Council wrong move on Sustainability

It is distressing to see the extent that Hornsby council is quickly moving towards government by General Manager and officers without community or even councillor oversight. At the recent council meeting the council General Manager had put up proposals to scrap several of the committees where councillors and interested members of the public can work with council officers to have input into council, and oversight of the performance of council.

Perhaps of chief concern is the proposal to scrap the Sustainability Action Committee. The view of the GM and council officers appears to be that this committee is no longer needed.

Yet in moving this way council ignores many fine statements made throughout council’s management plans and website, put succinctly on the website introduction.

“The Committee works with Council and community in order to achieve its strategic intent of creating a living environment towards a sustainable future.

The Committee’s mission is to ensure a healthy future for Hornsby Shire by fostering sustainable social, environmental and economic practices by council and the community.”

And elsewhere

“It is important in Hornsby Shire Council’s approach to sustainability that decision making processes create an environment in which all stakeholders can become involved in the planning and management of their communities. It requires an emphasis on open, deliberative approaches to decision-making.”

One has to ask why the GM is moving in direct opposition to these fine sentiments ?

Does the GM feel they have done all that is necessary on the sustainability front ? But you only have to look at the GM’s own report, measuring council performance against a fairly faint hearted set of sustainability ambitions, to see that even they do not think so.

Just to pick a few action items and the comments against them

• ·         Continue to implement the Hornsby 2020 Sustainability Framework across council – Limited progress due to resource constraints
• ·         Progress Quadruple Bottom Line sustainability decision making and reporting system within council – No progress due to resource constraints
• ·         Use GIS software to measure bushland cleared illegally – No mapping available.
• ·         Aim for 50% of waterways to be classed as healthy – only 36% measured as “good”, 56% as “poor”

And under the actions for a resilient local economy

• ·         Continue to implement the actions contained in the Sustainable Business Strategy – No progress due to resource constraints.

And as to the big ambition of council expressed in the Community Plan, to become “Carbon Neutral” ? The GM’s report does not even mention the word Carbon!

If the Sustainability Action Committee goes, who will oversight council performance?  GM’s report was waived through the council meeting, despite me putting my name down and requesting to speak on the matter. Not a single councillor questioned the general manager and officers on these complete failures of performance. Without the Sustainability Action Committee is this what we can expect to be the standard performance review from now on?

The community at the council meeting certainly expressed their dismay at this move. But it was very disappointing to see that some of our new councillors evidently were not interested, perhaps shirking the work involved on being on such a committee. Fortunately a holding move was successful, for the committee to be reviewed.

Again, one has to ask why the move, as there is not even any cost saving justification cited in proposing the scrapping of this committee. Does the GM think that the councillors and community are not interested, have nothing more to contribute ?Or that sustainability doesn't matter any more?

It is imperative that the community remind councillors that sustainability is the core principle of the council’s management plan, and that both councillors and the community must be able to oversight performance, and contribute fresh thinking to the council. We definitely need the Sustainability Action Committee. 

Results - Hornsby Council Elections, 2012

Hornsby Council Elections, 2012

Final Results for Hornsby

Mayor - Steve Russell (Liberal)
A Ward
- Nathan Tilbury (Liberal)
- Mick Gallagher (Independent)
- Anthony Anisse (Liberal)
B Ward
- Robert Browne (Liberal)
- Nick Berman (Independent)
- Gurdeep Singh (Liberal)

C Ward
- Michael Hutchence (Liberal)
- Jerome Cox (Liberal)
- Bernadette Azizi (Independent)

How Close did we get

Final Count before elimination

A ward reported turnout 84.84% Informal vote 13.93% Quota Liberals #1 1 Liberal  #2 .78 Mick Gallagher (4068) .74 Greens (3,774) .58 Berman #1 MSmart (3,736) .57 Christian Dem .16 Greenwood .16

B ward Reported turnout 83.45% Informal vote 14.58% Quota Liberals #1 1 Berman 1 Liberal  #2 .73 Greens .49 Berman #2 .45 Linda Wu .33

C ward Reported turnout 83.83% Informal vote 12.01% Quota Liberals #1 1 Liberals #2 1 Berman #1 .96 Greens .68 LDP .21 Nichols .10 Liberal #3 .05

Mayor Turnout 84.45% Informal Vote 4.72% Russell 42.92% Berman 40.07% Gallagher 13.30% Whelan 3.71% Final Result, after prefs Russell – 40,009 Berman – 38,678

In all wards, Liberals took 2 of the 3 first places. In wards B & C The Berman team, with their very high campaigning effort, took the third spot.

In ward C, Greens were the next significant group, with only the minor party LDP and unknown independent  to beat.

In B ward, where Nick Berman was the lead Berman candidate, we nevertheless managed to beat the number 2 on the Berman ticket.

In A ward, where the other main Mayoral Candidate, Steve Russell, was lead candidate for the Liberals, the fight for the next 2 spots was between

• the Liberal # 2, riding on the coat tails of the strong Liberals campaign for Steve Russell
• Mick Smart (the only sitting councillor on Berman's team)
• Mick Gallagher, the well known local identity who has previously served as councillor and Mayor, backed by the local newspaper (Bush Tele)
• The Greens

I consider it a small victory to have finished ahead of Mick Smart on first preferences(3,774 to 3,736). But final result after preference distributions was that Mick Smart beat me 4,389 to 4,308.

At that stage Anthony Anisse was at 5,862 and Mick Gallagher at 5,736.

After our preferences were distributed, Mick Gallagher finished narrowly ahead of Anthony Anisse by 6,101 to 6,004.

What would have happened if I had beaten Mick Smart at that stage ? From my analysis I would only have picked up about 30 preferences, so would not have caught either Mick Gallagher or Anthony Anisse.

