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BAYSIDE ratepayers have been hit with a $5.3 million bill from Vision Super.

The amount is Bayside’s share of the unfunded gap in the Defined Bene-fit Superannuation Scheme for council employees that will increase from $71 million to $320 million.

Although some councils have al-ready made provision in their current budgets to pay off Vision Super, Bay-side councillors only learned of the entire debt at the start of August.

In a non-performing market the fund manager Vision Super calls on councils to make up the shortfall to the level guaranteed by the defined scheme, including the15 per cent tax payable by all super schemes.

The generous super scheme applies only to council employees who signed up before it was abandoned in 1993 during the reign of the Kennett state government.

The mayor Cr Louise Cooper-Shaw told The Citizen on Monday 6 August that deciding how to pay the outstand-ing $5.3m “is the big question”.

“We’ve only just received notice of the amount. The only information giv-en top us previously was that it would be big,” Cr Cooper-Shaw said.

“It’s all a bit horrible. We only got the letter [from Vision Super] at the end of last week.”

The mayor said there were two pos-sible ways of raising the money: in-creasing rates or borrowing.

“Paying it off over 15 years, with interest, would make it $8 million.”

Cr Cooper-Shaw said the Municipal Association of Victoria was negotiat-ing for the state government to pro-vide municipalities with “a very low interest loan”.

Bayside Council’s communications co-ordinator Imogen Kelly said the $5.3m was “marginally less than we had forecast it might be”.

Continued Page 2

Bayside’s $5m super debt

Creative outputMANY of the works in Kylie Elk-ington’s Hampton exhibition were completed while she was an artist in residence at Bundanon, the working farm in New South Wales given to the nation by Arthur Boyd in 1993 for art-ists to make their mark on Australian landscape painting tradition.

Elkington’s quiet appreciation of the understated drama of this par-ticular stretch of landscape has fed directly into the recent body of work, according to fellow artist Dr Richard Dunlop.

“These paintings either gently re-cede or sparkle according to the var-ied handling and movement of the oil paint. Elkington’s immediate love of the Bundanon landscape and ongoing passion for depicting isolated regions of Australia is very much in evidence here.”

Kylie Elkington’s “Paintings from Bundanon and other Recent Works”, 17 August-8 September at the Bridget McDonnell Gallery, 392 Hampton St, Hampton, phone 9598 8398.

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heT itizenCBoard rules for businessIT may be just a board game, but the lessons learnt can help run businesses more economically and efficiently.

Businesspeople at a networking meeting at The Bay Recep-tions, Brighton, on 24 July helped raise money for a charity food bank while playing Leverage: The Game of Business.

Nearly 200 turned up for the night organised by David Guest of ActionCOACH.

Leverage claims to teach more about business in three hours than some business courses do in three days.

Classed as “edutainment”, the game claims to “alter your perception and open your mind to what’s truly possible within a business”.

Playing the game are, from left, James Ealing of Extreme Networks, George Bacon, Crown Business Solutions, Mar-

garet Harrison, BusinessTimes magazine, Rob Dare, Crown Business Solutions, and Stephen Le Page.

Continued from Page 1“The amount is not due until 1 July

2013 so it will figure in next year’s budget,” Ms Kelly said.

“You will appreciate that no deci-sion has been made as yet to how the shortfall will be funded, particularly as there will be a new council in place by then.

“At this very early stage it is likely to comprise a combination of sources as we obviously don’t have $5.3 mil-lion just sitting around.

City facing $5m super bill“There is a 15-year option to pay

off the liability, but the interest rate being offered by Vision Super is pos-sibly higher than council could source elsewhere.”

Council issued a news release four days after inquiries by The Citizen headed “Council campaign against $5.m super bill”.

In it, Cr Cooper-Shaw stated that Bayside would “lend its voice to a statewide campaign to change unfair rules that force ratepayers to keep top-ping up the scheme”.

“Along with other councils, we will seek the same exemption that allows the Australian government to carry an unfunded superannuation liability of around $61 billion and the Victorian Government more than $29 billion.”

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THE Runway Room is already plan-ning for the spring racing carnival where fashions and fillies attract at-tention on both sides of the rails.“We can come out of hibernation. It’s this time of year that we start thinking about showing some skin, the races begin, functions, parties it’s all about getting out and about again,” Runway owner Alex Fevola says.The Runway Room’s spring racing make over’s can transform a woman “into a fresh faced, sun kissed glama-zon”.“We are a new concept one-stop beau-ty shop. We do hair, tans, make-up artistry, waxing, nails, lash extensions and photography,” Ms Fevola said.“Our spring racing package has been designed with the modern woman in mind, fast and affordable.“You make one appointment and you leave completely made over from head to toe.”The Runway Room is at 581 Hamp-ton, Hampton, call 9521 9007.

