What made the news in Cockburn – 16-23 August, 2019

Cockburn Council has voted to meet with WA Police and Treeby Community Association to discuss off-road vehicle activity in Treeby and investigate solutions to community concerns. Residents have been plagued by trail bikes, quad bikes and four-wheel drives zooming over vacant land east of Clementine Boulevard and a large undeveloped area north of ArmadaleRoad.

The Sudan Crisis is one of the lesser-known Australian conflicts featured in a new war memorial walk in Cockburn. Situated on Remembrance Avenue in Cockburn Central, West Memorial Walk has 36 commemorative plinths dedicated to a conflict involving Australian forces, including Gallipoli (1915-16), Vietnam (1962-1975) and East Timor (1980-2000).

University testing of the hair of a nine-year-old girl living near Cockburn Cement has allegedly found elevated heavy metal levels.  Cockburn Cement said it was confident all its emissions were well below its licence limits, as demonstrated by all monitoring and reporting. Department of Water and Environmental Regulation licence limits are set specifically to protect human health and the environment.

THE Maritime Union of Australia has claimed scientific documents were misinterpreted to reduce the environmental risk of a proposed Outer Harbour at Kwinana. Westport said its assessment process was informed by scientifically robust studies and overseen by the WA Biodiversity Science Institute, the WA Marine Science Institute and the University of WA.

Thursday, 22 August: South Coogee Bush Fire Brigade has received a new fire appliance in readiness for the 2019/20 fire season. The $550,000 3.4 fire appliance would be heavily used by the brigade’s volunteers as part of their fire response and mitigation burning duties.

A Success man is preparing to achieve his 2020 Paralympics dream. Ben Rowe is preparing to represent Australia by qualifying for goalball, a team sport designed for athletes with vision impairment.

Wednesday, 21 August: Firefighters extinguished a fire at the Australian Marine Complex in Henderson. A Department of Fire and Emergency Services spokesperson said oil drums caught on fire at the Henderson shipyards, beneath HMAS Darwin, a vessel no longer used by the Navy.

A Maritime Union of Australia petition, with more than 2500 signatures, against a new outer harbour proposal for Kwinana has been tabled in Parliament.

Tuesday, 20 August: The Cockburn Chinese Community Association donated 100 children’s Chinese language books to the Cockburn Libraries collection in the lead up to Book Week 2019.   The donation comes after the City of Cockburn acted on the local Chinese community’s request for monthly Stories in Chinese sessions at Success Library.

The Cockburn ARC co-located Fremantle Dockers sacked their coach Ross Lyon with a year still to run on his contract. The club has also parted company with CEO Steve Rosich.

Kwinana Industries Council and the City of Kwinana support Westport’s top option to develop an  outer harbour in Kwinana.  The proposal was not supported by the Fish Army or the Maritime Union of Australia.

Monday, 19 August: In an opinion piece published in the Sydney Morning Herald, Westport Taskforce chairperson Nicole Lockwood said all over the world, major ports established over a century ago, like Fremantle, were being hemmed in by urban development, or being outgrown.   A multi-criteria analysis tool used by Westport to objectively assess 25 different options (as recommended by Infrastructure Australia), clearly determined Kwinana as the best overall option – with not just five, but most of the Kwinana options ranking higher than the Fremantle and Bunbury options.

Friday, 16 August: The City of Cockburn was named Most Accessible Community in the metropolitan area at the WA Local Government Convention.  The City won the award in partnership with non-profit disability employment service Bizlink, which works with the City to improve the lives of locals living with a disability.