February 10th, 2020Just sayin’…By Donna Kelly

THE world has gone mad.

Well, maybe just this part of the world, the rest is too busy worrying about coronavirus.

This morning I went and took a photo of some women who are very worried about the draft Local Law No. 2 that Hepburn Shire Council will most likely vote in on February 18. The women had, along with others, written letters to The Local, with a variety of very valid concerns. Check out pages 10 and 11.

Reading the letters, the rational person would think “it can’t be that bad” but then you read the draft. And it’s crazy.

Some of the laws are just dumb. Like you can’t put a disposable nappy in a council bin “unless they have been cleaned of solids”. Hmmm. Last time I looked harried parents just removed the nappy, rolled it up and popped it in bin. And who is going through the rubbish to check? The Shit Police?

Then there’s the one that says you can’t put a car for sale on a public place – like a nature strip. What do you do, keep it under wraps inside your fence and hope someone flying a drone overhead wants your 1990s Falcon? Got three dogs and live on less than one acre? Then get ready to choose your favourites. You can only have two. Same with cats – even if you have a couple of hectares or more and keep them inside – as you should.

And one of my favourites, no more unsightly properties. Now the draft law does list what constitutes unsightly but one of the items, “any other thing making the land visually repugnant”, could see anyone come undone. Personally I think two-storey McMansions are pretty unsightly, maybe others don’t like old schools. Is there a uni degree in unsightliness?

But jokes aside, there are some which are just wrong – which are what some very sane, rational and intelligent people have been trying hard to change. But so far with no luck.

So, if the law goes ahead: without a permit, no more gathering fruit, flowers or wood from public areas, no more gathering up bits and pieces from the tips to recycle, no busking, no street gatherings, no growing any trees on nature strips. WTF!

There will be one last-ditch effort to change councillors’ minds at 6pm on February 18 at the Daylesford Town Hall. People are being asked to bring signs or evidence of what they have created or foraged. It’s going to be difficult but I will try to bring our shower base.

And finally, in a continuing ‘it’s a mad world vein’, the Daylesford Field & Game Club has been told to stop, for now, its monthly shoot at the Glenlyon Reserve, after 40 years. Seems lead has been found in the soil in the middle of the track. But not enough to stop the Glenlyon New Year’s Day, or the daily walkers, or free range dogs, or the kids at the playground, or antiques fair. Just the shooters. Everyone else seems to have dodged a bullet.  Strange. Just sayin’…