Case Study – Community engagement ensures successful delivery of Black Diamond abandoned mines project

For all projects, DMP requires proponents to carry out community and stakeholder engagement to ensure interested and affected parties are informed regarding any proposed activities.

To this same aim, the department carried out similar engagement for its rehabilitation of the Black Diamond abandoned mine site near Collie. The department’s Abandoned Mines team undertook extensive consultation during the year to ensure the delivery of the project – the first pilot site to be rehabilitated under DMP’s Abandoned Mines Program.

Black Diamond, located approximately five kilometres west of Collie in the South West of Western Australia, has become a popular unmanaged recreation area since mining ceased in the pit in the 1950s. Black Diamond was selected as an Abandoned Mine Program pilot site due to the safety concerns associated with the steep pit wall on the southern side of the pit.

To ensure that the concerns of the local community were properly considered as part of this project, a Black Diamond Working Group was established and met regularly throughout the project. The working group consisted of representatives of the Shire of Collie, the Collie Visitors Centre, the Department of Lands (DoL), adjacent landowners and the Black Diamond Action Group. In addition to working group meetings, a Community Consultation Forum was held in May 2016 to ensure that the works proposed would achieve a long term solution that was supported by the community.

Following six months of consultation and engagement, civil works began, funded by interest generated from the Mining Rehabilitation Fund. These works aimed to shape the steep southern pit wall and manage erosion on the western end of the pit lake.

In June 2017, revegetation works on the remediated areas were completed to improve the area’s visual amenity, reduce levels of erosion and protect and conserve the local biodiversity. DMP partnered with industry, the Shire of Collie, DoL, and the community, including the local primary school, to maximise the likelihood of obtaining revegetation success within the remediated areas.

Although DMP’s involvement with the Black Diamond project has come to an end, the local community will continue to work with the relevant land managers to create a managed recreation space for the region.

Allanson Primary School students plant trees as part of the revegetation works at the Black Diamond site.