NEWSFLASH: CHRISTMAS TREE IN AVON TERRACE

This evening I received the following email from my friend Roma Paton:

I believe residents of York should be aware attempts were made by me, as a Community Representative on the council endorsed Christmas Decoration Working Party Group, to have the Christmas tree lights turned on in the CBD on the 1st of December. 

The Christmas Decoration Working Party Group (a separate group to the Children's Christmas Party) was responsible specifically for the Christmas Tree in the main street, the large historic cards, bin surrounds, laser tree lighting and the Best Decorated Business competition. 

I am happy for you to publish the email I sent to members of the Christmas Decoration Working Party and also forwarded to all councillors well before their last council meeting ensuring they had plenty of time to make the decision to turn the lights on on the 1st December. 

Roma 

Here follows the full text of Roma’s email, sent on 26 November 2016 to Shire President Wallace, Deputy President Smythe, Crs Ferro, Heaton, Randell, Saint and Walters, shire employees Paul Martin, Esmeralda Harmer and Carol Littlefair, and lay members of the Christmas Decorations Working Party:

Good Afternoon Everyone,

Re: turning on of lights

I have spent hours considering whether to make comment or not, unsure if decisions have been finalised or if the decision still has to go before Council to be endorsed. As no one else on the working group appears to have expressed their opinion - if they have I have not been copied in - I  concluded I must speak up and risk being the odd one out on the working party group.

I do not believe it is appropriate to leave turning on the Laser tree Lights and Christmas Tree lights to the 10th December - just 15 days before Christmas.  

An enormous amount of Ratepayers money has been spent and that expenditure should be maximised for the enjoyment and benefit of everyone.  

Other local government areas already have their decorations up and lights turned on.

The Lights, Historic cards and Christmas tree have been funded by the Ratepayers for all the Ratepayers to enjoy and the lights should be turned on on the 1st December to bring the Christmas atmosphere into the CBD at the earliest opportunity.  This would also serve to encourage support for the local businesses who themselves have put in a huge effort to bring some Christmas atmosphere into the shopping precinct. 

The Children's Christmas party in Peace Park is specifically for children - hence the name.   

Children attend from many other towns in the Valley.  This event has become extremely popular and increasingly crowded over the years it has been held.   It is not a function Adults without children feel comfortable attending, let alone elderly residents.  

The Christmas Tree, decorations and laser lights are for all the residents.  Please reconsider the date the lights are turned on so it is inclusive of all residents.  

Kind regards

Roma 

York's Christmas Tree, 2016

AND THE BEAT GOES ON…

How rife is corruption in WA local government, and what can be done to prevent it?

In 2015, the WA Crime and Corruption Commission reported to Parliament that ‘systemic weakness’ in the local government sector had resulted in numerous cases of alleged misconduct, including eight involving ‘irregularities’ in procuring goods and services—that is, in awarding contracts to suppliers.

This ‘systemic weakness’, the report suggested, signifies a widespread failure among local governments to ensure an adequate degree of control over municipal spending through audit and risk procedures.

The report suggested that

While it is difficult to prevent a determined person from committing fraud, the opportunities and temptations can be greatly reduced through an appropriate control framework.

Well, yes…but how diligent are councils in maintaining such a framework, and what is it about local government that seems to attract self-serving ‘determined persons’ with a penchant for trickery and fraud?

Examples of misconduct by council employees…

In one of those CCC cases, an employee of the City of Stirling had colluded for seven years with seven different building contractors, in the process trousering a handsome $600,000 over and above his legitimate emoluments.

At the Shire of Kalamunda, CEO James Trail spent more than $800,000 on management systems software, disregarding the more prudent and frugal limit of $200,000 budgeted by the shire council. 

Needless to say, the grateful software merchant rewarded Mr. Trail by paying for a flight in business class to London, where he was to attend a conference.  As well, it presented him with $2000 as spending money for the trip and (a nice touch) tickets for cricket matches at Lord’s.

James Trail, former Kalamunda CEO (PerthNow)

In the Wheatbelt, we’ve witnessed the tragic case of Dacre Alcock, former CEO of the Shire of Dowerin, who is now doing time for having over several years redirected hundreds of thousands of ratepayers’ dollars into the gaping coffers of online betting agencies.

