New opportunities for shack owners
The South Australian Government is committed to creating new opportunities for families to retain shacks on Crown land and in national parks by expanding the eligibility to maintain a lease in return for upgrading the shack to meet contemporary safety, amenity and environmental standards.
The commitment includes:
- providing certainty of tenure to families by expanding the eligibility to maintain a lease in return for upgrading the shack to meet contemporary safety, amenity and environmental standards
- investigating more freeholding of shacks located on Crown land
- providing a renewable tenure option to shacks located within national parks
- seeking fair valuation advice for the sale of shack sites
- strengthening links between local rangers and ‘Friends of Park’ volunteer groups and shack owners/lessees.
To do this, a new policy framework needed to be developed that would enable this certainty of tenure for shack holders.
A moratorium was put in place to halt the current practice of automatically terminating shack leases upon the death of the last person named on the lease, and a comprehensive review was undertaken of the legislation, regulations, policies, plans and standards involved in delivering the commitment.
This included:
- reviewing the regulatory and policy landscape
- consulting with key stakeholders
- developing new policy
- addressing legal barriers – i.e. amending the Crown Land Management Act 2009
- amending relevant park management plans.
Latest update December 2019
Amendments to Crown Land Management Act
Amendments to the Crown Land Management Act were passed on 5 December, which means the legislation formally allows greater tenure for shack leases on Crown land.
The amended Act is expected to come into effect in late January 2020. Following this, current holders of leases on Crown land will be invited in to indicate their preference for greater tenure.
For more information about the amendments, see the following:
Proposed amendments to relevant park management plans
Consultation is now open on the proposed amendments to the park management plans for Coorong National Park, Innes National Park, Kellidie Bay Conservation Park and Little Dip Conservation Park.
The amendments would enable the development of suitable longer-term tenure for shack leases in these national parks.
Input can be provided via YourSAy, via the links listed above. Consultation closes at 5pm on 28 February 2020.
Submissions will then be analysed and final draft amendments will be submitted to the Parks and Wilderness Council for consideration.
More information
For more information about how the Retaining Shacks commitment is progressing, read the following updates from Minister for Environment and Water David Speirs:
To learn more about the project, including more about the work undertaken so far, see the Frequently Asked Questions page.
