The Sutherland Shire Council has recently published Draft Overland Flood Maps on their webpage. Council has acknowledged that these maps are based on the most conservative approach to tagging properties susceptible to overland flooding .

Council has also acknowledged that Councillors were unaware that the broader range of filtering parameters were available and that they were also unaware that they could determine the filters used for the Study.

The Mayoral Minute, dated the 11th December 2023, committed to change the freeboard from .5 to .3, hold an URGENT briefing for Councillors to INFORM them of the full range of AVAILABLE settings to achieve the LOWEST number of affected lots and ENSURE that comprehensive modelling using the FULL range of possible filtering parameters and settings is used to reach FINAL settings that ACHIEVE BALANCED MANAGEMENT of substantially material risk, subject to concurrence with Dept of Planning and Environment.

This approach meets community expectations.

it appears that the trajectory of the Draft Overland Flood Study is that these actions will not be delivered before the end of the extended public consultation period on the 31st March 2024.
It is unclear WHEN the community will be advised of the outcome of  application of these less conservative filtering parameters and the .3 freeboard, for the updated and final version of the Draft Overland Flood Maps.

A significant factor in the overwhelming community angst and concern is that these current maps, based on conservative filters, are publicly available on Sutherland Shire Councils webpage.

There have been concerns  regarding significant increases in home insurance policy renewals, since publication of these Draft Overland Flood Maps, for properties with no previous history of overland flooding and which may possibly be excluded from the Study by the application of less conservative filters.

There are also concerns about disruptions to sales of properties, based on information from these conservative flood maps.

As a result, members of the Sutherland Shire community who have been adversely affected by publication of these Draft Overland Flood Maps are requesting then following action from Council at the March 2024 Council meeting.

That the current Draft Overland Flood Maps are removed from Council’s website until they can be replaced with the updated version, following applicable of the less conservative ,broader range of filtering parameters and a robust governance process.

That there is a notification to that effect on the Sutherland Shire Council webpage.

That Sutherland Shire Council notifies the Insurance Council of Australia that the maps published in October 2023, have been removed and are under review following application of broader, less conservative filtering parameters and a robust governance process.

We urge the Sutherland Shire Council to act by removing these maps from their website until they can provide an updated version with more accurate data. This action will ensure transparency and maintain trust between the council and its community.

Please sign this petition if you believe in accurate information dissemination for better decision-making processes in our community.