…and by councillors

It isn’t only council employees that game the local government system. 

In 2008, the Mayor of Cockburn, Stephen Lee, was up for re-election.  A property developer with significant real estate interests in Coogee paid $43,500 to a PR firm to bolster Mayor Lee’s campaign. 

Unaccountably—in both senses of the word—the mayor omitted to declare this generous gift in his annual return.

And speaking of gifts, let’s not overlook the scandal surrounding Perth’s Lord Mayor, Lisa Scaffidi.  Lord Mayor Scaffidi is a sophisticated, highly intelligent local government personality with the hide of a rhinoceros and a jumbo-sized sense of entitlement.  (Perhaps she should change her name to Lisa Safari.)

Now there’s a lady with chutzpah.  The CCC found her guilty of serious misconduct relating to an undeclared gift from a corporate admirer, BHP-Billiton.  This wasn’t perfume, nail polish or a T-shirt from Target but a hospitality package worth $36,500 covering the expense of a visit to the Beijing Olympics.

So does Lord Mayor Scaffidi repent her offence and humbly beg pardon of the mob? Not on your nelly!  Up goes the middle finger, while the bewitched burghers of Perth confirm the mandate of heaven by re-electing her to a third term in office.  

Perth's Lord Mayor, Lisa Scaffidi (ABC)

And here’s one of my favourites, culled from the casebook of the Department of Local Government and Communities. 

In 2012, a DLGC enquiry found that then City of Canning Mayor Joe Delle Donne and two other councillors had made

…improper use of their office as council members with the intent and purpose of gaining directly or indirectly an advantage for the Mayor’s daughter’s father-in-law and in so doing caused a detriment to the local government and the persons selected as preferred applicants.

A neat combination, you might think, of nepotism and patronage.  Thank goodness, nothing like that could ever have happened in York. 

  

Joe Delle Donne as Mayor of Canning (The West Australian)

Mice that roar

Now we travel northwards to Exmouth, a pleasant seaside town on the tip of Northwest Cape, famed far and wide as the gateway to Ningaloo Marine Park—where you can swim with whale sharks—and home to an important defence facility and a large painted replica of a prawn. 

Exmouth's Big Prawn (Kailis Bros.)

 Although a major fishing and tourist centre, Exmouth is a small town with only 2594 permanent inhabitants of whom 1469 are electors.  Its local government, the Shire of Exmouth, has 74 full time employees and holds sway over 6261 sq. kms of the West Pilbara region. 

According to the DLGC’s My Council website, the shire’s revenue in 2014/5 amounted to $16,139,102, compared with an operating expenditure in the same year of $18,113,046. 

The shortfall of $1,973,944 presumably goes some way to explain why the shire’s FHI (financial health index) weighs in at a mediocre 65, which is 5 points less than the minimum figure nominated by the DLGC as denoting a reasonable degree of financial health.

Still, some mice can roar, and the Shire of Exmouth is roaring even louder, and with greater effect, than the somewhat more populous Shire of York with its ridiculous Splurj Mahal, the failed York Recreation and Convention Centre. 

A visionary project

The Shire of Exmouth manages several infrastructure projects, most notably the visionary Ningaloo Centre estimated to cost about $32m. 

I don’t know how much of that will be extracted from the pockets of Exmouth ratepayers.  The development is supported by the Commonwealth Government, the WA Department of Regional Development, Royalties for Regions and Lotterywest. 

Perhaps providing management services is part of a partnership arrangement that results in a net financial gain for the shire, though somehow I doubt it.

I said the project is visionary, and it certainly is.  The facilities of the Ningaloo Centre will be devoted to scientific research, data sharing with industry and other interested parties, library services and education, and the promotion of tourism in the Exmouth region and further afield.  

A far cry, then, from York’s white elephant, with its limited appeal to a handful of sports fanatics (whom it doesn’t seem on the whole to have served very well) and a gaggle (or gargle) of superannuated quaffers drawn to the tavern’s promise of subsidised booze like moths to the proverbial flame.   

Admittedly York’s folly has cost—so far—only about one-third of what will be spent in constructing the Ningaloo Centre.

