Heritage

The Process of Enlisting an Item on the Victorian Heritage Register

In order to determine whether a place or object be included on the Victorian Heritage Register, it must first be nominated. A nomination must be supported by substantiated reasoning and/or evidence. The Executive Director assesses the information that is available to him/her and then responds to the nomination through a Recommendation to the Heritage Council of Victoria. The Recommendation is made public and third parties get the opportunity to make a submission to either support or challenge the Executive Director’s Recommendation. In their submission a party may request that a Heritage Hearing be held; in which case the Heritage Council of Victoria has little choice but to honour the request.

The Council will set a date for a Hearing and all parties are required to submit information for their presentations. The Executive Director then reviews the information that is received and makes a second Recommendation in reply. All parties’ submissions are then circulated to all concerned and the opportunity to make a final Submission in Reply is granted.

The Heritage Hearing is held, at which no new evidence is allowed to be presented. Each party has the right to make an uninterrupted presentation which is followed by questions. There may be some discussion and debate at the hearings in order to ‘flesh out’ issues concerning heritage. At the conclusion of the Hearing the Heritage Council of Victoria will advise of when a final decision may be made.

What went down at the Hearing?

On May 2nd, 2014 the Save the Palace Committee attended a Heritage Hearing to discuss the significance of the Palace Theatre. All parties acknowledged that the Palace Theatre has social and cultural significance. The question that remained was whether or not that significance was important to the State of Victoria, or whether it was only locally important.

In order to be included on the Victorian Heritage Register, a place or object only needs to satisfy one criterion from the Heritage of Victoria Criteria for Significance. Evidence does not need to be physical nor existent, so long as it is well documented. This documentation may even take the form of ‘oral history’, so basically, spoken word.

We believe that the Palace Theatre thoroughly satisfies most of the Criteria and thus should be included on the Victorian Heritage Register.

To find out why we and so many others believe that the Palace is significant, take a look at what we presented to the Heritage Council.

Visual Presentation accompanied by Oral Presentation