Community, Heritage, Relationships, Art, Home, No Surrender, Save Millers Point

 

THE POINT IS 

Community, Heritage, Relationships, Art, Home, No Surrender, Save Millers Point. 

Reg Mombassa I Deborah Kelly I Ruark Lewis I Mini Graff 

Ian Milliss I Alison Alder I Be Useful Group I Tamara Dean 

Nikki Easterbrook I Jane Bennett I Sally Cushing 

Margaret Bishop & John Dunn I Peque I Paddi O'Leary 

Members of the Millers Point Community 

Responses by artists and the community are presented in a united show of resistance to the relocation of Millers Point tenants. The Point is underscores the diversity and social cohesion inherent in the unique, historic community of Millers Point. 

Curated by Cara Martinez 

Preview to Documentary Forced Out by Blue Lucine 

Opening Wednesday 7th October, 6-8pm 

Keynote speech by Eva Cox AO I Live entertainment by Choir Rocks & 

Jacinta Tobin I Coordinated by Paddi O'Leary 

Exhibition continues until Sunday 1 Ith October 

Gallery open Wednesday-Saturday 1 Oam-5pm I Sunday 1 lam-4pm 

With thanks to Bec Dean; Public Housing Tenants Group - Millers Point, Dawes Point and The Rocks; The Working Party; Friends of Millers Point; Resident Action Group; the artists and all of our dedicated supporters. 

An independently funded multi-arts hub supporting emerging artists to present new work. 107 RE-DFERN STREET, RE-DFE-RN • www 107projects.org   

TRAVEL BETTER • BUS 305, 308, 309, 310 • TRAIN Redfern Station RIDE • WALK

Millers Point Historic Images and Oral Histories Released As Suburb Faces Redevelopment Threats

HuffPost Australia  By Bella Westaway  19/09/2015 20:54 AEST            

View along Argyle St, Millers Point, 1955 | City of Sydney Archives

View along Argyle St, Millers Point, 1955 | City of Sydney Archives

Images and oral histories chronicling Sydney’s historic Millers Point have been released for the first time, providing us with a fascinating look into the lives of local residents born as far back as 1915.

The histories come as Millers Point residents are being forced to vacate their homes due to NSW Government plans to redevelop the area, where former public housing terraces are worth a small fortune.
Lord Mayor Clover Moore said the interviews paint a vivid picture of of life on Sydney’s working harbour.

“This is the community that built much of Sydney -- Millers Point is more than just a collection of old terraces with good views, it’s a strong, proud community, and their stories and their history matters,” the Lord Mayor said.

“These voices are an important part of the City’s oral history collection, which can now be accessed online so more people can learn about one of Sydney’s most resilient and historic precincts”.
Harry Lapham, a Millers Point resident born in 1915 recounts the stories of his childhood where you knew the names of the shopkeepers and tobacco wasn’t sold on Sundays.
“They were the days when they had used to have to measure the butter out, had the box of butter, wooden paddles, scoop it out and weigh it out on the scales, a half a pound or a pound of butter, whatever you wanted,” he said.
Under the state government's sell-off plan, more than 460 Millers Point residents will be relocated from 206 properties.
With the eviction date looming in March 2016, residents are standing strong, saying they will fight until the end to live in the homes many of their families have occupied for generations.
"It’s the only place I’ve ever known, this is where I grew up, this is my life. It will be a fight [to evict us] because we will have many many supporters. We don’t want violence, but we are prepared to go to jail," life long resident Barney Gardner told The Sydney Morning Herald.
Community Services Minister Gabrielle Upton said the sell-off is required to fund the construction of more public housing.
"This is a fair outcome. The proceeds from the sale … can make sure that we provide more homes for more tenants [and] invest in the upgrade of other public housing stock," she told The Sydney Morning Herald.
And because pictures tell a thousand words, here are some incredible images depicting life in Millers Point throughout the twentieth century. 

More:

Sydney News History Life Millers Point

Millers Point - History

 

Hidden history in Sydney's Millers Point | The Saturday Paper

Millers Point Oral History Project Summary Report - Housing NSW

        
#Savemillerspoint

RESOURCED: http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2015/09/19/millers-point-history_n_8161594.html
 

Minister Hazzard gives Millers Point residents a glimmer of hope, but who will qualify to remain?