All that said, I’ve yet to be convinced that local governments should play any part in financing and managing grandiose building projects.  In my view, those are enterprises best left to private developers.

 In York, the tennis and bowling clubs were probably much better off before they foolishly lined up behind the Shire’s—that’s to say, CEO Hooper’s—pharaonic sporting hub fantasy.

Gigantic municipal building projects offer too much scope and too many ‘opportunities and temptations’ for fraud and other varieties of bureaucratic misconduct.

But if I had to bet my shirt on the eventual success of either development, the YRCC or the Ningaloo Centre, I would unpatriotically but without hesitation back the efforts of the Shire of Exmouth.

Artist's impression of the Ningaloo Centre (Shire of Exmouth)

 Allegations

More’s the pity, then, that the CCC now finds it necessary to investigate allegations of wrongdoing by the Shire of Exmouth’s CEO, Bill Price, and others on his staff.

At a hearing last week, it was alleged that Mr. Price, without calling for tenders, had awarded the contract to build a 55,000 litre aquarium to a company, Ocean Reefs Production, that had been formed only three months previously. 

It was further alleged that Mr. Price had deliberately misled the Shire Council regarding the award of the contract.

In the words of Tony Power, counsel assisting the Commission:

In the Shire of Exmouth, there appears to have been a blurring of what should be a bright line between the personal interests of senior managers including the CEO on the one hand, and their public functions and their use of public moneys on the other hand. 

Public officers should know where that line is and they shouldn’t cross it’.

Amen to that.

Bill Price, CEO Shire of Exmouth (LinkedIn)

‘Draining the swamp’ 

It’s possible—it may even be probable—that Mr. Price and his colleagues are innocent of every allegation levelled against them.  Mr. Price is represented by one of WA’s most senior criminal barristers, Tom Percy QC, who will no doubt put his client’s case to the Commission with style, vigour and élan.

But it troubles me that stories involving allegations of serious financial misconduct by public officers—elected as well as employed—seem to crop up with tedious regularity in the annals of local government in Western Australia.

Sometimes the miscreants are convicted and packed off to prison, as happened to poor Dacre Alcock.  More often, I suspect, councils unwilling to admit they were duped, and reluctant for that—and less noble reasons—to set an investigation going, quietly edge them out of their jobs and try to bury the evidence as deep as the spade will go.

Saving face, protecting vulnerable reputations and just wanting to ‘move forward’ at all costs are miserable motives for suppressing the truth about crimes and misdemeanours perpetrated against the public interest and the public purse. 

In the USA, President-elect Donald Trump campaigned successfully on a pledge ‘to drain the Washington swamp’.  When he’s done working out how to achieve that objective, he might care to give us a few ideas on how we can drain the municipal swamp over here.

MARK DUPEROUZEL RISES AGAIN, AND I WISH HIM GOOD LUCK

Remember Mark Duperouzel?

He’s the motor mechanic and former York councillor—Deputy President, no less—who conspired with his colleagues Tony Boyle and Pat Hooper to suppress the Fitz Gerald Report, in which like his co-conspirators he had received unfavourable mention.

To make matters worse, he did so behind then Shire President Reid’s back after seeking advice about the said report from Ray Hooper—also unfavourably mentioned, to put it mildly—who had resigned from the position of York CEO a couple of months previously but continued to influence his acolytes in York from his citadel in Alexander Heights.

You can bone up on that sorry story by reading my article The Truth is Out There, posted on this blog on 11 January 2016.

On top of that, Mr. Duperouzel voted to support SITA’s plan to dump millions of tons of metropolitan rubbish in our agricultural zone.  He did so at a meeting in the Town Hall attended by hundreds of angry residents strenuously and vociferously opposed to the landfill. 

He must have had a very good reason for voting in that way, because many of his regular customers, disgusted by his action, decided to take their business elsewhere.

Still, we shouldn’t dwell on the past.  Move forward, as I always say. 

Let’s see if a soufflé really can rise twice.

Mark Duperouzel, minibus entrepreneur

Minibus Hire

Mr. Duperouzel is currently reinventing himself as proprietor of a business known as Avon Minibus Hire.  The website is http://avonminibushire.com.au/.

