Tango with a twist

“KIM, as the old saying goes, it takes two to tango. Shall we dance? Regards Bob”.
This was the response by the late City of Karratha planning services director Robert Sharkey to Norwest Sand & Gravel director Kim North’s concerns over delays on several mining applications in Karratha and Wickham.
As reported by StreetWise (‘Pilbara miner pushes back’, July 8), Mr North and Mr Sharkey’s relationship went south after a heated meeting in 1999 when he refused to withdraw his Sam’s Creek leases near Point Samson.
Two years later, NWSG approached Mr Sharkey for approvals to establish a temporary workers’ camp at Wickham, only to be told council would not approve it unless it included disabled access. This seemed odd given the few dongas would house contractors handling heavy machinery, trucks, bulldozers and diggers.
The issue remained unresolved for nearly a decade, Mr Sharkey and council staff refusing to engage with or reply to repeated requests by NWSG for information about its lease applications. The delay cost the family run company hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost work, legal fees and consultancies.
By January 2008, Mr North and Mr Sharkey were facing off in the Warden’s Court over another council objection over a NWSG application to build a new road to its main sand storage and supply site in Wickham.
After a dressing down by the Warden for his behaviour in court, Mr Sharkey wrote to Mr North the following month, “had you sought the required approvals for all the activities that you wished to undertake over the past four to five years, rather than proceeding regardless, that most of those activities would have been approved … Kim, as the old saying goes, it takes two to tango. Shall we dance? Regards Bob”.
The Mining Warden’s decision to approve without conditions NWSG’s access road was delivered on December 1, 2008. In her judgement, Warden Vivian Campione stated: “The Objector (Shire of Roebourne) made bold assertions in opposition to the tenements and its arguments were not developed. In fact, the Objector’s representative positively confirmed that non-compliance was not a ground of objection.”
Two weeks later, despite the Warden’s decision, Mr North said Mr Sharkey with the support of Crs John Lally and Nicole Lockwood convinced elected members at the December 15, 2008, council meeting to introduce extraordinary new conditions in which it could at any time resume the road reserve without compensation to NWSG.
For the next two years, Mr North complained to council it was in contempt of the Warden’s findings and that the conditions were based on what he claims was a false petition engineered by executive staff and councillors to cause NWSG financial damage and delay.
This is one of the reasons NWSG has submitted its allegations of misconduct at the City of Karratha to the WA parliamentary select committee on local government (‘Trouble in WA’s engine room’, July 7).

Dodgy

NWSG operates from two blocks in Wilson Way, Wickham, the one-way street consisting of a handful of land owners and residents including Eureka Industries Pty Ltd.
On December 15, 2008, just two weeks after the Warden’s Court handed down its decision overturning the City’s objections to NWSG’s proposed road, Mr Sharkey not only ignored the Warden’s findings, he presented to council (and Mr North who attended the meeting), a petition opposed to NWSG’s activities on Wilson Way because it supposedly would cause dust, noise and environmental problems. Mr North said this was untrue nor have any residents ever complained to NWSG.
The petition was compiled by Eureka Industries after Cr Lally visited Wilson Way (miles from his Dampier ward) where, for a few hours, he reportedly spoke to residents including Eureka Industries, but not NWSG. Signatures were collected by Eureka on the premise that NWSG’s proposed expansion would threaten their boundaries, which Mr North says also was untrue.
Eureka director Joe Hofstee, who has lived in Wickham for 25 years, told StreetWise today he organised the petition because of his concerns over dust, which he says is still a problem when NWSG’s heavy vehicles enter and exit its Wilson Way properties.
“I went down and seen the residents and told them if NWSG gets this up and running … all of a sudden we have a sand mine at the back of our properties,” he said. “How can we run a business when he (Mr North) has open slather?”
Mr Sharkey wrote to Mr North after Mr Hofstee delivered the petition on the day of the council meeting: “I am finalising some information and comments concerning (the road), which will be distributed to Councillors and members of the public at tonight’s meeting.”
This included the Eureka petition, to which was stapled a two-page brief by Mr Sharkey, ‘Update on Mining Tenement Applications Wickham Township’, opposing NWSG’s activities at Sam’s Creek.
The next day, Mr North emailed Mr Sharkey: “Nice ambush. Last night at the meeting you stated that you have been tolerating me. Quite frankly Bob, it is you who will not work with me to get these issues resolved.”
StreetWise has obtained a copy of the Eureka petition and the attached two-page brief which Mr Sharkey presented to councillors. Last year, as part of a company review into its lease holdings, NWSG applied under FOI for documents including the Eureka petition and Mr Sharkey’s mining ‘Update’.
The City has released a copy of the petition, but could not find the ‘Update’. NWSG’s original 2008 copy includes Mr Sharkey’s name as the receiving officer and the document identification number, both of which have been concealed in white-out, not redacted in standard black boxes.
The City refused to say under internal review why it used both methods to conceal private details on the petition. The FOI Act stipulates using a black marker pen or correction fluid, not both and not on the same page.
CEO Chris Adams, who conducted the internal review, and the Office of the Information Commissioner, which conducted an external review, could not say why the City removed Mr Sharkey’s name and the ID number which is important when locating documents requested under FOI.
Mr North says Mr Sharkey’s ‘Update’ also is important because in its brief reference to the Wardens Court hearing, Mr Sharkey states regardless of the Warden’s decision: “In my view, the circumstances surrounding this application remain unchanged.”
Mr North says he raised the matter of contempt with Cr Lockwood and former director of development, regulatory & infrastructure services David Pentz.
It was not until 2010 that council removed the surrender conditions, Mr Pentz stating: “The reason for the Shire to amend its objection, seeking the ‘surrender without compensation’ of the road to the Shire through the introduction of a conditional surrender agreement is, ‘unclear and undocumented’.”
The dragged-out saga cost NWSG years of costly delays and unnecessary court actions, the company eventually proceeding with the new road but abandoning plans to expand its operations on Wilson Way.

Tomorrow: CCC on local governance in the Pilbara