September 9, 2015     James Gorman

Barney Gardner was born in Millers Point and has lived there all his life, stands in front of some of the empty houses in the area. Picture: Justin Lloyd

WHO will stay and who will be forced to leave?

An unexpected softening in the stance of NSW Family and Community Services Minister Brad Hazzard has opened the door to letting some housing tenants in Millers Point remain in their historic homes.
But a month after Mr Hazzard confirmed some positions could be reviewed, tenants are none the wiser as to who could be eligible or what criteria they may need to meet.




Central Sydney has learned since the contentious sell-off of state-owned housing at Millers Point began in July 2014, the NSW Government has generated $64 million in revenue from the sale of 29 properties. More than 280 residents have relocated voluntarily.
However, of the 412 remaining Millers Point properties approximately 100 are still occupied and many of these residents won’t give up their homes without a fight.

Millers Point Public housing terraces.

Millers Point resident Barney Gardner said he, along with many of his neighbours, were prepared to face legal prosecution by flouting the government’s March 2016 eviction deadline.
“There are quite a few of us that are going to stay and we have talked to Brad Hazzard and shown him the homes we want to be spared but he said he can’t promise anything as there are another 21 cabinet ministers,” Mr Gardner said.
PALISADE HOTEL RAISES THE BAR AFTER RE-OPENING
LAST RESIDENTS OF SIRIUS HIT OUT AT HOUSING SELL-OFF
“Obviously we don’t expect the older residents to stay and fight.

“We are talking about a group of people who are prepared to go to jail if they have to.
“In other words the government and Housing NSW are going to need more than the police and their dogs to get us out of here, they will need the army.
“When you consider the facades of our homes and the number of people we will be able to get out here we won’t be making it easy for them to get in.”

Development applications have been lodged with the city by new owners hoping to renovate their newly acquired workers cottages in the suburb. Picture: Carly Earl

In August, Central Sydney reported the details of a letter sent to Sydney State Independent MP Alex Greenwich written by Mr Hazzard.
“I am actively considering the question of whether there should be exceptions, extensions or alternative measures for tenants in particular extenuating circumstances,” Mr Hazzard wrote.
A department spokesman was not forthcoming as to what these circumstances may be but said staff would continue to work towards a peaceful outcome.

Myra is blind and one of the last remaining tenants in the Sirius Tower of Millers Point.

RESOURCED: http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/newslocal/city-east/minister-hazzard-gives-millers-point-residents-a-glimmer-of-hope-but-who-will-qualify-to-remain/story-fngr8h22-1227518185929  

Fighting to save Sydney's working-class history

By Sahlan Hayes
Sydney  30 August 2015



 Australia's first public housing site and an area with deep roots in Sydney's history is being transformed into a millionaire's precinct thanks to a government plan to sell homes built for dock workers to developers.
Strolling along High Street in Millers Point, Barney Gardner points out the empty terrace houses that were once home to friends and neighbours.
"Margaret was born upstairs there, she inherited the lease from her father… she's gone," he says of one of his old friends.
"The lady in No 22 moved out under pressure; Pat's going," he says of two other neighbours. Someone else has died; another person appears to have moved on, and so on.


Barney Gardner was born and bred in Millers Point

The humble homes in High Street, built at the beginning of the 20th century as part of a public housing estate, are dwarfed by Sydney's nearby central business district to the east. To the west, is a new precinct dubbed Barangaroo, once home to the city's wharves and warehouses but now earmarked for luxury residential towers, office blocks and a controversial six-star casino.

Sitting on prime real estate complete with city and harbour views, Millers Point's 11 streets of public housing were earmarked for sale in 2014 by the New South Wales state government. Local residents have been offered newer housing elsewhere in Sydney's suburbs.

Image caption High St has witnessed the highs and lows of this inner-city suburb

The government says the A$500m ($360m, £233m) it stands to reap from the sale of the harbourside properties - close to the city's prestigious theatre district and the sandstone heritage area known as The Rocks - will be used to build much needed public housing in Sydney's southern suburbs, the Illawarra region and the Blue Mountains.
But Millers Point residents, many of them elderly, say they stand to lose family homes, a tight knit community and a working-class legacy that has been erased from the rest of inner Sydney.

