Following advice from the General Manager at the last meeting that Council was expecting a new SEPP and a new law Council has eight separate applications to consider this week.

Greens Councillor Catherine Moore has submitted a Notice of Motion to the meeting requesting a full and frank discussion on the issue prior to the planning reports coming before Council.

Cr Moore says that "The discussion also needs to look at equity issues, and the division in the community that has been created by the first-come, first-served approach. The spirit of concessionals (originally put forward and often still argued as the reason to keep them) as being a way for a farmer to stay on the farm when his/her children take over has been lost. The LEP says Council "MAY" grant concessionals. It does not say it must. The LEP also talks about the need for an orderly approach, and the approach that we are currently taking is far from that."

The Notice of Motion asks Council to question "the number of rural lots, concessional or otherwise, available for building but which have not been yet been taken up for that purpose; and the cost of assessing these applications."

On Sunday a meeting of around 30 Mongarlowe residents at the Fire Shed, expressed concern at the number of developments before council. The Mongarlowe community group was aware that the nature of the community could be changed by a sudden influx of development.

However one resident said that the general feeling of the meeting was that the current developments before council did at least fit in with the current LEP, but that any development proposed for the area that was outside of the current LEP would be strongly opposed by the community.