State Significant Developments ~ Better Planning Network

State Significant Developments ~ Better Planning Network

The Better Planning Network (BPN) is a network of local communities, organisations and individuals striving to achieve a better planning system for NSW. EcoNetwork Port Stephens is a member of the Better Planning Network. BPN’s platform is here.

Increasingly, our community is having to respond to State Significant Developments (SSDs), such as that at the d’Albora Marina Nelson Bay, the Nelson Bay’s Belvedere, now Bob’s Farm Sand Quarry and to come is Kings Hill Urban Release development.

BPN have put together a general submission guide to assist in considering various aspects of SSDs to help us with making comment for a submission.

It is not a submission in itself, more of a framework that you can use as a basis for your specific SSD details and localised concerns.

As always, to ensure your submissions are considered to be individual and not part of a form letter group, rather than copying and pasting, please use it as a guide only.

We hope the general submission guide is of assistance to you.

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Guide is attached here and is pasted below for your ease of perusal.

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NSW State Significant Development (SSD) General Submission Guide

1. Introduction

2. Overview of the NSW State Significant Development Framework

State Significant Development is governed primarily by the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 (NSW) and supporting planning instruments.

A development may be classified as SSD when it:

• Exceeds specified capital investment thresholds
• Is located in a sensitive environmental or strategic planning area
• Is identified in planning legislation as state-significant due to its scale or impact

Typical categories include:

• Energy generation facilities
• Mining and extractive industries
• Major manufacturing and industrial facilities
• Waste management infrastructure
• Large tourism and recreation developments
• Major residential or mixed-use developments.

SSD proposals are assessed by the NSW Department of Planning and may ultimately be determined by the Minister for Planning or the Independent Planning Commission rather than local councils.

Recent government policy has expanded the use of the SSD pathway to accelerate housing supply, with hundreds of proposals declared state-significant and potentially delivering more than 100,000 homes statewide.

While this expansion aims to address housing shortages, it also intensifies concerns regarding the centralisation of planning authority, the uncertainty associated with uncontrolled development, integrity of process and reduced local oversight.

3. Community Concerns

These typically emphasise:

3.1 Democratic Participation

Community participation in planning is a mandatory process under the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979 where councils and planning authorities must engage the public in land-use decisions. The active engagement and involvement of community in local planning helps planners and decision makers to make decisions that reflect what people value and need.

Planning decisions should reflect community knowledge, needs and participation, ensuring that residents meaningfully influence developments affecting their environment and quality of life.

3.2 Environmental Stewardship

Development must respect ecological constraints, protect biodiversity, and consider long-term environmental sustainability.

3.3 Social Justice

Planning systems should deliver equitable outcomes, including:

• affordable and social housing
• public infrastructure
• protection of vulnerable communities.

3.4 Transparency and Accountability

Decision-making processes must be transparent, with clear reasoning, accessible information, and mechanisms for independent review.

These principles provide a benchmark against which the current SSD system can be evaluated.

4. Democratic Participation and Community Rights 

4.1 Centralisation of Planning Authority

The SSD framework centralises decision-making within state government institutions rather than local councils. While this may speed up planning outcomes, it also:

• Reduces or negates council and community engagement
• Weakens local democratic oversight
• Reduces the input of communities directly affected by projects
• Overrides local planning controls

Local councils and community members may provide submissions during public exhibition periods, but they do not retain final decision-making authority. Community sovereignty in land-use decisions should not bypass local democratic structures.

4.2 Consultation Processes

The planning system requires public exhibition of SSD proposals and community submissions during assessment.

However, consultations for SSDs have several shortcomings:

• Consultation often occurs after key project parameters are established
• Technical documentation (e.g., Environmental Impact Statements) can be complex and inaccessible
•  Communities may have limited resources to analyse large proposals within short exhibition periods.Meaningful participation requires early, ongoing engagement rather than late-stage inadequate exhibition periods.

4.3 Community Consultative Committees

For approved projects, community consultative committees may be established to maintain communication between developers and local stakeholders.While valuable, these committees:

• operate after approval, limiting influence over initial project design
• primarily facilitate information sharing rather than decision-making.

