ago. Continued Page 6
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