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She said councils had been forced by the Kennett government to sign legally binding agreements to keep funding the benefits of staff covered by the scheme.

“This problem is the making of the Victorian Government and ratepayers should not be made to shoulder that burden.

“The amount of our liability is based on the number of employees we have in the scheme as well as former employees of Bayside and the cities of Brighton, Sandringham, Moorabbin and Mordialloc.”

Cr Cooper-Shaw said Bayside was “better off” than councils where li-abilities topped $20m.

She said a review was made every three years to make sure current as-sets would meet benefits “promised to members now and into the future”.

Cr Felicity Frederico said council had known about the super debt but decided against including it in the 2012/13 budget.

“This was a criticism that I did men-tion in the chamber when debating on the budget,” she said.

“I think it is outrageous that the scheme is fully funded and is not on an equal footing with other public sector schemes - which are exempt. I applaud the advocacy role the MAV have ad-opted in trying to transition it back to a state managed scheme, or to remove the requirement for fully funding.”

THE New St railway crossing will again open to traffic, but not for more than a year. After a $2 million feasibility study the state government has abandoned plans to replace the gates with a tunnel and now says work will start on a more conventional so-lution in January. In the meantime, the entry from New St to and from Beach Rd remains closed to all but pedestrians, although gatekeepers remain on the job to change signals every time a train passes through.

CURVES in Hampton is raising mon-ey for the Heart Foundation by work-ing with the Go Red for Women cam-paign to help raise awareness about women and heart disease.

A fundraising event is being held at the Club 557 Hampton St at midday on Saturday 18 August. There will be a demonstration of preparing a healthy meal using fresh food and The Chefs Toolbox products.

After lunch there will be informa-tion given about Tri Nature household and personal care products as well as a raffle and spot prizes.

Curves works with the Heart Foun-dation and Breast Cancer Awareness every year to raise money and promote women’s health and disease prevention.

In July Curves collected more than 170kg of groceries for the BayCISS community support service.

Curves Hampton offers free fitness assessments to help maintain healthy lifestyles and help to prevent heart disease, Type 2 Diabetes, osteoporosis

Making a heartfelt effortand other debilitating diseases.

Curves, which is now a weight loss centre as well as a gym, also has a meal management plan.

For more information about the Go Red for Women Heart Foundation fundraiser call 9521 8100. Entry: $15.

Fine cut readingMEMBERS of Bayside Council’s li-braries with outstanding fines can cut the amount owed by attending the Read Down Your Fines Day. Fines will be reduced by $2 for every 30 minutes spent reading at the Hampton, Beaumaris, Brighton or Sandringham library on Saturday 25 August.

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EASE of parking and the physical appearance of streets are top of the list for shoppers in Hamp-ton St and Sandringham.

Price and range of products is also a disincen-tive to shop locally.

On average, shoppers in Sandringham spend $176 a week while those in Hampton St hand over $184.

Compared with Melbourne, residents in Hampton and Sandringham have “significantly higher average weekly family income”, more disposable income and a higher proportion of workers in highly skilled occupations.

The figures are contained in Business Monitor 2012, a survey conducted for Bayside Council by consultants Street Ryan, which “specialises in improving regional competitiveness and busi-ness performance through ongoing involvement with client organisations and through consul-tancy services”.

The results of the survey are based on in-terviews with business owners, managers and shoppers.

The Business Monitor uses responses from businesses and shoppers to make recommenda-tions seen as key to the survival of Bayside’s shopping precincts.

It also provides insights into the pressures faced by businesses within the Bayside Busi-ness Employment Area (BBEA), stretching north from Tulip St, Cheltenham and bounded by George St to the west and Jack Rd in the east.

Of the 308 completed trader questionnaires, 58 (18.5% of businesses) came from Hampton St and 55 from Sandringham (38% of busi-nesses).

In Hampton St 209 shoppers completed a written questionnaire while 96 did the same in Sandringham.

Hampton St has more businesses than Bay-side’s other eight shopping precincts: Sandring-ham, Martin St, Bay St, Church St, Hampton East, Highett, Black Rock and Beaumaris.

Face to face interviews with 920 shoppers showed that they visited Southland and Hamp-ton St the most, but spent more than 50 per cent more money at Southland.

Church St also caused a significant “leakage” of money from Bayside’s other eight shopping areas.

