Feature Image: A Mont Albert property excluded from the proposed Whitehorse Planning Scheme amendment. Source: Whitehorse Heritage Review, 2024.

The National Trust has written to Whitehorse Councillors urging them to reverse a decision to remove more than 40 places recommended for local heritage protection from a proposed planning scheme amendment due to untested owner objections received as part of an ordinary Council meeting. At its Meeting on 1 June 2026, Whitehorse Council resolved to exclude these places, which had not been reviewed by planning officers, from the Heritage Overlay amendment before the amendment had been publicly exhibited, effectively removing them from the formal consultation process and denying a fair process for all affected and interested parties.

Under the Planning and Environment Act 1987, Council is required to ensure the conservation of places of heritage significance within its municipality. The Draft City of Whitehorse Heritage Review 2024 recommends 47 individual places, and five precincts and group listings for local heritage significance. At an earlier Council Meeting on 16 March 2026, Council deferred adoption of the Review and resolved to notify affected landowners before seeking authorisation from the Minister for Planning to prepare and exhibit a Heritage Overlay amendment, which is the next step in process for protecting locally significant heritage places.

Owners and occupiers of properties identified in the Heritage Review were notified in early May. We understand that, prior to the matter returning to Council consideration in June, a Councillor also contacted affected property owners directly regarding the Heritage Review. In the intervening period, Council received a significant number of objections and five of the identified heritage places were demolished. Councillors subsequently resolved to remove those demolished places, along with all other properties that had attracted objections, from the proposed Heritage Overlay amendment.

Our letter to Council submits that objections from property owners outside of due planning process, is not a valid or equitable reason to exclude a recommended place from the proposed Planning Scheme Amendment process, and that removing these places from the amendment in this way, denies other affected parties the opportunity to have their views heard through the proper statutory process.

Additionally, much of the opposition to the Whitehorse Heritage Review’s recommendations appears to be based on common misconceptions about what a Heritage Overlay does and does not do. The National Trust has developed a range of evidence-based resources to address such myths regarding local heritage protections and explain the purpose and operation of local heritage protections. We have provided these resources to Councillors and urged them to make decisions consistent with their statutory responsibilities and the independent evidence before them, rather than allowing misconceptions to influence the decision-making process and thereby contribute to the spread of misinformation and unnecessary fear.

We recognise that progressing a heritage amendment in the face of organised owner opposition requires political courage, but we encourage the Whitehorse City Council to support the expertise and the experience of its own planning officers and reinstate all recommended places that have not yet been lost into the proposed Heritage Overlay amendment.

Council’s obligations extend to the whole municipality, and excluding these places from the amendment removes the wider community’s opportunity to have its say through the proper public process.

Read our letter to Whitehorse City Council here.