As well as hiring out its two minibuses ‘with or without a driver’, the business aims to provide guided tours of York’s tourist and heritage sites, picking up passengers at weekends from a designated parking bay on Avon Terrace.

Mr. Duperouzel’s preferred choice of parking bay is in front of the Bendigo Bank.  He has obtained a letter from the Bank to say that it doesn’t mind.  (There’s no reason why the Bank should mind, because it’s closed on Saturdays and Sundays.)

This afternoon Council’s ordinary meeting over at Greenhills will consider Mr. Duperouzel’s application for a permit to operate a commercial business in York and for the exclusive use of a parking bay, with signage, while the business is operating its guided tours.

You can study the details of Mr. Duperouzel’s application, along with the Shire officers’ recommendations, on pages 41 to 45 of the agenda for today’s meeting under the heading SY122-10/16 – Avon Minibus Hire.

I’m sure Council will view his application sympathetically, and so it should.

Parking in Avon Terrace

As the Shire's officers point out, the application is consistent with relevant provisions of the Strategic Community Plan and if approved, will promote tourism and is unlikely to hinder the operation of other businesses.

However, the officers are clearly less than happy about Mr. Duperouzel’s choice of parking bay.  They suggest other locations might be more suitable, like in front of the Community Resource Centre or the TransWA bus stop across the road from the Shire offices in Joaquina Street.

That’s not a matter on which I feel qualified to comment.  Still, in fairness to Mr. Duperouzel, I have to say there may be a precedent of which he is entitled to take full advantage in pressing his case. 

I’m talking about the decorated green vintage van, belonging to one of York’s most exclusive munching and swigging stations, that can be seen plonked for hours at a stretch at various locations along Avon Terrace over weekends and occasionally at other times. 

As other less obvious parking is usually available, I presume that the purpose of parking the van in Avon Terrace is to advertise the owners’ business to visiting connoisseurs of luxurious accommodation, delicate viands and fine wines.

I also presume that the owners of the business in question have secured Council’s permission to park their van as I’ve described.

Subsidy

Where I take issue with Mr. Duperouzel’s application is with his request for Council to waive all fees associated with it.

The officers state that such an application ‘would generally incur an application fee of $44, and application fees [sic - I think they mean ‘parking fees’] of $11 per day, $121 per month or $1,202 per year’.

For the life of me, I can see no reason why those fees should be waived.  On the contrary, I see every reason why they should be collected.  The most obvious reason is that Council should baulk at setting (yet another) uncomfortable precedent.

What Mr. Duperouzel has in effect requested is that Council should subsidise his proposed business.   The amount is small, but the principle isn’t.   Helping out administratively is one thing.  Handouts are another thing altogether.

A waived fee is still a handout.  Money may not change hands, but a financial benefit is conferred to the detriment of ratepayers and looks like favouritism if it isn’t extended to other businesses in town.

The officers have not recommended waiving the fees. They merely note that waiving them is an option available to Council.

Please, councillors, think carefully before voting on this aspect of Mr. Duperouzel’s application.  If Cr Randell moves to waive fees on the grounds that Mr. Duperouzel is the scion of an old York family, flog him with a handful of emu feathers until he promises to be a good boy.

POSTSCRIPT: The officers’ recommendation was that Council should approve Mr. Duperouzel’s application ‘in principle… subject to determination of an exact location outside the parking region’ and to conditions covering the display of an A frame sign.

At the meeting last Monday 24 October, Cr Randell moved acceptance of the officers’ recommendation.  Cr Walters seconded the motion, which was lost by a majority of 4 votes to 3, with Cr Heaton throwing in her lot with the losing side.

Cr Saint successfully moved, with Cr Smythe seconding, to defer considering the application to the November OCM, on the grounds that Council needed further and better particulars before making up its mind.

 

KNOW YOUR ENEMY: THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT MANAGERS ASSOCIATION

If you want a career in Western Australian local government, it pays big dividends to join the LGMA (WA)

This organisation is the state division of a nationwide network, the LGMA. 

It describes itself as ‘the peak representative body and leading voice for local government professionals in Western Australia’ and ‘a community of professionals working to shape the local government sector’.