The top three improvements wanted by shop-pers in Hampton St were parking, on-street seat-ing and landscaping. Sandringham shoppers

agreed, but added a need for public toilets. Southland, the elephant in the room, was not

directly included in the survey although it has the most shopper visits and the highest per cap-ita spending.

Straddling the Bayside/Kingston border, Southland has a bigger range of products and shops but the survey holds out hope for Bay-side’s, smaller, less unified competitors.

It says the nine precincts can compete “on consistent and personalised service and by of-fering the shopper an ‘experience’ rather than simply focusing on making a transaction”.

“This could be achieved, for example, through landscaping and streetscape treatments, consis-tency in appearance or theming, more outdoor dining, in-centre events.”

On average, businesses interviewed believed that about two thirds of their customers came from the suburb in which the commercial pre-cinct is located, with another 21% coming from elsewhere in Bayside.

“Almost half the shoppers interviewed (44.8%) indicated that they research their shop-ping online and over one third (36%) shop on-line,” the survey results showed.

“The proportion of shoppers who shop online was greatest for Bay St (46.1%) and Church St (45.2%) and least for Hampton East (12.5%) and Sandringham Village (29.2%).

“Almost half (47.2%) of those who shop on-line indicated that they do so monthly or more, and 17.3% shop online weekly or more. Over-all, those who shop online spend 20.6% of their total retail spend through the online medium.”

Despite this high rate of online trade, the number of businesses with websites was just 40% in Sandringham, with only 7% per cent of those offering online sales.

Businesses across the municipality which did trade online said it made up 25% of their sales and they expected this to be 29% next year.

Traders in Hampton St came bottom of the list for length of time in business at the same ad-dress, they also came second (93%) as having the highest proportion of rented premises (with average annual rents of $33,792).

Sandringham Village performed just below a District Centre but had the potential to be el-evated to a District Centre with an expansion in its range of specialty outlets.

The Business Monitor can be viewed at www.bayside.vic.gov.au

Shoppers list their wants

VACANT and For Lease are two of the most prevalent signs of the times in shopping centres.Six years ago just under 3% of the 335 businesses premises in Hampton St were vacant, now there are 9.2%.Sandringham has 17% vacancies, compared to 6% in 2006, although much of the empty space is in new developments.Hampton St traders’ association president Kel Costello is about to wind up his own Way To Go travel goods business and fears there are not enough traders willing to continue the group.He says his six-year lease at 627 Hampton St is up and he has decided to “call it quits on retail”.He blames much of the retail malaise on online shopping and margins charged by wholesalers.“It would cost $177,000 to fit out a new shop and with six-year leases being normal there’s not enough time to amortise a return on that outlay,” Mr Costello said.“The real problem for the committee will be to get motivation. They will also need a new president.”The annual general meeting of the Hampton Traders’ Association will be held at 6.30pm on Wednesday 22 August at the Hampton Community Centre, 14 Willis St.

Council gives OK to light upAMENDMENTS to the Bayside planning scheme will clear the way for “ecological burn-ing” to control native trees like coastal tea-tree and wattles.

Council sees them as “weed species” and has also given the go ahead for a “suitable” ecologi-cal burn during 2013/14.

The decision follows community outrage about previous burns in Gramatan Av, Beau-maris and the Long Hollow Heathland.

A report to council said ecological burning was an established natural resources manage-ment practice undertaken in Bayside over the

past 28 years “to promote the regeneration of desirable species and control weed species in bushland reserves”.

“Based on past experience and the best ad-vice, we firmly believe that without ecological burning Bayside would be at a significant risk of losing our remaining heathland vegetation,” the mayor Cr Louise Cooper-Shaw said.

She said sufficient evidence had been pre-sented to support ecological burns “and that the benefits are significant for local natural biodi-versity”.

DESPITE wanting to pull out of the childcare business altogether, Bayside Council has decid-ed to “invest” $1.3 million upgrading its centres in Sandringham and Hampton.

The number of places will increase by 48 and the centres will be operated under a 30-year lease Bambini Juniors Pty Ltd, which already runs two child care centres in Bayside.

“Their proposal will result in fees increas-ing from the 2012/13 proposed council fee of $107.75 to $120,” the mayor Cr Louise Cooper-Shaw stated.

“However, the increased fees will be reflected in the standard of the facilities that will be sub-stantially improved by the proposed upgrades to both facilities.”

In a news release council said the centres “re-

quire significant investment and modification to meet new national standards”.

“Council decided not to continue as a direct provider of childcare services in the context of significant, competing budgetary pressures in the provision of family and children’s services and the availability of sufficient, sustainable childcare in Bayside.

