REPORT ON THE EXTRAORDINARY MEETING WEDNESDAY 13TH 2014 COUNCIL CHAMBERS Predictably we were left waiting forty minutes before this meeting commenced to deal with the rates issue. 9 speakers registered. The standout performance must go the the General Manager Gary Chapman who spent most of the meeting asleep. That pretty much sums up the meeting, it was a perfect demonstration of the lack of importance to the QCC of the diabolical rates debacle. He obviously found the whole thing tedious and just so boring! (Instead of counting sheep folks, we should revisit last nights meeting. There are many of us needing to count sheep at present!) Chapman actually proceeded to bore everyone with intricate detail about how old our infrastructure is and in need of updating....rararara. To the tune of $80 mill. Makes this fund raising debacle of 3.7 million look a bit poor doesnt it? Looks to me that they are in some financial strife due to very poor management. I wont bore you with the rest of his speech, he actually was reasonably awake for that bit but promptly went back to sleep. They (Chapman and Overall) prattled out the same old line.....legislation obligation....with their expensive lawyer Bradley sitting very quietly to the side. Given the assumptions he was given by the council in order to come to his legal advice he must have been squirming...legally. Their assumption was we want to recover this money so tell us what to do,(equivalent to we want to say that back is white so tell us how to it legally). (Just on this point....What if this audit found that the money lost was as the result of corruption? Is the council still legally obliged to recover the costs by the rate payers? I should think not! What is the penalty for the council for not choosing to recover these costs under the Local Government Act? Do the council personnel involved and the Mayor go to jail? Are they criminally liable?) So, back to the minutes. The following recommendations were carried. 1 That Council write to the NSW Minister for Local Government seeking an amendment to the Local Government Act and Regulations which will allow a Council to write-off or waive retrospective rates and charges. 2 That Council write off all affected property owners advising that all supplementary rate notices having rate arrears are on hold until further advice is received. 3 That Council proceed with issuing refunds to those property owners that are due a refund. (we know the majority of these refunds are under $20) Crs Jamie Cregan, Kenrick Winchester and Brian Brown were all very outspoken. Cr Sue Whelan also put forward a notion that caused some sweat beads from the front desk. Brian was sent to the naughty chair by the Mayor Tim, Jamie put forward a motion that made them squirm and Kenrick asked for certain matters to be divulged that also caused movements of discomfort. (More on what these matters are later) So it boils down to this. The powers that created this mess, with full knowledge of the ramifications are now in favour of seeking the turning over of their creation. Really? Do we trust them? Not for one minute! This is just the beginning.
Posted on: Wed, 13 Aug 2014 21:54:42 +0000
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