Like other ‘professional’ associations, only more so, it is really a trade union, aiming primarily—you might think exclusively—to ‘shape’ (in the sense of ‘inflate’) the salaries, emoluments, perquisites and career opportunities of local government bureaucrats. 

In this respect, it has enjoyed outstanding success, to the overall detriment of ratepayers in most if not all of our cities, towns and shires.

When speaking of blue-collar trade unions like the CFMEU or MUA, we wouldn’t hesitate to use the phrase ‘feather-bedding’ to sum up the nature of the LGMA’s services to its 800 members in WA.

Because LGMA is a white-collar union, we are bound to treat it with the same degree of indulgence as traditionally the legal system has extended to white-collar crime.

I wonder how much influence the association had on the drafting of provisions in the Local Government Act which exempt local government employees from direct public questioning and criticism—turning them, in effect, into a protected species.

 Signs of the times

If you study the association’s website (http://www.lgmawa.org.au/) you will find scant indication that its members are employed to provide services to the ratepayers and residents of the local government areas where they work.

What you will find is the curious slogan ‘Without fear or favour’ and a drawing of a signpost with four arms bearing respectively the words ‘Ethics, Respect, Integrity, Honesty’, all pointing in different directions. 

I’m not sure what we are expected to make of that.  It appears that members may choose any one of those directions, or none of them, as they set out on the golden road to ratepayer-funded prosperity. 

You will also discover that the association has 11 regionally based branches and offers professional development ‘events’ including one entitled ‘Ignite Programs’—presumably relating to the burning of heretics wanting to add a fifth arm to the signpost, one inscribed with the word ‘Transparency’.

‘Networks’

Members can opt to join one or more of 9 national networks, with names like ‘Governance’, ‘Human Resources and Workforce Development’, ‘Age Friendly Communities’, and my favourite, ‘Integrated Planners’.  I bet there are hundreds of integrated planners, each one employed by a local government, busily networking away across Australia, though I’m not sure what an integrated planner is or does or how anyone gets to be one.

It goes without saying that the association enjoys a cosy relationship with the other state members of the local government club, WALGA and the presiding geniuses of the DLGC.  They share activities and preoccupations, and their representatives enjoy the hospitality of one another’s annual talkfests. 

I’m reminded of Adam Smith’s famous observation that ‘People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices’.

Awards

The association likes to award certificates of appreciation to members who have distinguished themselves in some way, for example by having paid their dues on the nail over a very long period of time.

Last year, while he was drawing a salary as Acting CEO of the Shire of York, Graeme Simpson received such an award.  Readers may recall that he was a fellow of the association (FLGMA)—a privilege for which he would have had to pay a bit more than if he had remained a mere member (MLGMA).  

Here’s a photo of him clutching his certificate. 

Graeme is the one on the right.  I don't know who his friend is.

And here’s the accompanying citation.  (I have left the stale cliches, awkward phrasing, questionable grammar, eccentric punctuation and wonky syntax exactly as I found them, while rearranging the paragraphing to make the citation easier to read.)

Graeme Simpson, is currently the Acting Chief Executive Officer at the Shire of York.
However, this hasn’t been his only tough job in recent years.  

  

Becoming a Fellow of LGMA in 1999, Graeme has had a long and successful career in local government.  

But retirement, hasn’t stopped him coming back for more, having taken on a number of difficult temporary or stop-gap postings, in the Shire of Lake Grace, and the Shire of Boddington and now at the Shire of York. 

Graeme has been a steady hand in difficult times, his experience invaluable.  

On these occasions, Graeme’s first thought is to ensure that the local government officers working under him have the support they need to do their jobs.  

His quiet, affable nature, and firm approach to leadership is remembered by all who know him.  

York people may be surprised to learn that the LGMA considers York to have been a tough assignment for Mr. Simpson.  If it was tough, that was because he and his companion in arms Commissioner James Best made it so.

They will be less surprised to learn that Mr. Simpson’s ‘first thought’ was not, as it should have been, for the welfare of the shire’s ratepayers and residents, but instead to support the Shire workforce—regardless of how well or badly they were performing.

