Albany council votes to pause National Heritage List push until bicentenary

The City of Albany council has voted to pause a push for the city to be included on Australia’s National Heritage List until Albany’s 2026 bicentenary. In July 2020, Deputy Mayor Sandie Smith secured the support of councillors to request the chief executive to investigate the “process of nominating the City of Albany or precincts within Albany” for inclusion on the National Heritage List. Under the plan, Albany could become the second Australian city to be included in the list after Broken Hill in NSW. The list includes natural, historic and Indigenous places of “outstanding significance to the nation”. There are 17 national heritage-listed locations in WA, including the Fitzgerald River National Park between Albany and Esperance. More than a year after the request, an officer’s report advised councillors the City was “not in a position to consider nomination” as it could result in “significant cost and dedicated resources potentially wasted”. According to the report, the process of compiling a National Heritage List nomination submission could take up to 18 months and would be a “substantial project, involving dedication of significant resources and budget at an organisation-wide level”. It would require a similar scale of community consultation and engagement as the 2026 Albany bicentenary project already under way, according to the report. Councillors agreed 11-1, with Cr Chris Thomson voting against, to put the nomination process on hold but request the chief executive to reconsider the nomination towards the end of the 2026 bicentenary project. Speaking for the motion, Cr Malcolm Traill said he wanted to keep the national heritage listing “on the agenda” throughout the bicentenary planning. “I think we agreed that National Heritage Listing is worth pursuing and this recommendation simply agrees to put it on hold for a little while,” he said. “The point of delaying it is not setting us up for failure.”