Save The Figs in Newcastle

[Toymaker Len]

Newcastle members. The plan to knock over the figs in Layman St is an absolute farce. The figs have withstood everything nature and man has thrown at them for more than half a century...Now suddenly some genius in council has decided that walking under them is 400 times more dangerous than driving a car, 200 hundred times more dangerous than being posted to Iraq... and they have never dropped a branch or caused an injury. Further than that the council officers have spent vast sums of ratepayers money to make the formally safe street "safe" with security guards and fences thus putting enormous pressure on councillors to recind their previous motions protecting the figs and instead have them cut down. Again at enormous cost to ratepayers. This is an abuse of process of the first order in my opinion. Un-named and unaccountable public officials on unbelievable salaries from the public purse are pursuing unexamined agendas which will have unprecedented consequences.
Search for 'Save our Figs' to get the full story. If you can...do something. Get down to the Civic Park and have a look for yourself. Take it from there.

[Bushmiller]

I know these trees. A crying shame if they go. Officialdom clearly doesn't give a fig.

Regards
Paul

[Toymaker Len]

Thanks for the support Bushmiller. I wonder why the newcastle members aren't chiming in ? It amazes me that a clique of bureacrats can railroad the democratic process. For example a petition with eleven thousand signatures was presented to the council asking for the figs to be protected... Later the Save our Figs group asked for the petition so they could present it to state parliament it turned out that the council officers had shredded the petition entirely despite it being the largest petition ever presented to a local council in Australia. Barstools !

[Claw Hama]

Hi Len, what can I say that you haven't already expressed. We have been down there and friends of ours who live nearby havebeen there almost every day. Total bull*(#^ as you say they stood up to the Pasha Bulker storm etc etc and not a sign of falling. With all the shity areas in Newcastle to clean up, repair, renew etc they pick the prettiest part of town to trash. BULLS*%@

[Black Ned]

I have heard but cannot vouch that it is true - that the real reason Council wants the trees removed is because their insurance premium would rise $10,000
per year to cover the trees. So far at least $210,000 has been spent by the Council on security, road closure, workman etc., to cut the trees down. (That could have paid for insurance extra for next 21 years. Note it is only the trees in Laman Street that are to be cut down. (Just happens to be in front of the Newcastle Art Gallery). No concern however for all the Figs of similar age and condition in adjoining streets. I wonder if this is true? - what will happen if a branch falls in the other streets - will the public be covered by insurance?
This Council needs replacing - it is dysfunctional and does not serve the publics best interests.
P.S. - the insurance cost and money spent has come from someone who is a council employee and relayed the message to a friend.

[Toymaker Len]

Well the insurance company offered the council $25,000 to have an independent assessment but the council knocked it back. Go figure.
Yes and all those other trees all over Newie are apparently safe. Its just the ones in Layman St where some unknown planning committee has decided that they want a plaza in front of the library and art gallery. There is also a WWII victory garden at the eastern end of Layman St where there is a pine from a seed of the famous Lone Pine and the ashes of many veterans there. That garden is continually left off council plans in what looks like an attempt to make it disappear along with the fig trees. How do we get the veterans moving ?

[Toymaker Len]

Last chance rally on the steps of the town hall at 4.30 today before the council meets at 6.00. Barry O'Farrell has offered the use of a state arborist to make a free and unbiased assessment of the trees but he insists that the council manager has to ask for the arborist to be sent up. Otherwise it is too much like interfering in local government. However the new general manager won't make the call. The friends of the figs say they will abide by the umpires decision and happily stand aside if the trees are found to be unsafe. On the other hand if the trees are found to be safe then they should be left in place and managed like any other street trees.

[Lyle]

For goodness sakes.
The council was elected to make decisions based on information supplied for the community as a whole.
This debacle has gone on for far too long.
Cut them down, plant new ones (as they had planned to do) and move on people.

I'm not taking sides as both sides have their own agendum. No one is 'winning' here and the whole thing is farcical.

But common sense dictates that a decision has to be made and stop the waste of time money and emotions.

Lyle.

[Waldo]

Hi Len, what can I say that you haven't already expressed. We have been down there and friends of ours who live nearby havebeen there almost every day. Total bull*(#^ as you say they stood up to the Pasha Bulker storm etc etc and not a sign of falling. With all the shity areas in Newcastle to clean up, repair, renew etc they pick the prettiest part of town to trash. BULLS*%@

(to give a little background to the relevance to my agreement with what Clawhama has written, I lived in Newcastle for 4 years)

[Toymaker Len]

The trouble here Lyle is that the elected council representatives did look at the issue two years ago and decide that the trees were not dangerous and that they should be kept. Then the faceless men kept stirring by sending letters to the insurance company(and the papers) saying that they thought the figs were unsafe and they started putting in wire fences around the trees and blocking off parts of the street. Then the insurance company said "well how about we pay for some testing ? Then it became a political fight and the councillors who had backed removal of the trees started to blame the others who wanted to keep the trees for the cost of the fences and street closures etc.(Something very like blackmail) Most of all they didn't want any independent expert to give an opinion to the whole council because the tree destroyers will be shown up to have lied to the council. All along the trees are fine healthy trees making Layman St outside the art gallery and library a beautiful shady avenue...
Why should ratepayers just knuckle under and go along when something cool and beautiful is being destroyed for false reasons to further a hidden agenda.
As Clawhammer has indicated this little bit of destruction will end up costing close to two million dollars that Newcastle doesn't have and while we have many other real and pressing problems.

[Toymaker Len]

After a hard day at the barricades at 3.30 this afternoon we got an injunction through the Land and Environment Court to protect the figs until Nov 11th so that an independent assessment can be done. Came home and sat down to write a letter to the herald, sent it and bang! one minute later my phone rings. - Tony from the Herald... "We will be running your letter in the morning".
Funny thing is, and just between us here, standing there all day I got a bit of a plan going in my head about what to do with a fair bit of that fig wood. I've used quite a bit of fig over the last few years and I really like it, especially after its been left on the ground to get a bit of spalting. Just don't tell anybody.

[NCArcher]

That's good news Len. I don't know all the ins and outs of this fight and to be honest I don't want to know but they are very beautiful trees and it would be a shame to see them go if they didn't need to.

[Claw Hama]

Great work Len, I couldn't get in there today but have been emailing councillors regarding trees and federal and state gov about CSG and mining. Keep up the good work. Do you know Anna and Brian? They will have been in there I'm sure.

[wheelinround]

Len I am sorry I didn't chime in earlier

The Figs in The Domain suffered the same fate but they were not saved.

One of the main reasons they were culled is the $%&& politicians office workers could not sit in the offices when performances were on and watch concerts etc FREE in airconditioned comfort. I just looked at Civic park via google maps Town Hall and right beside is yep a government building on the side of the pakr your talking about is yet another gov building the Library..

Here's the tree's what a croc of they have been there longer than any of the buildings about them


Good luck and don't given in.

[Bushmiller]

One of the features that characterises an established area is vegetation and in particular trees. It takes for ever to achieve that look. Laman street has an almost unique avenue of trees. It is quite monsterous to imagine somebody would want these removed for flippant reasons.

And yet it appears so.

There are more of such trees around. Some beauties at the Tocal Ag College at Patterson, several in the main street in Moree. More for that matter in the Islington section of Hunter street. Actually, we have one in our back yard, although I wouldn't recommend them for back yards.

Does this mean insurance companies everywhere are going to be asking for such trees to be removed? Bring back hanging for this offense. In fact the limbs of said trees are very suitable for such a purpose as they don't break.

Regards
Paul