57-point plan to revive Sydney’s live scene endorsed

All 57 recommendations put forward in the Live Music Matters action plan were unanimously endorsed at a Cultural and Community Committee meeting held at Sydney Town Hall last night.

The report was assembled last November by the 11-person NSW’s Live Music and Performance Taskforce, which was set up in December 2012 by the City of Sydney. At the time, the action plan was referred to by Dr Ianto Ware, co-director of the National Live Music Office, as "the first serious attempt to actually fix the labyrinth of red tape affecting music and arts venues.”

In December, a number of these recommended were fast tracked, including developing a permit system to allow musicians and staff to load and unload equipment outside music and performance venues without getting a ticket, and making a number of City of Sydney-owned properties available to school-aged musicians for after-school and weekend rehearsals at no cost.

Last night during the meeting, Lord Mayor Clover Moore referred to the policy as “a natural progressions from our open policy”, stating the genesis of the policy stems from 2007, when she introduced her private members bill into the NSW parliament to allow small bars to open. There are now more than 70 of these small bars operating in Sydney.

“Live music has not had the same funding as other cultural activities," Moore noted. “We know from observation that people drink less when they have live music, that’s a really important issue."

Speaking to TMN this afternoon, the Lord Mayor added: “Last night the City’s Cultural Committee voted unanimously to support our new Live Music and Performance Action Plan, which includes nearly 60 ways we can help performers, venues, audiences, visitors and residents.

"From encouraging pop-up gigs in local venues to reducing red tape so emerging performers can showcase their talents, we are serious about supporting live music. We’re looking forward to putting our plans into action right away.

"I called for the creation of a Live Music Taskforce at the end of 2012. The Taskforce spent a year researching, consulting and developing an Action Plan for the City. They spoke to venue operators, musicians, government agencies, audiences, students and hundreds of Sydneysiders.

"The 11-member Taskforce was chaired by co-director of the National Live Music Office, John Wardle. I want to thank the Taskforce members, and everyone who came to speak to the Committee, for their passion and hard work. Their work was the most thorough investigation into live music ever produced in Australia.”

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The key recommendations outlined in the Live Music Matters action plan include:

• Simplifying the approval process for low impact live music and performances.

• Providing financial help for infrastructure and capital costs to encourage new and existing venues to present live music and performance.

• Using  indoor and outdoor City properties as live music and performance venues by improving sound, lighting and seating.

• Making City-owned community properties available as rehearsal space.

• Working with neighbouring councils and the NSW Government to establish a new major outdoor event space for the Sydney area.

• Creating the role of a City of Sydney live music and performance liaison officer.

• Exploring changes to the liquor freeze for venues that have live music and entertainment as their primary purpose.

• Setting new sound proofing standards for new residential developments.

• Amending parking rules so musicians and  performers can unload equipment regardless of vehicle type.

• Meeting the increased demand from young people for live music by increasing the frequency of all ages events.

• Finding better ways to deal with complaints from neighbours including mediation.

•  A formal mediation policy to be set up to offer free independent and confidential mediation for resolving noise complaints.

•  Developing information guides that provide specific information on the processes for setting up temporary and permanent venues in the City of Sydney.

•  Hosting a public symposium next year in partnership with the National Live Music Office to investigate compliance and affordability issues in small and medium size venues.

•  Undertaking research into design and construction standards to reduce low frequency or bass noise in residential buildings and advocating to the Australian Building Codes Board for an Australian standard.

• Ensuring City staff who take enforcement action against live music venues are experienced and trained to assess and determine offensive noise.

•  Working with other agencies to gather data on alcohol consumption and behaviour in live music and performance venues.

•   Coordinating administrative approval processes with the Office of Liquor Gaming and Racing to make it easier to establish venues.

•  Conducting annual surveys of venue operators to understand their experience dealing with the City of Sydney.

•  Working with the Department of Immigration and promoters to develop new models to help international visiting artists play with local musicians.

Sydney councillors will meet in private to discuss the action plan next Monday (April 7) before a business paper outlining a five-year plan for live music in Sydney is released to the public on the Thursday (April 10).

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In further pleasing news for the Sydney live music sector, Leichhardt Mayor Darcy Byrne has released his own plan to revive Sydney’s live music culture.

Byrne’s recommendations include: a distinct difference between live venues are other venues when it comes to licensing; compensation for live venues for the reduction in trading during performances, including an extension of trading times after performances finish and an exemption from the new lock out laws; a recommendation pioneered by Leichhardt Council called The Good Neighbour Policy, in which noise complaints are first dealt with through mandatory mediation, and a collaboration between the Government and councils to identify and rezone precincts that harbor clusters of live music venues.

The new sectors should have later trading hours and council rates exemptions for new and existing venues.

"After years of venues being prosecuted over noise complaints, now it is being made financially unsustainable to hold live gigs,” Byrne told TMN this afternoon. “It is time for the Government to realise that music venues can be the solution to alcohol related violence not the cause of it.”