While a number of Councillors, mostly new Councillors, have grand-standed to the public and the press on a number of issues, I have stayed silent since the Council election in early September in the hope that things would settle down, and Councillors would be able to work together positively and amicably for the good of the Armidale Dumaresq community.
Now, some three months after the elections, I cannot stay silent any more, and feel that I must voice my deep concern that this Council is fast becoming dysfunctional. A number of the newly-elected Councillors in particular are showing a dangerous mixture of ignorance and arrogance. On the one hand they claim that they do not have enough information, and are thereby severely hindering, and in some cases, completely halting the normal operations of Council by these delaying tactics, while on the other hand they allegedly know everything better, not only compared to the old Councillors, but also in respect to advice received from the professional staff of Council, as well as from outside experts, be they consultants or from state government authorities.
Let me just recapitulate some of the salient points:
1. A rescision motion was tabled not to accept the final report on the industrial land study, which was needed to feed into the new LEP and in particular to open up land for industrial purposes to boost economic development in Armidale. This rescision motion was withdrawn at the last minute after plenty of press publicity, and after causing considerable delay in this process.
2. A proposal to CONSIDER, yes only consider, a rate increase for 2013/14 to start addressing our infrastructure backlog, subject to public consultation and scrutiny by the IPART consent authority, was rejected, deferring any consid-eration of a perhaps sorely needed increase for the next 18 months. This is in sharp contrast to the new Council in Gunnedah, which acted decisively and has just applied to commence the process of considering significant rate increases to increase its income to a sustainable level.
3. The proposal to apply for a Federal Government RDA grant to assist in the building of an urgently needed new library, which had been the subject of extensive community consultation and committee work, was torpedoed, and replaced, with no prior notice given and no consultation with community groups or any detailed justification, with a proposal to upgrade the airport. Laudable as this aim may be, it should not have been at the expense of the well-prepared library submission, which had (and still has, I believe) overwhelming community support.
4. In response to what can only be called a directive from the NSW Dam Safety Committee regarding safety issues at Dumaresq Dam, Council had resolved to accept a tender which would work towards assisting Council to address the issues, and recommend or put in train the required remedial action by the agency’s deadline of June 30, 2013. This decision has been stymied by a rescision motion, which at best has delayed work on this matter for over one month, or at worst, if passed, can lead to a scuttling of the whole process. Without putting too fine a point on it, we are at risk of defying a State Government authority charged explicitly with dam safety which, to my mind, virtually makes such a rescision motion ultra vires, and would quite frankly put Council beyond the pale in the hopefully unlikely event of a dam failure.
5. With the Damocles sword of a rescision motion hanging over its head, Council agreed to yet another Workshop on this issue, which soon became a travesty, with one Councillor hogging a microphone for one-and-a-half hours, while an engineer from the Dam Safety Committee, who had come up from Sydney to share his expertise with Council, was basically reduced to answering questions or making brief comments, without being given the opportunity in the full two hours to make an uninterrupted presentation. And to make matters worse, two gentleman from the successful tenderers (NSW Public Works Department), who had likewise flown in from Sydney, were kept outside the closed Council doors for these same two hours, with the same filibustering Councillor objecting to their very presence. And yes, it was at this point that yours truly left this travesty of a Workshop after approximately two hours.
I sincerely hope that readers will understand my frustration with what has become a Do Nothing Council. I can only hope that Council, and that means all ten Councillors, can soon get their act together, and actually do something, rather than attempting to block anything and everything just because they haven’t had the time to work through all the issues. If this doesn’t happen as we move into the New Year, and this Council remains dysfunctional, I can only see the very real danger of Council being sacked and an administrator appointed.
Cr Dr Herman Beyersdorf
Deputy Mayor
Armidale Dumaresq Council