“Contributing factors included the ageing fa-cilities, increased costs associated with chang-ing regulations and reducing financial viability.

“Council is a very small provider of local childcare and these factors prompted council to conclude its resources would be best used meet-ing other community demands for services and facilities.”

Bambini Juniors takes over in January 2013.

Contractor takes over childcare

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To advertise in The Citizen call Grada on 0432 224 172 gradawel@hotmail.com Editorial to keithplatt48@gmail.com

MANY buildings in Hampton St, Hampton, are being decorated for all the wrong reasons.Graffiti has been daubed on walls and doors, both facing the street and at the rear.

In some places the graffiti is clearly visible from trains and provides an unsightly first view of Hampton for alighting passengers.

While Bayside Council’s graffiti management plan provides free removal kits to the public, council staff will only be sent out to clean public property.

Acting director of city strategy Stephen Thorpe said council had this year budgeted $120,000 to remove graffiti from council buildings with another $40,000 targeted to clean up “other public places”.

Mr Thorpe said council was supporting Victoria Police in developing a system for using smart phones to make reporting graffiti “faster and easier for the community”.

Cr Felicity Frederico said prompt removal of graffiti was a deterrent “as it signals that graffiti is not tolerated in that area”.

The mayor Cr Louise Cooper-Shaw said no graffiti in Hampton St had been reported to council and she was “curious to see where it might be”.

Cr Cooper-Shaw said “first time” graffiti would be removed free by council from private property.

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Clean-up time

Market stays putHAMPTON Rotary Club has been given the go ahead to run its monthly farmers’ market while waiting for three-year licence from the Depart-ment of Sustainability and Environment.

The market has been running at Trey Bit Re-serve, Sandringham, since May 2011.

The market’s 50 stalls draws 1500-2000 cus-tomers a month and has enabled Rotary to hand $27,412 to charities.

Councillors on callCR JAMES Long last year spent more money on council-funded phone calls than any of his six colleagues.

Figures produced at council’s 17 July meet-ing showed Cr Long ran up a $2923 phone bill, including $1761 for his mobile phone.

The next highest bill came from Cr Felicity Fredrico with $2259 (mobile $1869), with Cr Alex del Porto, $2033 (mobile $1555) third.

Cr Simon Russell spent $1871 on phone calls, Cr Michael Norris $$1357, Cr Clifford Hayes $1259 and the mayor, Cr Louise Cooper-Shaw $1058.

In the same time span Cr Del Porto received $2421 for car mileage claims, Cr Frederico $890 and Cr Norris $476.

GREY Fantails, also known as ‘mad fans’, come closer to homes during winter and are exciting guests to have in your backyard.

“Grey fantails, closely related to willie wag-tails, madly dive-bomb about the garden chasing after flying insects,” Susanna Bradshaw, CEO of the Foundation for National Parks and Wildlife said. “They twist, turn and roll like a gymnast to catch their prey mid-air. These aerial acrobats hardly stay in one spot for long.

“Insect-eating birds like the grey fantail are great to have in your garden because they will keep your bug numbers under control. They will eat up your wasps, flies, bees, flying ants, beetles, dragonflies—whatever they can catch. They’re fun to watch and, best of all, their pest control service is absolutely free.”

Ms Bradshaw said August was the month grey fantails changed pace “just enough to find a mate”.

They will build a curiously shaped nest that looks a bit like a wine glass without the base, and raise two to four chicks.

“Grey fantails are quite inquisitive birds and

Winter’s fine for backyard fan

very fearless. If you try to mimic their calls by going ‘chip, chip, chip, chip, chip, chip’ you may find a grey fantail gets very curious and comes closer to investigate. They are also appar-ently attracted by kissing sounds or humming,” Ms Bradshaw said.

“You may see a lot of bigger birds such as honeyeaters and magpies around your place, but not as many smaller birds. Larger, more aggres-sive birds may try to drive other birds out of their territories. While this is normal behaviour, sub-urban gardens with their lawns and open spaces give these bigger birds an unfair advantage.”

Ms Bradshaw smaller birds like the grey fan-tail could be encouraged in backyards by:n Including plants of different heights and

densities, including an understory and some spikey bushes for them to hide in.n Think about plants that can provide birds

with shelter and somewhere to nest—and not just about plants that provide food.n Place a small bird bath next to a dense

bush. This will provide shelter for the bird from the wind and also from predators.n Avoid using chemicals, pesticides or bug

zappers in your garden as insects are the only source of food for grey fantails.n Keep cats or install a cat run so your pet

can go outside without attacking any native birds.

Picture: Lip Kee Yap