A community of residents facing eviction have had their fight to keep their homes reignited after a change to the planning scheme by the state government in February.
These residents live in Techno Park, a tight-knit community in Melbourne’s industrial west. They’ve been fighting for their homes since the Hobsons Bay City council ordered their eviction last May, on the basis that the land is zoned for industrial use, meaning people cannot live there.
However, the amendment forces councils to acknowledge “existing use rights” after 15 years, stripping its power to extinguish these rights through an eviction notice. Techno Park has seen residential use as far back as the 1960s when it was a migrant hostel, before being sold to the private market as industrial land in the 1980s – however people remained in their homes, and have lived there ever since.
The council has paused the eviction until further notice, offering some respite for Techno Park. However, the council’s contradictory conduct has left the community feeling indignant.
“Like someone with a big piece of steel hit my head.”
Vincenzo Schirripa, a resident at Techno Park. The 76-year-old has lived at Techno Park for the last eight years with his wife. The below market rates offered at Techno Park allows him to live comfortably on his pension, but that security has now been threatened.
“We are getting into an age where we are vulnerable, any illness can come to us,” Mr Schirripa said.
“We cannot just leave as they want us to do.”
The council claims that residential use is unsafe at Techno Park due to the estate’s close proximity to the Mobil owned fuel tanks sitting beside the estate. However, the tanks were dismantled when Mobil closed its Altona Refinery in 2021, leaving them empty and in a safe state.
Techno Park residents raise this as just one example of the many inconsistent claims made by the council in regards to the situation.
“I can’t even tell you how frightening it was… it was like my world was falling apart.”
Techno Park resident Lara Week felt confusion and fear when she received the eviction letter.
“I originally just thought the council had made a really terrible mistake,” Ms Week said.
But when she attempted to contact the council with other residents, her fears were confirmed when the council said the eviction notice extinguished their existing use rights.
“When you have something as fundamental as the security of where you live shaken in that way, it impacts every part of your life.”
Ms Week also claimed the council was giving “entirely different responses” to different residents when they called, “depending on who they were”. One resident, a lawyer, was invited to discuss accommodations in person with senior council members, where others were “treated horribly”, Ms Week said.
The community banded together to form the Save Techno Park group to approach the council as a collective. However, the council rejected the group’s attempts to engage in talks, stating that it would only meet with residents individually.
Later in October, the council moved to ban all questions relating to Techno Park at council meetings, citing legal reasons – though it never explained what these legal reasons were.
“If a law is unjust and not fit for purpose, you change the law, you don’t change reality.”
Other councils have expressed support for the Techno Park community. Yarra City councillor Stephen Jolly drew upon Yarra City Council’s own rezoning situation, where the council invoked a special land overlay to allow residential use on industrial land.
“The council clearly had it wrong, so we just changed the planning scheme, we got it stamped for approval… and everything was fixed,” Cr Jolly said.
“If a law is unjust and not fit for purpose, you change the law, you don’t change reality.”
When the ABC sourced internal documents from the council on matters relating to Techno Park, the details contradicted the council’s claims. An internal memo from 2018 noted Mobil requested the council to “enforce the planning scheme” on residents at Techno Park, going against the council’s initial claim it only “recently was made aware” of residential use at Techno Park.
Also sourced by the ABC was a presentation titled “Operation Pegasus”, which residents believe is a reference to Mobil’s logo. The presentation was heavily redacted, however one slide titled “existing use rights” suggests the council was aware of Techno Park resident’s eligibility for such rights.
“Had the council really wanted to formalise the situation, they could’ve called to formalise residential rights. Instead, they tried to extinguish these rights,” Ms Week said.
“We are happy here.”
Despite the hardship, Techno Park’s community has only grown stronger. It’s clear that no matter what happens, the people of Techno Park will keep fighting.
“It’s not just a question of roofs over heads, people are embedded in the community,” Ms Week said.
“If you lose your home, you lose a lot more than just a physical place.”
