By Kai Ianssen

THE TORCH Newspaper – 28/04/1999

Residents say Bankstown Council bureaucrats have not told the truth about the environmental significance of some land the council is planning to exchange with Bankstown Airport Limited.
The concerns stern from a council report from September 28, 1998, which states that the Bankstown Bushland Society (BBS) had done regeneration work on part of Airport Reserve, the land near the corner of Henry Lawson Drive and Milperra Road.
But the BBS has done regeneration work in all of the land in question, local environmentalist
Mr Robert Miller said.
“The council papers that have been presented to the councillors appear to have misleading facts.  Specifically a statement in there [the council report] under the section dealing with BBS where it states the society specifically had under¬ taken bush regeneration in the east of the reserve – well that is completely wrong,” Mr Miller said.
“The society has done work specifically in the west of the reserve and on portions of the land that are proposed to be transferred to the FAC [BAL].
“It indicated in the report that has gone to the councillors that the bushland wasn’t a problem because of the fact that the works were done in the east of the reserve but they were done primarily in the western part of the reserve… we worked over the entire bushland remnant.”
This area is “protected under the Threatened Species Act and it is a sub unit of Cumberland Plain woodland and also the far west of the reserve has got species that are part of the Sydney coastal river flat forest,” he said.

“Both of those communities arc currently listed under the Threatened Species Conservation Act as threatened or endangered ecological communities.

“The councillors need to be informed that some of the information is misleading. In fact, there arc bushland issues that need to to be considered.

“I’d also like to raise the fact that the road here has had extra fill, which is a prohibited activity on this reserve. Bankstown Council is trustee of the reserve. The amplification of the road that has already occurred is an illegal activity under the terms of the trusteeship and we’d like to put in ail official complaint to that as well,” he said.

BBS said it had carried out work on the site, funded by an Environmental Trust grant of $40,000 in 1991 to 1996.

“Despite assurances that the bushland will not be affected by BAL’s proposal to construct a slip road to provide access to the airport museum, a proposed fast food outlet and a motel on airport land, we can¬ not see how this can be done without impacting on the bushland,” a BBS statement said.

“A slip road would need to be long enough to allow heavy vehicles to enter safely and to park off road at this site, which is very close to the busy intersection with Henry Lawson Drive.