For decades, Kaye Oddie has been involved in community battles to protect the heritage of her patch of North Melbourne and make sure planning decisions reflect what locals want.
But now, she and her Shiel Street neighbours feel like they have been completely cut out of a key planning decision that will soon be made for their street.
"It is just Big Brother, it is nothing short of Big Brother," she said.
On her street, a nine-storey apartment building has been proposed by Housing Choices Australia, a not-for-profit organisation that provides affordable housing to those in need.
What has angered neighbours is how the building will be assessed.
The development, backed by a $26 million investment from the Victorian Government, will go directly to the Victorian Minister for Land and Environment Lily D'Ambrosio for approval.
Neighbours will not have any appeal rights once the minister makes her decision.
It is a process designed to streamline applications made under the Victorian Government's $5.3 billion Big Housing Build program, which aims to create nearly 10,000 new social housing dwellings.
The initiative has been hailed as visionary by its supporters and will help respond to a vital need for more public housing.
But many residents are angry that these developments are being decided by the Victorian Government rather than going through the usual council planning approval process.
In this case, neighbours have raised concerns about the design of the building on Shiel Street.
Ms Oddie said she could not understand why the building could not go through the usual Melbourne City Council planning process.
"They could have easily made 3-15 [Shiel Street] comply with the planning scheme, fit in with the streetscape, it would have been a win for everybody, a win for social housing, a win for the residents, a win for planning," she said.
Need for affordable housing is urgent, developer says
While Shiel Street residents want a return to the usual council planning process, Housing Choices Australia says the need for social housing is urgent.
Its chief operating officer, Roberta Buchanan, said the state had more than 51,000 people on the Victorian Housing Register who needed support finding affordable housing.
The issue, she said, had been exasperated because of the pandemic – with older women and families on lower incomes particularly struggling to meet the cost of rent in the private market.
The organisation's general manager of housing development, James Henry, said it was important to get projects built as quickly as possible to meet the needs of those struggling to find housing now.
The ABC requested an interview with the Lands Minister, Ms D'Ambrosio.
A government spokesperson provided a statement saying its new planning pathway allowed development times to be cut by nine to 15 months on some social housing projects and still included safeguards to protect planning, design and community engagement.
Ms D'Ambrosio is responsible for approving social housing applications because the government believes Planning Minister Richard Wynne has a conflict, as the minister who is also responsible for housing.
Mr Henry said he still believed the process the Shiel Street proposal was going through was thorough and transparent and would give residents and local councils the time to consult and have their input.
He and Ms Buchanan were both proud of the building their organisation planned to construct – saying it was designed by an award-winning architect and had high energy efficiency and accessibility standards.
Community tension will continue, councillor predicts
Nicholas Reece is the Deputy Mayor of Melbourne City Council, but before joining council he had a long career in Labor politics.
He was an adviser to former Prime Minister Julia Gillard and former Premiers Steve Bracks and John Brumby, while also being a former party state secretary and campaigns director.
He said he was a big supporter of the Victorian Labor government's investment in social housing, calling it a "brave" initiative that was decades overdue.
But he was also critical of the planning process.
The Shiel Street proposal, he said, showed the challenges.
Here, he said there was an applicant with a proven track record of building and running social housing, and a development he said was of a higher quality than a previous design that had been given approval for the site but was never built.
But he believed the building could still be improved, and residents had a right to feel upset about the process.
"The planning system is completely bypassing them in terms of their ability to have input or appeal rights against the state government's decision in that case," he said.
But he said he could think of one reason why the state government may have set up this "pretty egregious" alternative planning model.
In Hawthorn, in Melbourne's east, Opposition MP David Davis witnessed a similar battle in his electorate.
Residents concerned about the size and design of a proposed redevelopment on Bills Street protested against the planned build and the government's approvals system.
Mr Davis said councils and communities were being cut from the planning process.
He said he worried about the lasting impact of the alternative planning process, which he described as "cutting corners."
It's a process he and others fear will continue to create tensions between the need for urgent affordable housing, and residents who want a say about the future of their communities.