Image caption Barney is determined to fight on

Fifty odd years ago, Millers Point was a thriving community of families and dock workers. A hundred years earlier, the area was home to seafarers and whalers, and a mercantile elite.
Before that, the Cadigal Aboriginal people speared fish and gathered shellfish from mudflats around the point.

Image caption The view across Millers Point, circa 1875-1885

Barney was born on the Point and has lived nowhere else.
The 66-year-old is a gentle, softly spoken man who is passionate about the Point.
The son of a seaman who "wasn't around much", Barney's parents divorced when he was 12. His brother was sent to a mental asylum at the age of 16.
"As a child I lived in No 12 with my mum, dad, my older brother and sister in a three-bedroom apartment," Barney tells the BBC.
"Later on, my brother moved away, my sister married and her and her husband along with her new baby lived with us. We did ask for another place but we were denied".

Image caption Like many local residents, Barney has strong ties to Millers Point

Barney is among the 100 residents out of an original 400 people who are still living in public housing in Millers Point.
Since his election to a public housing tenants committee in 2013, the former labourer, shipping and council worker has acted as a spokesperson for residents who don't want to move.
He has studied the government's proposals, knows who to lobby to get residents' views heard and keeps an eye on his neighbours' health and welfare.
"I was born here, they were tough times," he recalls.
"No one wanted to live here, it had a stigma about it, but it was our home."

Image caption Residents have vented their anger at meetings about the sale of their homes to no avail

Not everyone has been able to keep up the fight.
One man whose terrace overlooks a brand new, landscape-designed apartment complex shows little interest in staying on.
"I'm going to Rookwood soon [in Sydney's west]. I'm 87, you can't beat age," he says, remembering more vibrant times.
But when Barney sees people being moved out of their homes, he sees the extinguishment of a working class community that in one way or another has been on the Point for almost 200 years.

'Only for the rich'

"Mums would sit on the footsteps of the houses and shell peas and string the beans for the meals, the men would be in the pub and having a laugh and they'd dutifully come back to their wives and have the evening meal," he recalls.

As each week passes and another elderly resident is relocated or dies, the chances of saving this area for public housing becomes less likely.
"Here's this little village sitting there like a pimple in the middle of all this concrete, steel and glass and they're saying 'They shouldn't be living there'."
For the residents who remain, the fight goes on and at the forefront will be Barney Gardner, adamant he is going nowhere. He just might be the last man standing.
"Here is where I was born. Here is where I've lived and feel that I've contributed to this community, to this state, to this country.
"Because it's been gentrified, why am I not good enough to live here now?"

Sahlan Hayes is a Sydney photo journalist.

Resourced: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-34070549 

Alison Alder and Mini Graff: Some Posters / Local Positions — 6 March to 18 April 2015

Alison Alder and Mini Graff: Some Posters / Local Positions — 6 March to 18 April 2015   

On Friday 6 March at 6pm Julie Ewington opens an exhibition by Alison Alder and Mini Graff, 'Some Posters / Local Positions' for Future Feminist Archive presented by Contemporary Art and Feminism for the 40th Anniversary of International Women’s Year.
Talks by Mini Graff and Charles Pickett, curator and historian, Saturday 21 March.

Exhibition dates: 6 March to Saturday 18 April 2015.

The exhibition Some Posters / Local Positions aims to blur the line between studio, street and social/political art practice. A modus operandi of artists Alison Alder and Mini Graff is to use a fluid community residency to engage with social justice issues; their print and poster works or stencils often pose puzzling, persuading or provoking questions. Both artists are also renowned high-end printmakers and teachers.
 
Some Posters / Local Positions contributes to Future Feminist Archive, an expanded project for the 40th Anniversary of International Women’s Year (1975) comprising exhibitions, symposia and artist talks. The Cross Art Projects is making a yearlong contribution to the anniversary and will help investigate some of the many forms that a Future Feminist Archive might take — real and virtual, activist action! Some Posters / Local Positions pays homage to the feminist artists who worked with community groups pre-empting what is now called socially engaged art practice and is working with the group Women in Public Housing.

