In my post of a few minutes ago I talked of the working s of our new Development, Strategy & Policy committee meeting as they dealt with DPA 3A.

Two months ago this committee heard submissions from members of our residents and businesses. I posted on this at the time.

The committee sat to review these responses this week and to contribute their own thoughts. It was an active meeting with all members contributing, both elected and independent. Even absent independent member Tim Horton (not allowed to attend as he had to attend his surprise birthday party) contributed .

We heard also from Cr John Koumi the presiding member of another of our committees, UBED, about their concerns regarding the economic impacts of the development.

In the end all the input from this meeting will be forwarded onto Council for them to make their decision as to what to put to the Minister for Planning to consider. We then await his blessing on what I believe to be the best result we could have hoped for.

The mood of this committee I believe will be matched by council. In other words we remain on the same page we have always been on in respect of issues DPTI have previously indicated were non-negotiables. Issues such as having a 30 degree envelope not 45 degrees and that public notification be permitted I am sure will be endorsed by Council.

We also have rejected the concept of providing incentives that might allow the overall height to be increased.