How long do we have to provide feedback in the current phase before decisions will have been made?

Email sent to Brisbane City Council - Neighbourhood Planning

I’m writing to you on behalf of the Protect Sandgate’s Character group regarding the Sandgate Centre Suburban Renewal Precinct, and in particular regarding timings in the current stage of the process. The information we have at this point comes from https://www.brisbane.qld.gov.au/about-council/council-projects/sandgate-centre-suburban-renewal-precinct.

That page invites “initial thoughts” and says “your feedback will help shape this plan”. There has been considerable interest in the community in taking advantage of this, and within our group in particular we are investigating other areas (in Brisbane and elsewhere) that have been able to handle increased density without erasing their local identity. This will inform our preferred vision and what we will want to feed back to Council in this current ‘shaping’ phase, during whatever time we have (and the lack of clarity about that amount of time is what this email is about).

I am aware that this current phase also involves your background research, and the creation of the draft plan. This implies that at some point during this phase, the timing of which is completely unknown to us, the decisions feeding in to the draft plan will have been basically made, and our input will no longer be as relevant.

We are effectively in a de-facto consultation phase (arguably the more important one when we can be proactive and not just reactive), and yet the parameters are not clear. If we have to rush our input we will do so, but we would just like to know for sure. There is a perception in the community (not without foundation) that certain groups in our community have direct links to the Council administration and have access to the ‘rules of engagement’ whereas members of the general community do not. An informative response to this email would do a lot to shift that perception.

I also notice, on the page mentioned above, it says “We’ll also be inviting you to share your ideas for this precinct through an interactive online map and survey, which will be made available soon”. I would assume that the draft plan would not be firmed up until after this has happened, but again we have no knowledge of when these consultation measures would take place.

A response as soon as practical would be greatly appreciated.