Tallow Beach, Tallow Creek, Broken Head Beach, Whites Beach, Belongil Creek… Council wants to know what you value about these areas and invites the community to share their thoughts on management issues via an online survey.
These areas are all part of a Scoping Study being developed as part of a Coastal Management Program (CMP) for the southern coastline of Byron Shire including the Belongil Creek catchment which includes the Cumbebin Swamp.
The Coastal Management Program will be a long-term strategy that focuses on the management of the coastal zone taking into account what people value about the beaches, estuaries and coastal areas, what issues are important, current and future threats to the natural environment and how to ensure they are maintained and protected well into the future.
Orla Seccull, Council's Coastal and Estuary Officer, said the study is the first of several stages in developing a CMP.
"As the coastal parts of NSW, the Byron Shire included, get busier and more populated, the job of managing these areas, in conjunction with agencies such as the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) and Crown Lands, becomes even more important," Ms Seccull said.
The areas included in the scoping study for the Byron Shire's southern coastline include:
- Belongil Creek estuary and catchment
- Cape Byron Headland Reserve
- Tallow Beach
- Tallow Creek estuary and catchment
- Suffolk Park Beach
- Broken Head Beach
- Broken Head Nature Reserve
- Kings Beach
- Whites Beach
- Brays Beach
- Seven Mile Beach
The Belongil Creek estuary and catchment are included in this study as the creek opens periodically to the ocean, similar to the Tallow Creek estuary and they share some of the same management and environmental issues.
The aim of the survey is to understand the community's environmental, cultural, recreational and economic values for the study area, and what the community considers are the threats, conflicts and management issues surrounding those values.
"When the survey closes, the information will used in a risk assessment to identify the key management issues, whether any additional studies are required to fill knowledge gaps, and to develop a forward program for preparing the future stages of the CMP.
Further community engagement will take place during the development of management actions at a later stage of preparing the CMP," Ms Seccull said.
Council has already prepared and adopted a Scoping Study for Cape Byron to South Golden Beach and will also prepare one for the Brunswick River estuary in the future.
The survey is on the Your Say Byron Shire website and is open until 1 February 2021.