The artists have created new works about the struggle by a small public housing community in Millers Point and The Rocks to save their homes. A former maritime community’s battle against a cruel upheaval and state social cleansing has created a national scandal and is emblematic of the real-life impacts of the housing affordability crisis and its disproportionate impact on the aged, single women (estimated at over 60%) and single parent families as smaller inner-city housing estates are now high land value areas.

Mini Graff, Pipped at the post (Dominos), 2015. Acrylic screen print on 100gsm litho. Pipped at the post (Dominos) responds to the public housing sell-off in Millers Point and The Rocks and the greater issue of public housing and housing affordability in Sydney and NSW, especially for the elderly, women and children.

At Millers Point and in The Rocks, developers are likely to be given access to a fire sale of historic properties and it seems they may even be able to purchase consolidated lots of housing. Meanwhile, in adjacent former docklands, the vision of a gambling billionaire and Lend Lease corporation’s $6 billion Barangaroo South high-density housing project is openly facilitated by government as an ‘engine of growth’.

Some Posters / Local Positions is an intergenerational project: Alison Alder was a major force in political poster making in the 1980s and beyond in remote Aboriginal communities. Therefore, classic works, such as Alder’s ‘Even a man can do it’ (1981) and Mini Graff’s response two decades later, are included. The artists have undertaken several prior dialogical projects at Megalo in Canberra and have both worked independently on housing issues: Alison in Wollongong with Redback Graphix and Mini around the Green Bans that saved several historic Australian inner cities.

Alison Alder worked in the traditional screen-printing workshops of Megalo Print Studio (Canberra 1980–1982 and 2008–2014) and Redback Graphix (Wollongong and Sydney from 1985 to 1993) known for high visibility full colour blasts on bleak streets. Pink power heralded their 1985 International Women's Day poster (Alison Alder with Leonie Lane.) Later Alison worked within Indigenous organisations in the Northern Territory, primarily for Julalikari Council in Tennant Creek.

As street posters and protests waned and gentrification picked up speed, printmaking moved to low-tech stencils with Mini Graff's whimsical or satirical posters and stencils appearing as fleeting messages — sometimes about the satirical corporations Grab and U-Spend — and occasionally in projects such as the ‘Green Bans Art Walk’ (2011). Mini’s style owes much to the power of the dot-screen and mass media images. Mini's art work extends to touring with the Mays Lane project and regional workshops (Lake Macquarie City Gallery and Megalo Print Studio) and, recently, 'Behind this smile', a project about racism and cultural stereotypes (Hobson’s Bay area in Victoria).

What is saved is not always safe. Post-Green Ban Sydney has been shaped by three decades of anti-union political rhetoric and a move away from public housing to more aesthetic-sounding and more selective corporate management as signaled by the rising towers of Barangaroo with its generic arts precinct. In a battle for survival, inner city arts institutions are played off against each other — the MCA against the nearby Powerhouse (Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences). Meanwhile Sydney’s streets and habitats are rendered contraband for art (political posters, stencils) other than the facade of polite and conforming streetscapes and public sculpture.  

Mini Graff, Pipped at the post (Dominos), 2015. Set of 6 posters.	Mini Graff, Pipped at the post (Dominos), 2015. Set of 6 posters. Pipped at the post (Dominos) responds to the public housing sell-off in Millers Point and The Rocks and the greater issue of public housing in Sydney and NSW.

Mini Graff, Pipped at the post (Dominos), 2015. Set of 6 posters.	Mini Graff, Pipped at the post (Dominos), 2015. Set of 6 posters.

Alison Alder, Real Estate, 2015.	Alison Alder, Get Out Quick, 2015.	Alison Alder, Goodbye from Sirius, 2015.

Alison Alder, Anyone Can Do It, screen print on multiple paper bags, 2013.

‘No Surrender’: Background to a Public Housing Fire-Sale


In a media blitz on 19 March 2014, the Minister for Family and Community Services, trumpeted that the New South Wales state government will auction off 293 high-value public housing properties in Millers Point, Gloucester Street and the Sirius building in The Rocks. They would relocate the 590 evicted residents.

