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Lancelin residents are taking their fight to Perth in the hope of saving their town from coastal erosion.
About 80 residents will make their way to Forrest Place on Thursday to take part in a rally to raise more awareness and support for their town.
The coastal erosion in Lancelin as of June 27.9 News Perth
“There’s been an evolving, serious, and rapidly progressing erosion situation in the town of Lancelin, which has reached crisis point,” resident Kirsty Harding said.
“There’s now a very small section of sand dune holding back the ocean from one property currently, but also that sand dune is acting as a dam wall, really, to the entire town, which has a lot of low-lying land below sea level.
“So there are a lot of homes and businesses and people’s livelihoods at stake. And despite this situation being known about, and having been progressing over some time, the state and local governments have not acted effectively or intervened effectively, and we’re now at crisis point.”
About 50 metres of dune have eroded over the past 12 months, despite a sand re-nourishment attempt around a year ago.
Now, Harding says the townsfolk are at breaking point and ready to bring their message straight to government officials.
“We’ve kindly been donated a coach … and we’ll be boarding that early in the morning in Lancelin. We’ve got a really broad representative group of the community on board. So we’ve got everyone from age seven to age 80 coming on the coach,” she said.
“We have just over 40 people on the coach, but 80 people coming all up.
“It will be a peaceful demonstration because that’s what the community of Lancelin is all about, to spread the word that [we are] asking for a solution, and we need it now.”
Last month, Lancelin Sand Hotel owner Glen Trebilcock told 9News Perth the coastline was within 10 metres of his property.
“It’s about seven and a half to eight metres away. We lost five metres overnight, and she’s getting close,” he said.
“It’s something that is a very, very grave concern.”
Shire of Gingin president Linda Balcombe also told 9News Perth that the local council was advocating for state government support.
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Locals have created a GoFundMe page to raise money to build a seawall. The goal is to reach $150,000 and the page currently has $97,565 in donations so far.
Harding hopes the rally, which will begin at 11am, will help to show people how dire the situation is in Lancelin.
“Lancelin has been ignored on this for a long time to get to this critical point, and we were desperate to be heard for fear that our town would be inundated, and properties and businesses washed away by the ocean,” she said.
“We attempted to draw the attention of government, and recently, we are very grateful that [Planning and Lands Minister] John Carey did come to Lancelin to have a look, but he was the first member of the state government to come and actually have a look at the situation,” she said.
As for what she’d like those in power to do about the growing issue, Harding says it’s all about protection.
“We’d like them to, in a timely manner, given the urgency of the situation, use their expertise and their resources to devise a long-term engineered solution to this erosion crisis that protects the town, protects the people, their properties, and their livelihoods and their businesses,” she said.
Lancelin locals will depart Perth immediately after the rally – which will run for about an hour – with a representative group left behind to meet with Carey later that day.
Carey said the meeting would help to continue support for the struggling community.
“I recently visited Lancelin because I wanted to see the coastal erosion issue firsthand and meet with those directly impacted,” he said.
“[Thursday’s] meeting is a further opportunity to hear from members of the Lancelin community as we continue to support the Shire of Gingin on interim and longer-term responses.”
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