Allowing horses on beaches and coastal dunes at Spookys Beach was like allowing racehorses to train in a "church" or "cemetery" for traditional owners, Warrnambool council meeting was told.
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In a speech on Monday night, councillor Kylie Gaston implored fellow councillors to vote to prevent horses on the beach after traditional owners had spoken to her with such emotion and conviction about the issue.
Councillors were asked to consider giving Warrnambool Racing Club more time to prepare documents which would allow commercial horses to train on Spookys Beach after it had failed to meet a crucial deadline on November 30.
But, in a 4-2 vote, councillors instead decided to get all stakeholders together at a special meeting to clear up conflicting messages on the issue.
Cr Gaston told the meeting that Uncle Robbie Lowe Senior had told her that the sand dunes were of great importance because of the burial sites in the area.
"He said to me 'would we allow, as council, racehorses into the Warrnambool cemetery?' Of course we wouldn't," she said.
Cr Gaston also read out a letter from Eastern Marr's Lee-Anne Clarke which says traditional owners considered the natural environment their "cathedral", their "church".
Ms Clarke's letter says the issue had "terribly upset" elders who "have cried openly for country such is the raw emotion that genuinely attaches us to dune country".
"It would be irresponsible for us not to speak out, as next of kin, of our spiritual and ancestral homelands," the letter says.
"Please shut the gate on this now and save what little remaining pristine area we have left, the Belfast Coastal Reserve."
Mojil at the Hopkins River mouth, about five kilometres from the dune country earmarked for horse access, was being investigated and thought to be between 80,000 to 120,000 years old, the letter says.
"Does this not tell you something," she says.
"This is an area where our people were quite heavily populated and utilised this area for traditional customs, enjoyment, economy and environment, ceremony and trade over many, many thousands of years."
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