Greater Taree City Council learned last week that senior staff from the Department of Planning and Office of Environment and Heritage (OEH) would assist its staff to rewrite its Coastal Zone Management Plan (CZMP) and design "the mechanisms by which retreat could be implemented".

Council's executive leader corporate support, Laura Black said council staff last week began to discuss "some very complex issues" and "mapped all the options that are either available, or could be made available with legislative change."

"Various scenarios for property at different levels of threat, and property owners in different stages of life and with different needs and different ownership styles, were discussed," Ms Black said.

"We also began to canvass options that involve stakeholders who were not in the room, including other government departments and some private sector industries.

"The options are varied, but included things like relief and waiver of State and local government regulatory fees and charges, land release for relocation and other personal and monetary incentives.

"We also canvassed the levy of a Special Rate Variation given the community's high level of demand to maintain beach amenity.

"These options were mapped for the State broadly, not just Old Bar, as the minister's intention is to implement a consistent state-wide coastal management framework.

"The next step is to investigate the ease and cost of implementing the options, and to draw them into packages that could be offered as the different hazard triggers of the coastal zone are met.

"When looking at the options, we didn't allow cost or the fact that the relevant stakeholder might not have been in the room to limit the scope of options. It may be that some options are discounted when fully investigated.

"As the majority of options that require legislative change and engagement of other stakeholders rely on the minister's involvement, OEH staff took responsibility for investigating these further.

"The options for local government contribution were fairly straightforward as they exist now, either under delegated authority or by the will of council.

"Our discretionary income is quite low as most fees levied by councils, like rates, waste disposal and other fees and charges either include a State levy or are regulated by State legislation, so change at that level is required for us to offer relief and waiver," she added.