Remember his kneejerk defence as Acting CEO of his ‘exemplary employees’—some of whom, later subjected to wiser scrutiny, are now seeking their fortunes elsewhere?

 *******

POETRY CORNER

The Ballad of Grababyt Swansong

Have you heard about Grababyt Swansong?

He was Acting CEO

Of the Shire of Outer Mongolia

Not so many moons ago,

And most of the people who live in the shire

Wept buckets to see him go.

He’d held that exalted position

In several shires before:

Those postings were tough, rough and difficult,

But he kept coming back for more,

Relying on a pittance—about four grand a week—

To banish the wolf from his door.

As kingpin of Outer Mongolia

He teamed up with Jimmy the Rat,

Who conjured grotesque ‘ideations’

From the depths of his ‘visioning’ hat,

Convinced, so it seemed, that the ratepayers

Would be happy to fork out for that.

His ‘quiet and affable nature’

He hid from the popular view,

But he kept a firm hand on the tiller

And always supported his crew:

Propping them up was priority one

When brickbats from ratepayers flew,

For the Shire was an unsafe workplace,

The most hazardous under the sun.

Every day came a fresh nervous breakdown,

Not a day would go by but someone—

Feeling threatened by truths that popped up on the blogs—

Reached for pills, poison, rope or a gun.

He wasn’t as smarmy as Jimmy,

He didn’t suck up to the nobs

Like Lord and Lady Ecstasy

And other establishment snobs,

But he’d hold up two fingers like chopsticks

At the sight of us yokels and yobs.

So here’s to old Grababyt Swansong!

Long may he prosper and thrive!

He’s one of the world’s great survivors,

He knows how to duck, weave and dive:

There’s hope for us peasants out here in the sticks

While fellows like him are alive!

© Norah, Lady Rapture of Favorsdone Hall

GREAT WALL BLUES

Chinese local authority ‘vandalism’ goes viral on the Net

Last week the Internet buzzed with reports from China concerning the concreting over of a mile-long section, dating from 1381, of the historic Great Wall.

The dubious ‘restoration’ was carried out on the orders of the Cultural Relics Bureau of Suizhong, a county forming part of northeast China’s Liaoning Province.

One observer complained that what had previously been ‘an unkempt, haunting 700-year stretch of the wall’ now resembled ‘a cement skateboarding lane dumped in the wilderness’.

Ding Hui, chairman of the Cultural Relics Bureau, acknowledged that the changes to the wall were aesthetically ‘not ideal’, adding that ‘the repairs really don’t look good’.

Park officer Liu Fusheng, who first alerted the public and media to what the Bureau had done, called it ‘an act of vandalism carried out in the name of preservation.’ 

He told an interviewer that even little children could see that the work had been botched.

‘It’s like a head that’s lost its nose and ears’, Mr. Liu said.  He explained that the Bureau was supposed to have restored original features of the wall, like fallen stone carvings and crenellations, but had chosen instead to save money by using new bricks and concrete and ‘tossing the carvings aside’.

 

Photo: Shanghaiist.com

Unrepentant

Despite the furor that erupted on national and social media, some local officials remain unrepentant about the Suizhong Bureau’s decision.

Bureau CEO, Wei Hupo, was the most outspoken, describing complainers as ‘idiots and scoffers’ who should reflect on the quality of their lives and ‘either shut up or expect a visit from the municipal ranger’.

Local business identity and former member of the Bureau’s governing committee, Ah Wonwa, refused to be fazed by criticism that the work had ruined a piece of China’s history. 

‘History isn’t for Suizhong’, he said.  ‘It’s only for silk scrolls and embroidered fans’.

An equally dismissive response came from Suizhong celebrity chef and Bureau committee member Wang Delti when he was asked about the likely impact on tourism of the Bureau’s action, which contravened its own policy of restoring historical monuments to their pristine state. 

‘People need to remember that Suizhong isn’t a big city like Shanghai or Shenzhen’, Mr. Wang told a reporter from the Liaoning Gazette and Communist Party Calendar. 

‘It’s in the country, so we have to take a flexible approach to this sort of thing.  Tourists like to walk on our section of the Great Wall, but now and then they used to slip on the ancient bricks.  Any fool knows it’s safer to walk on concrete. 

