Jeff Pudwell

2014 candidate for City of Unley.
Heritage survey responses.

1. What do you think Council's role is in protecting and conserving heritage?
   Heritage can be one of the features that makes a suburb unique and gives it its character. It is the responsibility of the council to protect and maintain this heritage by not only supporting its residents to renovate and restore but also to ensure that any new development is sensitive to the area and enhances its surroundings.

2. What measures and incentives do you support to protect and conserve local heritage?
   Residents need to be supported and encouraged to restore homes and gardens to maintain the era in which the home was built. Councils can also support this by ensuring that street-scapes are well maintained and looked after. Council planning guidelines must ensure new development or renovations blend in with existing heritage homes in both design and material. A potential way to support conservation of local heritage would be for the council to provide access to a specialist with knowledge on heritage renovation and garden design who could support residents.

3. What is the most important heritage protection issue in your local government area?
   The major issues in our area is the threat of high density living and the ease of which heritage homes can be demolished to allow modern dwellings.

4. What policies and programs will you advocate to protect and conserve heritage in your local area?
   Council must set building guidelines that preserve the majority of character homes and buildings in the area. There should be strict guidelines for the types of homes that are acceptable to be built in the area, including facades that are architecturally designed to fit in with surrounding homes.

5. Do you support local Councils retaining development approval powers for projects over $3m in value?
   Yes, local councils need to maintain control over these developments, providing the council does not abuse this power to facilitate their own agenda. This will ensure that issues such as overshadowing, parking and usage types are strictly controlled and monitored, protecting the character of the surrounding suburbs and taking residents interests into account. Furthermore, it is well known that the state government has proposed the need for high density living within 1km of Adelaide's park lands. If approval does not remain within the local council's control, the state government could approve developments which are not sensitive and have negative impacts within the suburb and on its residents.

6. Do you have any other thoughts about the protection of heritage in your Council area?
   It is a major concern that old homes are being demolished and replaced with modern designs. It is understandable where a house is in a condemned state that restoration may not be feasible, however it is possible to build new homes that maintain an external heritage style while still enabling owners to have the modern interior they desire. This helps to maintain the overall character of a suburb as character is obtained from the density of heritage homes.