Proposed Amendments to the EPA Act
On 24 October 2012 the Environmental Planning and Assessment Amendment Bill 2012 (Bill) was introduced into the NSW Legislative Assembly.
The Bill proposes a number of amendments to the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (EPA Act).
Amongst the proposed changes are amendments relating to the purpose and status of development control plans, including an amendment to s79C of the EPA Act which aims to clarify how development control plans should taken into account in the development assessment process. The Explanatory Note indicates:
[The Bill] clarifies how development control plans are to be taken into account
during the development assessment process. In particular, to ensure that they are
given less weight and significance than environmental planning instruments and that they are applied flexibly so as to allow alternative solutions to how permissible
development may be carried out.
Amendments are also proposed to the EPA Act concerning copyright in documents that are used for the purposes of the EPA Act.
The Bill relates covers other areas including:
- review of the designation of bushfire prone land,
- new provisions in relation to development of “paper subdivisions”,
- development contributions for complying development.
More detail to follow.
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