I read it in the newspaper so it must be true

Another old draft post completed. 

There is a Melbourne local government area called Glen Eira. It is one of Melbourne's expensive south eastern suburbs and a rather nice area to live. It has a high Jewish population and in some parts a high Indian immigrant population. 

Long have I known it has the least amount of parkland of any local government area in Greater Melbourne, however unlike Melbourne's western  and north western suburbs, it in common with most of the inner to middle eastern to south eastern suburbs, had good tree cover, known as one of the 'leafy green suburbs'.  

Truly disturbing, there has been a reduction of of tree canopy covering in the local government area of roughly, between 2010 and 2020, half. Like 50%. No doubt this is a result of older houses with large gardens and trees, being demolished and the resulting blocks of land covered with housing and paving, almost edge to edge, without room for large trees. 

Yes, we need higher density in these spacious areas to cater for population growth, rather than expanding the outer areas, but it really needs to better managed. Many free standing houses fit for a family are demolished for luxury apartments for wealthy older downsizers and cashed up Asian immigrants. The area of land probably houses no more people, in spite of the land being covered over and trees cut down. 

As long as historic areas are respected, the state government is doing the right thing with higher rise buildings near train stations. But allowing tree cover to be so reduced is not the right thing. This also applies to City of Stonnington, City of Boroondara and a couple of other local areas too.  

Very local newspapers

When a member of our building Owners' Corporation committee I arranged for all three local newspapers to be delivered as pick ups in our mail room. In time deliveries all ceased as local newspapers closed down, even the most read Murdoch paper. There were no electronic replacements.

No one in my council area receives any kind of local council news unless they search City of Port Phillip. This is just terrible. In a city with so many rebellious people, not one can write an online reporting of what council is up to, never mind other local matters. Good things happen in our council area too, and these also need to be reported. 

I was absolutely flabbergasted when a comment by Yorkshire Pudding led me to discover we have new mayor in City of Port Phillip, another pro business mayor. But I went from being astonished at my lack of knowledge to not being surprised, as how would I know? Unless I actively search out such information, I won't know unless I hear about it on the radio or read it in a daily paper.

This is a very bad state for local democracy.