THE City of Gosnells council has disallowed a development application for a telecommunications tower submitted in the name of the mayor’s 14-year-old daughter.
The application for the 30m lattice telecommunications tower at 45 Douglas Rd in Martin was submitted by Mayor Glenn Dewhurst in his daughter’s name.
Mayor Dewhurst said he had submitted the application before he was elected mayor and had used his daughter’s name to help build her online profile.
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READ NOW“Employment agencies are actually having a look at social media and the internet about employees, that’s the only reason her name was on the application,” he said.
“If they Googled her name, they’d see she’d applied for this antenna.”
The City had referred the application to the City of Kalamunda, to make sure there were no perceptions of bias in the report.
Their report noted the proposal initially received five objections from neighbours upon its advertisement and received a further six objections and three non-objections when it was re-advertised.
Neighbour Kelsey Finny was one such objector and said the antenna would ruin the area’s amenity.
She asked the council to listen to the City of Kalamunda’s recommendation the application be refused as it did not comply with the Local Planning Policy for telecommunications infrastructure.
Mayor Dewhurst, Deputy Mayor Terresa Lynes and Councillors Ron Mitchell and Peter Griffiths left the council chambers during the discussion and vote due to a declared interest.
All six remaining councillors voted against the application.
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