I anticipate millions of safety conscious tourists coming here, not to mention skateboarders eager for a new and unusual challenge’.

Told that some local residents were up in arms over unsightly damage done to the Great Wall, Mr. Wang replied that he wasn’t interested in the views of such people because they were known to be newcomers to Suizhong. 

‘I think they should be run out of town,’ he said. ‘And my friend and political adviser, Pa Hupa, agrees with me.  If your family hasn’t lived in Suizhong since Confucius invented prawn crackers and dim sums, you don’t count for much around here.

Those troublemakers can bugger off back to Beijing.’

http://shanghaiist.com/2016/09/26/great_wall_of_concrete_investigation.php

http://epaper.bjnews.com.cn/html/2016-09/26/content_653617.htm?div=-1

 

NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND

Paul Miles takes over as local government minister

Following the unseemly, not to say bizarre, departure from office of local government minister Tony Simpson last weekend, Premier Colin Barnett has appointed Paul Miles MLA to replace him. 

Mr. Miles, Liberal member for Wanneroo in the lower house of the WA parliament, will not have to exert himself overmuch to improve on his underperforming predecessor.

The new minister was elected to parliament in 2008.  Previously, he had served as councillor for the City of Wanneroo’s North Ward.  He has an impressive record of community involvement, including stints as president, vice-president, treasurer and secretary of the Wanneroo Lions Club.

Since 2013, he has held the position of parliamentary secretary to the attorney general and the minister for commerce.  He has also chaired the parliament’s joint standing committee on delegated legislation.

Hansard records that Mr. Miles in the course of his parliamentary career has made more than 370 speeches covering a wide range of topics.  His inaugural speech (or ‘maiden speech’, as it used to be known before the virus of political correctness congested the lungs of legislative deliberation) focussed on planning and road safety issues in his electorate.

In his life before politics, Mr. Miles worked in information technology as a senior technician.   Last month, he joined the WA Council for the Ageing in hosting a forum in Wanneroo on cyber security attended, according to his website, by ‘over 100 tech-savvy seniors’.

Mr. Miles now faces what I fancy he will come to regard as the challenge of a lifetime—namely, taking control of the multifarious self-replicating shape-changing lifeforms infesting the headquarters of the WA Department of Local Government and Communities in Gordon Stephenson House.

I wish him all the luck he’s going to need.

Hon. Paul Miles, MLA, Minister for Local Government

POSTSCRIPT:  Please note that my mischievous characterisation of DLGC bureaucrats wasn’t intended to apply to everyone employed by the department.  It was aimed solely at the senior staff responsible, among other evils, for the sacking of our council in 2014; for the appointment of James Best as commissioner, with all of its horrible consequences including the shifty purchase for an outrageous price of the Old Convent School; and for the subsequent persecution of Shire President Reid, culminating in his resignation shortly after resuming office.  We know who those people are, and so do they. 

It wasn’t intended to apply to everyone working for the DLGC.  I’m sure many of them at more junior levels were as disgusted as were most people in York by the actions of their superiors. 

*******

Bowled over?  Yes, but not out

In an article posted at the end of August  (Bowling Club President Pat Hooper Bowls for the Jack but Winds Up Well and Truly Skittled) I responded to a complaint from Mr. Hooper, aired in an open letter addressed to me and in a question he put to Council.

The complaint was that in an earlier article I had said that in 2012 the Shire had taken out a loan for the club but had subsequently waived the club’s obligation to repay the loan in instalments of roughly $30,000 per year.

According to Mr. Hooper, the club ‘had never received or sought’ any such loan.  He demanded an apology.

In my response, I apologised for having mistakenly typed ‘2012’ when I meant ‘2008’.  I then drew attention to the minutes of the special council meeting held on 5 September 2008, which record the offer of a self-supporting contingency loan to the club repayable over 15 years by annual instalments of $29,799.

The club had requested the loan to replace its grass greens with synthetic greens in the event of being unable to get the necessary funds from other sources—hence the ‘contingency’.

I admitted that I had failed in my search of council minutes to find later references to the loan.

