Community councils in Canberra's older inner suburbs say they are more active building regulators than planning authorities who are reluctant to discourage developers.
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The ACT government relies on private certifiers to decide if knock-down rebuild projects are exempt from development applications.
Community councils say a conflict of interest arises because developers pay the certifiers.
When Mike Hettinger delved into a three-level development in O'Connor he found the planning authority had little record of what was going on. Mr Hettinger, vice-president of the Canberra North Community Council, sought under freedom of information how many developments were being audited.
He discovered certifiers, not developments, were audited, but he couldn't find out how many.
''In other words, the so -called regulator is not doing a lot of regulating,'' he said.
The size of the multi-level O'Connor home went beyond the building envelope and inspectors issued a stop work order. A retrospective development application was advertised, drawing 18 objections.
''ACTPLA said it was still OK. I guess they did not want to have egg on their face.''
When planning laws were amended to allow exempt developments in greenfield sites there was little discussion, but the scope widened to include knock-down re-builds in existing suburbs.
''That's the big difference,'' Mr Hettinger said. ''The community council was told that it was to ensure work went through quickly to attract funding under the federal government's stimulus package.
''But it's gone beyond justification for stimulus package.''
Griffith/Narrabundah Community Council president David Denham said the council was concerned that Territory and Municipal Services, which looked after verges and street trees, was not informed about knock-down rebuilds and could not ensure trees were protected.
The council did not know the extent of non-compliance because some knock-down rebuilds complied, while others didn't.