New Curdies River Consultative Committee to hold first meeting

Barb Mullen, one of six community members appointed to the Curdies River Consultative Committee along with Marg O'Toole, Catherine Bell, Dean Drayton, Debbie Dalziel and Ron Irvine, said she hoped the new group heralded meaningful action in the Curdies.

"There has been consistent obfuscation and buck passing by the authorities on the Curdies," Ms Mullen said. "I'm looking forward to the first meeting."

The new committee will be led by the Corangamite Catchment Management Authority, with representatives from Eastern Maar Aboriginal Corporation, Agriculture Victoria, WestVic Dairy, Wannon Water, Parks Victoria, Environment Protection Authority Victoria, Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, Corangamite and Moyne Shire Councils, and Heytesbury District Landcare Network.

The creation of a coordinating committee run by the CCMA was the highest priority recommendation from a 2008 Curdies Estuary Management Plan, but a committee was never created.

CCMA chief executive John Riddiford said there had been "fantastic" community interest in the group, which would oversee all action, research and monitoring in the Curdies catchment.

Mr Riddiford said one of the key functions of the group would be to "support collaboration" and "provide clarity across agencies and community" on roles and responsibilities in the catchment.

Ms Mullen said she welcomed greater clarity, arguing local trust in the authorities was at its nadir.

"When you've got members of our community going to the personal cost of getting independent water testing done because they don't trust the agencies to tell us the truth, it shows something's wrong," she said.

Ms Mullen is also the chair of the newly formed Curdies River Catchment Alliance, a purely local group created to campaign for more action to save the river. She said the group hoped to adopt a constitution in coming months so it could "get on with the real stuff".

"What we want to do is reach agreement on the source of the problem, and what needs to be done to fix it," she said.

"The causes are pollution with sewage and fertiliser. But there's already so much nutrient in the sediment that there would be blue green algae outbreaks even without more pollution getting in."

Concerned locals launched a petition in June, sponsored by Member for Polwarth Richard Riordan, calling for "relevant ministers" to urgently create a "Remediation Action Plan" to lock in timelines, targets and funding for action to save the river. The petition closes on August 12.

The Standard understands the EPA is auditing 450 farms throughout the catchment and has checked 25 so far, finding two "non-compliant" with regulations.

"It's so depressing to know you can't go near the river, let alone dealing with the stink," Ms Mullen said.

"We want change and we want the change to be effective."

UPDATED - Monday

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