Questions

Not long after posting my response, I submitted a series of questions—in writing, not in person—to the September ordinary council meeting.  They were framed as a single composite question.  You’ll find those questions and the Shire’s answers on page 7 of the unconfirmed minutes of that meeting, published on the Shire’s website earlier this week.

As it turned out, only three of my questions required answers (the answers to the first two rendered the others irrelevant).  The only questions of importance here are the first two.  They read as follows:

(a) Did the York Bowling Club in 2008, when Mr. Hooper held the office of Shire President, or at any other time seek a loan from the Shire for the purpose of replacing the grass greens at its former premises with synthetic greens or for any other purpose?

(b) Did the Club accept the Shire’s offer of a loan of $250,000.00 on the terms and conditions indicated above or any variation of them?

Responding to the first question, the Shire confirmed that the York Bowling Club had indeed requested a contingency loan as described above for the purpose of replacing its greens. 

So Mr. Hooper was wrong to suggest that the club had never sought such a loan—but right, of course, to say that the club had not done so in 2012, a fact acknowledged in my article of 30 August.

The answer to the second question was that the Shire had not raised the loan referred to on behalf of the York Bowling Club. 

So I was wrong to suggest that the club had received such a loan, and that repayments had later been waived.

The answer went on to point out that the Shire’s not raising the loan was reported ‘in the financial statements of the 2008/09 Annual Report’.  The 2008/09 Annual Report is my favourite bed-time reading, so goodness knows how I contrived to miss that crucial detail.

I’m happy to stand corrected, and to apologise to the club’s membership, past and present, for my error and for any anger, anxiety or suicidal ideation it may have provoked.

If you see a diminutive figure prowling along Avon Terrace covered in sackcloth and ashes, wailing mea culpa and lashing his back with a nail-studded whip, it will probably be me. 

(Unless it’s Mr. Hooper, belatedly making atonement for his authorship of the infamous ‘Minority Report’.)

An earlier request for money

There was an earlier occasion when the York Bowling Club sought money from the Shire—this time, however, not as a loan, but as a grant of $80,500 to help pay for the replacement of a grass green with a synthetic one.

You can read all about it on pages 72 to 74 of the minutes of the ordinary council meeting held on 15 October 2007, chaired by Shire President Pat Hooper (yes, the very same...).  The transaction is recorded under the heading ‘Late Reports’ as item ‘9.5.1 Application for Community Sport and Recreation Facilities Fund Grant in 2008/2009’.

The grant (or ‘allocation’, as the minutes describe it) is explained as one-third of the cost of replacing a single green, the remaining two-thirds to be funded equally by the club and the Community Sporting and Recreation Facilities Fund, managed I believe by the Department of Sport and Recreation.

Did the York Bowling Club accept this ‘allocation’?  I don’t know, and I won’t risk diminishing the force and value of my apology to the club by taking steps to find out.

One thing puzzles me, though.  In his ‘open letter’, Mr. Hooper ‘reminded’ me of something I hadn’t previously known, namely that ‘the Bowling Club contributed $80,000 to the Forrest Oval reconstruction’.

Would that by any chance be the same money, or most of it, that the club appears to have received as an allocation from the Shire towards the cost of a new synthetic green?
 
Or was Mr. Hooper referring to the club’s agreed contribution to a new green as recorded in the October 2007 minutes?
 

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Kerrie and Farren Wheeler are returning to Esperance.  Does this spell the end of the York Carriage Diner? 

From Facebook:

York Carriage Diner

6 hrs ·

Kellie and Farren are terribly sorry that due to personal reason we have had to close the carriage earlier then expected, we are very very sorry for the inconvenience and would like to thank you all again for your support #york #eat

From Michael Watts and Rob Cameron:

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Kellie and Farren for their time at the Diner.

We wish them every success for the future when they return home to Esperance to start their new venture.

The Diner therefore, will be closed indefinitely from the 1st October 2016, in order to negotiate a replacement team; although we will be open for special functions such as the "Medieval Fayre" on the 2nd October and the "All Ford Day" on the 6th November 2016.

Interested parties in either leasing or buying the business should contact Michael Watts of Elders York - 9641 3000 or Rob Cameron on 0451 944 877.

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