A MOUNT Cotton chicken producer will find out on Wednesday if the Redland City Council will grant it a second extension to a development permit to build an electricity plant powered on chook poo.
Council received a letter from lawyers for Cleveland Power, affiliated to chicken producer Darwalla, on March 20 this year, the day the permit expired.
The letter asked for the development approval to be extended until September 20, 2016.
It is the second request for an extension since Cleveland Power first lodged its development application with council in 2006.
In a report to be tabled at the recent meeting, council officers recommending approval said an extension would be consistent with a 2013 Planning and Environment Court decision and with the Sustainable Planning Act.
"While it is almost certain that objecting submissions would be received if the application was re-lodged, it is considered that the submissions are unlikely to raise new issues not already considered as part of the original application and subsequent a court appeal," the report said.
"This is strengthened by the premise that there have been no significant changes to laws and policies that have a specific impact on this development."
Former councillor for Mount Cotton Toni Bowler said she was shocked officers recommended a second extension.
She said no groundwork had started on the power plant in the past two-year extension, breaching conditions in the 2013 Planning and Environment court ruling.
She also called for a new development application to be lodged to give the public a chance to voice their views on the power plant.
"It was only in 2011 when council officers first refused to grant an extension and since then the situation hasn't changed," Ms Bowler said.
"Since 2006, when this application was lodged, an extra 500 homes at least have been built in new estates in Mount Cotton and there are now 1200 more people living within 3km from this incinerator.
"Mount Cotton School has more students and this incinerator is only 600m away. This is a heavy industrial use project and should not be built in a rural area."
Ms Bowler said she was concerned her successor, councillor Julie Talty, who was also appointed as a Cleveland Power community liaison officer, had not informed Mount Cotton residents about the March 20 extension application.
Cr Talty said she had communicated directly and broadly with the community on the chicken-poo fired power plant despite not knowing Cleveland Power had intended to apply for an extension.
She said she would resign from the Cleveland Power Community Consultative Committee, which was set up as a condition of the original development approval.
"I want to make it clear that my resignation is in no way linked to the company's request for an extension to their development approval, or any decision to be made at the general meeting."
