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Residents in Sydney’s east have been shut out of a school oval they have freely used for more than six decades after the NSW Department of Education demanded almost $600,000 from ratepayers to restore public access.
The dispute over the Rose Bay Secondary College grounds has erupted into a political and community turf war, with Waverley Council accusing the department of using Yes Minister tactics to price the public out of land long treated as a community playing field.
At the centre of the stand-off is a 3000-square-metre playing field on the campus grounds, used by generations of residents outside school hours for exercise, dog walking and recreation in one of Sydney’s most densely populated suburbs.
Last month, the department sealed the grounds and erected permanent two-metre fencing, ending years of unrestricted public access.
It has since told the council the gates would only reopen if the council entered into a formal joint-use agreement requiring it to pay $585,000 to bankroll further fencing, gates and field upgrades, plus ongoing maintenance, cleaning and security costs, estimated at $90,000 annually.
Department documents cited student safety, vandalism, littering, trespassing and wear on the playing fields as primary reasons for the increased security measures.
Mayor Will Nemesh said the terms of the agreement were difficult to justify at a time when public recreational space in the eastern suburbs was increasingly in demand.
Councillor Steven Lewis accused the department of designing a deal no council could accept.
“It’s a hit job straight out of the Yes Minister playbook,” he said.
“The best way to kill a project is to make it too expensive. To ask the council to pay almost $600,000 just to allow public access that was continuous until recently is deliberate, knowing no council could ever agree to it.”
In a statement, the Department of Education did not address the financial terms of the proposal but said it remained committed to “unlocking extra green space outside of school hours to share with the community” and confirmed discussions with the council were continuing.
Locals have rejected suggestions the community poses a security or vandalism threat to the school. Resident Robert Kantor said the field had long been part of daily family life.
“Many other schools in Sydney open their gates to the public outside school hours for the community to use – why is this one being locked up?” he said.
“For years, the kids would go on the fields with pool noodles, kick a football around and throw homemade boomerangs, and it was a safe place where neighbours met each other.
“How that represents some kind of security threat is beyond me.”
Across Sydney, more than 100 public schools are open for community use outside school hours, providing public recreational space on existing public infrastructure.
The department’s proposed arrangement for Rose Bay is similar to agreements entered into with other councils or community groups, which often include licence fees or “in-kind maintenance contributions” to support public access to school grounds.
Waverley Council is seeking urgent talks with Education Minister Prue Car to discuss the matter.
North Bondi Residents Action Group member Samuel Reuben is hopeful a resolution can be found.
“We aren’t asking for access during school hours, just what we had for 60 years.”
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David Barwell is an urban affairs reporter for The Sydney Morning HeraldConnect via email.From our partners
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