West End Community Association

Room only for the rich?
- Increase affordable housing








The Issue

As West End real estate values and rents rise, it's becoming increasingly difficult for individuals and families on lower and fixed incomes to remain in the suburb. If students, artists, migrants and pensioners continue to be forced out, the social and cultural diversity of the local area will disappear and much of what we value about West End will be lost forever.

What WECA wants to promote

The West End Community Association wants to retain the social and cultural diversity which makes West End so unique and desirable to current and prospective residents. To meet the accepted Australian standard, households in the bottom 40% of the income range should not need to pay more than 30% of their income in housing costs.

Ideally it would be great to see Council and the State Government implementing concrete measures to improve housing affordability within the peninsula. Key outcomes of such a strategy would be:

  • no net loss of affordable housing from the current level of provision.
  • no new residential housing development without creation of extra affordable housing.

WECA wants 10% of all new developments to comprise affordable housing. Ways of achieving this could include:

  • financial incentives to developers such as a partial refund of infrastructure charges, reduction in pedestal charges etc;
  • private-community-government partnerships;
  • one-stop-shop service for those proposing affordable housing developments, including the opportunity for pre-lodgement round table discussions with key stakeholders including community representatives;
  • removal of planning barriers to the creation of affordable housing, including innovative forms of housing where community service agencies, affordable housing units and or commercial operations are configured together for mutual benefit.

What YOU can do:

  1. Write to State Government/local MP and housing bodies requesting more public and community housing in West End
  2. Write to Council/local councillor urging inclusion of a significant proportion (WECA advocates 10%) of affordable housing in all developments approved for West End
  3. Write letters to newspapers
  4. Telephone talkback radio
  5. Join a housing cooperative
  6. Join and/or donate to WECA and participate in its activities
  7. Get others involved: numbers=power!