29 June 2026
North Sydney mayor Zoe Baker has used a lengthy impassioned speech to effectively shut down a campaign by Kelly’s Place Children’s Centre to delay its eviction from Hume Street, arguing council had to choose the wider public need for open space over the childcare centre’s wish to remain on the site.
Cr Baker said the decision was ultimately about “the needs of a few against those of the many and the broader public interest”.
Council voted to adopt a report confirming it will not extend Kelly’s Place’s lease beyond 31 December 2026 and will not retain the childcare building within the stage two expansion of Hume Street Park.
The decision clears the way for council to proceed with the next stage of the park expansion, which is expected to deliver at least 2000 square metres of additional open space in the rapidly growing Crows Nest and St Leonards precinct.
It followed a heated debate in which Greens councillor Angus Hoy broke with the majority bloc of Labor and the Real Independents to support the Kelly’s Place campaign, arguing council should at least test whether the centre could be retained in the park design.
But Cr Baker said the issue had been before Kelly’s Place and council for many years and the time for delay had passed.
“Kelly’s Place has been on notice for 14 years. Its lease has had demolition clauses in it for 10 years,” she said.
She said the council had spent years extending the centre’s lease and trying to find relocation options, but the centre’s requirements had made that task impossible in Crows Nest.
“The requirements that Kelly’s Place has put forward are unreasonable,” she said.
“450 square metres of both inside and outside space in Crows Nest is impossible and that’s why the council has been unable to find a new location and why Kelly’s Place itself has not been able to put something on the table.”
Cr Baker rejected suggestions that council was rushing the decision or that the park project lacked proper planning.
“There was a suggestion that there’s no clear plan or consultation on what the park at Hume Street stage two of Hume Street Plaza will look like and that’s not true,” she said.
“There was a concept plan adopted by council in 2015 and there is currently a pre-design consultation on exhibition now. That’s the first of two consultations. The second will be the post-design consultation with the final design. That is how community consultation in strategic planning when it comes to implementation works.”
Cr Baker said claims that the state government was open to keeping the existing Kelly’s Place building within the park were “really an exaggeration”.
She also rejected Bank Street, North Sydney as an alternative site, saying council had already determined in November 2025 that it was not viable.
“Not only does it currently house the base for more than a hundred families for family daycare, all of whom are local residents and who are amongst the lowest socioeconomic band in our community, it is located in a cul-de-sac, a residential cul-de-sac,” she said.
“The traffic generation alone for a 40-plus childcare centre space would mean that it would be refused if there were any development application.”
Cr Baker said the debate had focused heavily on Kelly’s Place families while giving too little weight to the current and future residents of Crows Nest.
“What we know that there is a dearth of is public open space and it is a terrible thing that as a council that we have to be considering the balancing 40 childcare spaces against the needs of tens of thousands of people who currently live in Crows Nest and will be moving there,” she said.
She said the precinct’s population was expected to reach 29,000 by 2036, and even the second stage of Hume Street Park would not be enough to meet the area’s open space needs.
“This isn’t some pretty plaza to walk through on your way to and from the metro,” she said.
“This is a place where you can bring your dog from your apartment to have a pee. This is the place where you can throw a ball. This is a place where you can sit under a tree and read a book because you do not have those facilities available in the density that is there and is coming.”
Cr Baker said leadership required council to stay the course despite pressure.
“Leadership is not measured by how easy the journey to the decision is, but by whether we stay the course and deliver on our commitments,” she said.
“There are always moments of pressure, moments when the course is challenged by the loudest critics, moments when it would be easier to return to the status quo or defer, delay or dilute the original commitment. However, when the outcome is in the long-term interests of our community, our responsibility is to stand steady and to work to deliver it.”
She said council would continue to work with Kelly’s Place on transition arrangements, but criticised the nature of the campaign.
“So far I’ve seen more lobbying and social media activity than any attempt to find a compromise position for a location within the North Sydney local government area,” she said.
“The reality is that the driver of this park has always been about providing open space to the people who live in Crows Nest and that’s the reason that I’ve supported the motion.”
The report adopted by council said the expansion of Hume Street Park had been planned for almost two decades to address a growing open space shortfall in Crows Nest and St Leonards. It said the land occupied by Kelly’s Place had consistently been identified as required for the full park expansion.
Cr Angus Hoy unsuccessfully argued for council’s project design team to develop and exhibit options retaining Kelly’s Place in its current location.
He said the report presented “an unfortunate and false dichotomy” between public open space and community childcare.
“It implies that we must make a choice between two community needs. We can either have public open space or we can have community childcare,” he said.
“At the risk of sounding too Pollyanna, I don’t accept that premise. I do believe that we can have both.”
Cr Hoy said Kelly’s Place was a “proudly community owned not-for-profit institution” that had served Crows Nest since 1988 and should not be treated as interchangeable with other childcare vacancies.
“You cannot simply replace a historic high quality community asset with a commercial for-profit vacancy down the road and call it a win,” he said.
He said the park design had not yet been drawn up.
“We are currently progressing along a timeline to evict a childcare centre to make way for a design that is currently a blank piece of paper,” he said.
Cr Hoy’s stance put him at odds with the majority bloc but aligned him with councillors Jessica Keen, James Spenceley and Efi Carr, who argued council should keep working to save the centre.
Cr Keen said incorporating Kelly’s Place into the park should be investigated.
“We’re all looking to find a solution and I think incorporating the facility into the park is actually a really good solution,” she said.
“You’ve got to think about the two-year-olds that met in early childcare and what we’re suggesting that you evict them out of the facility and then what they go to different childcares. They’re not going to understand that.”
Cr Spenceley said council would be responsible for the outcome.
“Let us be completely clear on this matter,” he said.
“It is our decision tonight whether we want to find a solution that incorporates public open space and community run childcare that incorporates new opportunities for people walking through the metro, but also respects the 40 years of hard work, tradition, love, and support of kids that have gone through a facility.”
Cr Carr said council should not be “trading green space for a childcare centre”, describing Kelly’s Place as valued, well run and necessary infrastructure for Crows Nest.
The motion to accept the report was carried, confirming the end of Kelly’s Place’s tenure at Hume Street and allowing council to proceed with the next stage of the park expansion.