Participatory governance mechanisms should be in place before approvals are granted, ensuring communities shape outcomes rather than merely reacting to them.

5. Environmental and Social Impact Governance 

5.1 Environmental Impact Assessment

SSD proposals require Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) and associated studies covering environmental, social, and economic impacts.These assessments must consider:

• environmental sustainability
• strategic planning policies
•  public interest.

However, community concerns have been raised regarding:

• lack of consideration of cumulative impacts across multiple developments
• lack of independent supporting studies and reliance on developer-funded studies
• perceived developer influence and political pressure to approve large projects.

Independent environmental oversight is therefore essential.

5.2 Cumulative and Regional Impacts

Large developments often occur in clusters (for example, energy infrastructure, mining regions, or urban growth corridors).

There is a need for cumulative impact assessments, evaluating how multiple developments interact across ecosystems, communities, and infrastructure networks.

Without this broader perspective, project-by-project assessment may underestimate long-term impacts.

5.3 Social Impact and Housing Equity

Recent SSD reforms emphasise accelerating housing approvals and facilitating construction. While increasing housing supply is essential, it is noted that:

• supply alone does not guarantee affordability
• large developments must include affordable and social housing provisions in perpetuity
• infrastructure and community services planning and investment must accompany residential growth.
• socially disadvantaged groups are being forced out of areas to allow construction of luxury housing.
• accelerated housing approvals and facilitated construction should not be at the expense of housing quality.

Planning systems must therefore integrate housing justice and equitable urban development.

6. Transparency and Accountability 

6.1 Decision-Making Transparency

SSD decisions involve ministerial or independent commission determinations following departmental assessment.

While assessment reports and submissions are typically published, concerns remain regarding:

• ministerial discretion
• limited appeal rights for community stakeholders but full appeal rights for developers
• perceived imbalance between developer resources and community capacity
• developer nominated rezoning pathways influenced by industry rather than community interest.

There is a need for stronger transparency measures, including:

• clear justification for decisions
• publicly accessible data
• independent oversight mechanisms

6.2 Accountability Mechanisms

Potential reforms need to include:

• expanded role for independent planning commissions
• improved rights for community appeals
• mandatory identification and disclosure of lobbyist and developer interactions.

These measures would strengthen public confidence in the planning system.

7. Alignment with Sustainable Development

Development must serve long-term public interest rather than short-term economic gain.

This requires integrating:

• climate resilience
• biodiversity protection
• sustainable urban design
• infrastructure capacity planning

SSD projects should therefore demonstrate clear alignment with ecologically sustainable development principles.

8. Recommendations

To better align the NSW State Significant Development system with community expectations, the following reforms are recommended:

8.1 Strengthen Community Participation

• Introduce mandatory early consultation before SSD applications are finalised
• Provide funding or technical assistance for community review of complex proposals
• Restore 30-day exhibition periods for SSDs and more for major infrastructure, precinct and green field projects.

8.2 Enhance Environmental Safeguards

• Require independent environmental review panels for high-impact projects
• Mandate cumulative impact assessments across regions
• Strengthen biodiversity and climate resilience requirements.

8.3 Improve Transparency and Accountability

• Publish detailed reasoning for all SSD determinations
• Expand opportunities for independent review or appeal
• Require disclosure logs of developer lobbying.

8.4 Ensure Social Equity

• Mandate affordable housing targets in perpetuity within large residential SSD developments.
• Remove the bonus FSR and Height for affordable housing to provide certainty for the community and to permit a genuine estimation of cumulative impacts of developments and infrastructure needs.
• Integrate infrastructure planning (transport, schools, health) with major housing proposals.
• Require social impact assessments that include community wellbeing metrics.

9. Conclusion

The State Significant Development framework can play a role in shaping the economic, environmental, and social future of New South Wales. While it provides a mechanism for facilitating large and strategic projects, its scope has been widened to include infill housing developments which bypass scrutiny and democratically elected bodies. The SSD policy therefoe necessitates further scrutiny and important changes to ensure that the planning system remains democratic, transparent, and sustainable.

By strengthening community participation, improving environmental safeguards, enhancing transparency, ensuring social equity, and limiting its parameters, the SSD system would better align with the broader public interest.