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May 13, 2009
The fuss and bother over a proposed Muslim college in Camden last year was a spectacular media event. The people of Camden really know how to do outrage. The residents of Carrara on the Gold Coast, not so much.
The proposed Gold Coast Islamic College, to house 60 students at Chisholm Rd, Carrara, made headlines late last year when hundreds of protesters stormed the city's council chambers shouting Australian slogans while boom boxes blared out Oz rock classics.
The project has attracted more than 1000 objections, with only 67 written submissions in support of the school, even though Mayor Ron Clarke said it was just as important to cater for the needs of minority groups as for the masses.
Despite the immense power of Cold Chisel and Australian Crawl singles boom boxed up to 11, the council approved the school.
Bits and pieces have been turning up in local media since then, but nothing terribly substantial.
The free local Gold Coast Sun [not online] has been fairly neutral on the topic, sticking to straight, regular, reporting on developments. Hooray for you, Ed Earl, reporter worthy of the title.
This week, Ed reports that council planners are imposing conditions on the school, seeing as how it's being built in a residential area. A lot like the school not a stone's throw from my house. In a residential area. With residents and houses, and not factories and office buildings and shopping centres.
Unfortunately, Ed doesn't spell out all of the conditions, but they appear to include:
the college also had to give up 30 percent of its land and was forced to build a 200m footpath just to get a green light.
None of which tells us very much. Other conditions are operating conditions which will effect the school's capacity to function like other schools:
These conditions include restricting operating hours to between 8am and 3.05pm, as well as a requirement for council to be given 30 days notice for every after-school function.
No after school care, then. Or after school detention. Or parent-teacher nights. Or after school sports training. Or school plays or fetes or school dances or P and C meetings or band practice or on-site professional development. Or any of the other things schools routinely do in residential areas.
Council planning boss Ted Shepherd conceded the conditions placed on the Islamic school - relating to hours of operation - were not applicable for every school on the Coast.
According to Keysar Trad they're not applicable for any other school on the Coast.
Cr Shepherd said the conditions were introduced because it was in a residential area, and religion did not play a part.
So it's all above board and perfectly reasonable.
The school, given a green light from the Gold Coast City Council in February, was the subject of a series of protests after some Carrara residents claimed it would put them at risk of terrorism.
Out of school hours terrorism in residential areas is just not acceptable. We already have enough to deal with, what with Lamington drives and 3.30pm tennis lessons.
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hmm,
on the surface it looks as if Queensland has thrown off its redneck image and embraced multiculturalism, but the conditions set in place by the Gold Coast Council indicate otherwise.
Why did it have to give up 30% of its land? To reduce the possibility of kids being trained as terrorists to bomb the iconic tourist sites?