Seeing the change in a sea change community : issues for environmental managers

‘Sea Change’ communities have drawn much attention over recent years for the way their accelerated growth and development is impacting on both ecological sustainability and connection to place for longer-term residents. The urgency of these and other issues is reflected in the establishment of a National Sea Change Taskforce in 2004, a collective of Council planners from around Australia charged with working collaboratively with state and federal tiers of government to develop policies that will protect the coastal environment and establish sustainable limits to growth. This paper examines how the environment in a particular sea change community is being affected, and highlights issues that need careful consideration from environmental managers. It does so by exploring demographic and environmental change in a coastal lifestyle destination, namely Central Queensland’s Capricorn Coast. It also looks at how both the local authority and community are responding to the growth affecting the environment. The paper adopts an environmental history perspective by focusing on change and human motivation during the past 30 years, and leading into the sea change era from the 1990s. The environmental management issues emanating from this study are multi-dimensional and include: hillside clearings; high-rises; corrosion of people’s connection to place; water supply; habitat loss; false sense of security from so-called ‘green’ development; and difficulty for conservation groups to make a difference on their own. The paper finds that a whole of community approach, as well as acceptance of the need for limits to growth, are required to ameliorate further environmental and social impacts.