Residents immediately received a letter titled 'Moving To A New Home' promising a 'comprehensive relocation strategy’ and housing preference in the closest social housing allocation zones. The people who built the city were being evicted from it to make way for the new upper middle class.
When Mike Baird became NSW Premier in April 2014 he said: 'I have a deep respect for every single person in this state. And I will serve every single one of them with every ounce of my being'. (Sean Nicholls, News Review, Sydney Morning Herald, 26-27 April 2014, p 35. http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/mike-baird-the-new-man-at-the-top-20140425-379jy.html#ixzz301lOkrTA)

Yet, a year into the government’s 2-year 'relocation' plan and the building of the massive towers of the Barangaroo development encroach on this national heritage-listed precinct as residents are still stalked by ‘relocation officers’ and assaulted by the noise and dust of often around-the-clock construction. On 4 August 2014 the government’s inhumanity was brought to the United Nations' Open-Ended Working Group on Ageing (5th session), by Kim Boettcher, solicitor for The Aged-care Rights Service (TARS) who drew attention to the plight of tenants of social housing at Millers Point and The Rocks, and of other older persons, and a Women in Public Housing steering committee was formed to highlight the particular need to house women, the aged and single families.

There are over 55,000 people on the waiting list for public housing. Since coming to office, the NSW State Government has sold more public housing properties than it has built, using proceeds from asset sales to pay for maintenance on existing properties rather than funding the construction of new dwellings. Sydney Council, meanwhile, downgraded its ‘affordable housing’ target from 10% to 7.5% of new dwellings. The 2014 NSW State Budget forecasts a net increase in the number of people supported in social housing of zero.

On 20 August 2014 the Barangaroo Authority lost its Supreme Court appeal over $1 billion in developer contributions by the developer Lend Lease for the site. On the same day Millers Point residents were holding a vigil outside a Sydney real estate office that was reportedly selling off state-owned Millers Point properties. Lend Lease has been in talks with non-government housing managers about meeting their affordable housing targets for the Barangaroo development off-site. Millers Point is seen as a potential site, presumably with the more high-value Georgian and Victorian terrace houses being saved and the early twentieth century model workers housing demolished.
The sell-off of public housing assets speeds the divide in Australia’s cities — between young and old, rich and poor, the outer suburbs and the inner city. If unchecked these sales have real consequences for our future.

Reg Mombassa created the  ‘No Surrender’ logo of a beret-wearing firebrand for the tenants and many visual artists and photographers are quietly participating in the struggle.

 

Future Feminist Archive, artists, activists, curators and locals for 40th Anniversary of International Women's Day. Lineup at XAP: Women in Public Housing members Allana Walton, Wendy Ford and Eddie Lloyd (ALP candidate for Sydney) with opening speaker Julie Ewington and artist Alison Alder.	Future Feminist Archive, artists, activists, curators and locals for 40th Anniversary of International Women's Day at XAP.

Alison Alder, 'Get Out Quick', 2015. Alison Alder, 'Goodbye from Sirius', 2015. Alison Alder, 'Real Estate', 2015.	Alison Alder, Even a Man can do it, 1981. Silkscreen on paper bag. Courtesy CCAS Collection.

Installation view, Mini Graff, Pipped at the post (Dominos), 2015. Set of 6 Acrylic screen prints.	Installation detail: Mini Graff, Sorry, 2015. Set of 5 Acrylic screen prints.

