Jennifer Pittorino
Three Maribyrnong residents have joined forces against the ongoing Paintback proposal dispute in West Footscray, creating a go-fund-me to pay for legal representation to fight an appeal before the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.
Aimée Thorpe, Kelami Ata and Amy Kenny have created RAP (Residents against Paintback) to fight for their homes.
As reported by Star Weekly in July, Wattyl Paints applied for a planning permit for a Paintback hazardous waste processing facility in West Footscray.
The facility, mooted for Graingers Road, would crush paint cans and in the process release post-processed fumes into the surrounding area.
Residents wasted no time creating a petition against the proposal which accumulated 310 signatures and filed 112 objections to Maribyrnong council.
In November, council showed its support for the residents, some of whom live only 30 meters away from the proposed site, by knocking back the proposal on the grounds it would unreasonably affect the safety and amenity of adjacent or sensitive land users.
Wattyl Paints had 60 days to file an appeal with VCAT, which it did, notifying residents including Ms Thorpe in late January.
“All the original objectors received a notification in the mail from their legal team advising us of the appeal,” she said.
“Given we all objected we had the right to be named a party in the VCAT matter with council.
“So we formed RAP and called for expressions of interest from those 110 original objectors who would want to be listed as a joint responded to the VCAT matter.”
Now RAP represents 40 named residents who are hoping to raise over $7000 to hire an expert to solidify their VCAT case which is booked for the start of May.
“A compulsory conference between the parties was held at VCAT, however as no suitable agreement could be reached by all parties, the matter has progressed to a hearing before a VCAT member,” she said.
“This money is just a drop in the ocean and is still not going to put us anywhere near on a level footing to present our arguments at VCAT.
“All of the quotes that we obtained for legal representation were well in excess of $15,00 which we don’t expect to get.
“So we’re hoping that this money will be able to get some basic, expert advice and assistance, to help us prepare our submissions to VCAT.”
Ms Thorpe said RAP’s deadline is Wednesday, April 10, but any donations raised after that date will go towards extra support.
“Anything that we can raise in excess after Wednesday we will be willing to take on board and pay for additional support.”
As of Tuesday, April 9, the go fund me had raised $7,040.
