ALMOST five years ago when Newcastle lord mayor Nuatali Nelmes rose to address a packed auditorium at Stockton RSL and Citizens' Club, the Labor council leader had a plan.
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A "united community front" and "sound business case" to attract funding were what was needed to get sand back on Stockton beach.
A short time later, as the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage's principal coastal specialist Phil Watson stood in the same packed room to speak, he didn't pull any punches.
The usually gagged public servant spoke freely, detailing how he'd attended a similar meeting in Stockton back in 1995.
He described what can only be summarised as a the complete lack of action by authorities on a long-term solution for the decades-old issue.
"It's with a sense of regret that here we are 23 years later ... and we still don't have a solution," Mr Watson conceded. "Regrettably we've heard it before."
The crowd at the club, thirsty for answers and action, the community outrage heightened by those all too familiar with the fight.
As the night wore on, the verbal spikes dug in and the mood shifted quickly from unhappy rumblings to angry outbursts.
"This is ridiculous", "when are you going to do something", "soon we'll be washed away", "get off your arses and act", and "the beach is disappearing".
At the end of the official proceedings, residents' hands shot up around the room, eager to be heard, angry that Stockton's only child-care centre had closed, later to be demolished, after it was undermined by erosion and an old tip, exposed by the disappearing shoreline, was spewing asbestos and rubbish into the sea.
Increasingly desperate, residents agreed to take a leap of faith and put their trust in Cr Nelmes' plan.
Mass sand nourishment from offshore dredging was eventually agreed on as the best way forward. It would be a NSW first.
Stockton beach, long suffering from erosion caused by deepening of the Newcastle harbour shipping channel and the breakwaters, which trap longshore drift sand at Nobbys, is disappearing.
Ever since the breakwaters were built in the late 1800s, the condition of the beach has declined. Every year it loses up to 140,000 cubic metres of sand and needs an injection of between 2.5 and 4 million cubic metres of sand to be restored.
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Hope competes with despair in early 2020 as grim images of Stockton's coast being pounded by massive swell sees then deputy premier John Barilaro sign on to adopt the beach as one of his pet projects.
"I made a promise to the people of Stockton that we would set politics aside and put community at the heart of what we're trying to achieve, and this is just the beginning of what's possible if we all work together to get the best outcome," Mr Barilaro said in May 2020 as he announced the state had identified a potential offshore sand source.
But that brief seems to have wilted, along with Mr Barilaro who quit politics in 2021 and was replaced by Deputy Premier Paul Toole, who thankfully agreed to take on the project.
The headbutting between the two parties and refusal to work together has recently spilled into the public domain, at the same time as the Newcastle Herald reports that Stockton beach is disappearing faster than what experts previously forecast.
"It's predictable - so predictable," one resident commented, describing the project as, "moving as quickly in the wrong direction as Stockton's coastline".
"It's pathetic," mumbled another.
City of Newcastle has spent $9.5 million on Stockton beach since 2020 and committed $27.5 million.
Much of the works short-to-medium-term measures including rock bag walls, sand scraping, emergency works, restoring beach access following closures and seawalls.
The state government has provided $1.5 million in grant funding to City of Newcastle and spent $1million on a detailed study to assess the viability of an offshore sand source.
While there are differing views of whose fault it is, there is a unified growing community contempt at the squabbling and lack of leadership that is holding up the project, adding more costs.
The perplexing and frustrating thing is how, at both levels of government, there seems to be so little regard for a unified approach, as was first put forward by Cr Nelmes at the community meeting back in 2018, and reiterated by Mr Barilaro in 2020.
The sound and fury of the ocean as it pounds Stockton's seawall, the only thing protecting homes, says it all.
Squabbling like school children over the future of a tiny coastal town is unlikely to win the confidence of anyone, including voters at the upcoming state election.
While ever the bickering continues, he might be Stockton's only hope.
- Donna Page is a Stockton resident.
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