 
 
Links

Alison Alder at http://alisonalder.com/
Mini Graff at http://minigraff.com/

History and Background: Millers Point  A community under the hammer
SMH Interactive Millers Point Community History Site  at http://www.smh.com.au/interactive/2014/millers-point/place.html
Tenant News, Tenants Union, November 2014 > Download pdf
Read the Sirius history here

Campaign Updates

The Official Millers Point, Dawes Point and the Rocks Tenants is https://www.facebook.com/millerspointsaveourhomes
The Brown Couch at http://tunswblog.blogspot.com.au/
Tenants Union Clearing House Page - http://clearinghousetunsw.blogspot.com.au/
Edwina Lloyd - https://www.facebook.com/Eddie4Sydney
Millers Point and the United Nations at http://tunswblog.blogspot.com.au/2014/08/millers-point-and-united-nations.html and
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/rats-plague-vulnerable-elderly-of-millers-point-un-told-20140802-zzf72.html
Barangaroo a plague on all their houses, SMH, August 25, 2013 at http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/barangaroo-a-plague-on-all-their-houses-20130824-2sied.html



http://crossart.com.au/home/index.php/archive/272-some-posters-positions-for-future-feminist-archive
 

Nile is godsend for Millers Point residents

August 13, 2015

By CHRISTOPHER HARRIS

 The long battle for Millers Point residents against the state government to remain in their homes might be coming to an end, with early signs suggesting the residents may be the victors.

City Hub can reveal last Thursday NSW Christian Democrat MLC  Fred Nile, who holds the balance of power, visited some of the 100 residents and said the government must allow them to stay in the area.
Speaking to City Hub, he was critical of the government’s “lack of humanity” in how they had handled the issue.
The move comes after Social Housing Minister Brad Hazzard wrote to Independent Sydney MP Alex Greenwich on August 4, stating that the relocation of certain residents and alternative options could be reconsidered due to “extenuating circumstances”.
“While the timing of relocations remains geared to making properties available for sale as quickly as possible, following representation and discussions of which you are well aware, I am actively considering the question of whether there should be exceptions, extensions or alternative measures for tenants in particular extenuating circumstances,” Mr Hazzard wrote.
Mr Hazzard’s office did not respond to City Hub’s questions.
The Baird Government started selling off homes in the suburb last year, on the premise that the revenue from each house could build three new social housing dwellings.
But the decision about evicting the remaining tenants could be out of the government’s hands, as Mr Nile said he was committed to helping the group of mainly elderly residents.
He said the most import issue surrounding the sell off of property in Millers Point was to accommodate and allow the remaining residents to continue in living in that area.
He said one option was to make to Sirius building be made available to residents.
“The Sirius building that they’re cleaning the residents out of, which is a very strong, well built building, could be used to maintain that village atmosphere for remaining residents of Millers Point,” he said.
“That would be my proposal for the remaining 100 or so residents that they should either live in their homes or be transferred to the Sirius building.
“[It should] be maintained and painted white as it was originally designed by the architect, instead of in that very dirty grey colour which it is at the moment.”
He said it was a cruel situation that current residents who had been moved by Housing NSW to Liverpool and Bankstown were travelling back every day to visit friends and be around the remaining residents.
“I am pretty critical of the government’s lack of humanity in how they’ve handled this entire issue,” he said.
Chairman of the Millers Point, Dawes Point, The Rocks and Walsh Bay Resident Action Group John McInerney wanted to know the details of the minister’s exceptions and extenuating circumstances, and welcomed the visit from Reverend Nile.
“We believe we recently had a victory after a visit from Fred Nile and it was very productive, and he has told us he is going to help all those remaining,” he said.
“We haven’t actually heard any positive results up till now from all our proposals and suggestions, and this is first time we have indication of possible positive response.”
He said the government will have difficulty moving the remaining residents because they were committed to staying in the area.
“So they will have to be physically ejected from their houses, particularly if it’s a 70 year old woman. Are they going to throw her out on the street?”
“The bulk of remaining residents are elderly and dependent on the current community for physical and emotional support, and they will have difficulty getting that if they’re forced to move to a new area, because it is hard to get new connections at that age.”
Independent Sydney MP Alex Greenwich welcomed the political actions and said forced evictions was a dangerous move.
“Millers Point has been a safe and stable home for many tenants who are aged, frail and have complex needs. Forced evictions of these tenants would cause avoidable harm to their health and mental health,” he said.
“I appreciate the time the minister [Brad Hazzard] has taken to meet with and hear from the residents of Millers Point and his compassionate consideration of alternatives that could keep some tenants in the community they have built.”

RESOURCED: http://www.altmedia.net.au/reasons-for-hope-for-millers-point-residents-as-nile-opposes-eviction/108633