With the state election two weeks away, Independent candidate for Wollondilly Judy Hannan has the region's infrastructure in her sites, with roads, schools and overdevelopment at the top of her list.
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"We've got a couple of roads that are closed," she said.
"There's Old South Road in the Highlands, there's old Razorback road, and we've got landslides still affecting roads in Picton," she said.
"We've got potholes, but it's beyond potholes. We don't need to keep filling them. We need to do major roadwork. It's just not acceptable.
"The state government gave some of the roads to the local councils a few years ago. Those roads need to go back to being classified as state roads, which will make them financed by state roads.
"Now the state government say it's not in their budget.
"But neither are all the fake promises that are being made at the moment. They've had years and years to fix this.
"Stop blaming people looking backwards, and let's look forward and just tick the box and get it reclassified."
Ms Hannan said if elected she would put an end to rapid rezoning.
"The government now have this rapid rezoning program that they've put in place so they can come in and overnight rezone an area," she said.
"That's not going to the council or the community that lives there."
According to Ms Hannan, three sites in Wingecarribee, and six sites in Wollondilly were rezoned under the government program.
"They [the NSW Government] won't even tell us where they are," she said.
"It's inappropriate having these sorts of secret deals because they're not giving us any information."
Ms Hannan said the rapid rezoning would lead to people living in areas without proper infrastructure in place.
"We'll get lots of people living in these areas that can't get to their jobs or don't have enough money to stay there," she said.
"The affordability, the electricity, and the transport costs will make it hard for them to survive."
Another key concern is the lack of high schools in the Wollondilly electorate. Ms Hannan said while incumbent Wollondilly MP Nathaniel Smith promised a new high school in Wilton, it would take "five to 10 years."
"What about the families that are here now, we only have two public high schools in the whole electorate," she said.
"It's not just families with children that are zero to five years old now. Some of these people have kids that are already in sixth class.
"We can't build a high school in five years. We need the construction of at least two new public high schools in the electorate.
"We're just forgotten and taken for granted."
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Vera Demertzis
Journalist at the Southern Highland News covering council yarns and community news. Got a tip or a story to tell? Email vera.demertzis@southernhighlandnews.com.au or call on 0427 250 908.
Journalist at the Southern Highland News covering council yarns and community news. Got a tip or a story to tell? Email vera.demertzis@southernhighlandnews.com.au or call on 0427 250 908.
