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
February 2020
Amendments to the Crown Land Management Act, to facilitate arrangements for longer tenure to existing section 78B life tenure leaseholders, formally came into effect on 28 January 2020.
The amendments allow eligible shacks on Crown land to be retained, provided certain requirements are met by shack leaseholders.
Current Section 78B life-tenure leaseholders are now being invited in to indicate whether they would like to apply for longer tenure or remain on their current agreements.
Shack leaseholders (or nominee) are being provided with information on the process and the requirements they would need to meet to be eligible.
For further information see the Applying for greater tenure page
For more information about the amendments to the Crown Land Management Act, see the following:
Amending relevant park management plans
The 3-month public consultation period 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 closed on 28 February 2020.
Over the coming months an analysis of all 287 submissions received will be undertaken and provided to the Minister for Environment and Water for consideration in accordance with Section 38 of the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1972.
If the proposed amendments are endorsed, it would enable longer term tenure for shack leases in these national parks.
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.