Comparisons with 2008 LGA Election

A ward 2012 First Preferences Greens         3,574, 13.86%

A ward 2012 First Preferences Gallagher      4,584 15.46%

A ward 2008 First Preferences Greens      4,202, 16.9%

A ward 2008 First Preferences ALP          3,149, 13%

A ward 2008 First Preferences Gallagher 1,839,   7%

A ward 2008 First Preferences Smart        3,348, 13%

Worth noting that the ALP at a branch level decided to support Berman's team. Yet in A ward Mick Smart barely picked up any of them, and we didn't pick any up either. They all seem to have gone to Mick Gallagher

B ward 2012 First Preferences Greens               3,315, 11.75%

B ward 2012 First Preferences Berman team    10,419 36.94%

B ward 2008 First Preferences ALP                4,223, 18%

B ward 2008 First Preferences Berman team  9,188, 40%

Where did that 18% ALP vote go? Berman didn't pick up any, but we picked up 12%

C Ward 2012 First Preferences Greens  4,857 17.00%

C Ward 2008 First Preferences Greens  5,136  21%

C Ward 2008 First Preferences ALP     3,370, 14%

Council Elections 2012

Council Elections 2012

Reflections on Greens performance at Local Government Elections 2012 for Hornsby Council

Firstly, a big thank you to all the volunteers. So many of you did a long stint.  Thankfully it was beautiful day for it, though I know some were not lucky enough to have shade. I hope most of you found it a positive experience, and would be willing to do it again – Federal election probably next year :-)

Next, let's recognise some of the successes

• we stood a team of candidates in each Hornsby ward, for the first time. 3 real candidates.
• Ku-ring-gai council continues to have an "Independent Green"in Elaine Malicki. And, drawn from the hat, she is Mayor again.
• We got 14% of the vote, when the State average was reportedly considerably lower. The national polls were showing us at a short term low of around 9%.
• The SMH actually "congratulated" Hornsby on an increased Greens vote ~without realising our Green vote count was up only due to running 3 wards for the first time, and thus increasing our vote count despite the dipping percentage.

The Campaign

Obviously, we have done better, we could have done better, we should have done better, we must do better. What are the major things we could have done better.

• Better engaged with the community in the first place
• Started our campaign and endorsed candidates much much earlier
• Somehow energised more people to be really active in the campaign

In this campaign we ended up with really only 4 people highly active in the campaign ~Sherrie, Janet Castle, Jack Gough and myself (Excluding Janet Ellis, who, although one of our candidates, was busy running the Ryde Epping campaign). With support delivered as promised by John Inshaw. With only small contributions from a very few  others.

Personally, this meant I as a candidate had no time for issues or the media. I was 100%  occupied with materials and logistics. No door-knocking  no attending community events and meetings for months. Similarly, Sherrie was buried trying to get coverage for us in the media, writing letters to the editor, organising and preparing for the related planning forum.

Janet did a great, almost lone job of ringing volunteers, but even she was absent for the last week. (On holiday!!! What kind of an excuse is that?)

And of the main four of us, three had full time jobs, while Sherrie was dealing with an elderly sick mother in and out of hospital, and a couple of times threatening to die.

And, let's put it on the record, our 3rd lead candidate contributed nothing to the campaign, and was actually a negative to the campaign a couple of times. OK, a seriously damaged knee put her out of action in one way, but actually gave her time off work, still well able to use phone and internet, if she felt like it.

The Vote

But that was the campaign. When it came to the vote, why did we not do better. Have previous campaigns really been much better ?

My belief is that there are a lot of people who have values that fit well with Green values better than with Present Liberal party values. But they are turned off voting for us, particularly at local elections, for a couple of reasons.

• The Greens, as a political party, are tainted in the eyes of the voters just for being a party. As far as they are concerned, as a political party we are probably as bad as Liberal or Labor; controlled from head office, not listening to local issues. This is particularly an issue at local elections when there are notionally independent candidates running.
• Voters somehow expect us, as Greens, to be perfect, but then they find fault with one or two national policy details, such as non-negotiation over "boat people, BDS etc. Largely mis-perceptions, bless our beloved mainstream media, but nevertheless perceptions held by people who should be voting for us, if they are voting on values held in common.
  
  Consequently they can't quite yet bring themselves to vote for all the good things that they do know that Greens stand for. Some would rather play pot luck by picking a local "independent", even if they really have no idea what the person stands for.
  
  True, many expressing such thoughts are only looking for anything to use as an excuse, rather than tell us they never would vote for Greens anyway. But equally, I know many friends, supporters and sympathisers who do find these issues are a hurdle to real commitment to the Greens.
• Of  course, Hornsby was particularly impacted by the Liberals running under the party name this time, instead of as independents. So many people just grabbed the Liberal How To vote, and voted without any more thought than that, whereas previously they had to pay more attention to find out what the different independent groups stand for.

Next Time

Perhaps at the next election we should consider running a mixed group ticket, with Greens and green minded independents. Perhaps a Greens lead candidate, funded by the Greens, but supported by well known locals. At this election, if we had played it right, we might have got Mick Gallagher on our ticket for Ward A. Perhaps we could have supported Linda Wu in B ward and had Sherrie as lead candidate for Ward C. Perhaps we should be seen to be active in Ku-ring-gai by providing a support candidate for Elaine Malicki.

Or could we get away with running a group called "Local Greens", but funded by "The Greens".

But what do other people think ? I know for instance that many advised us to find 3 or 4 specific local issues and run on them, whereas we tended to run on the more general values of grass roots democracy; openness and transparency; appropriate development.

What do you think we could or should have done better ?

How can we do better next time ?

A No Kill pound for Hornsby

As originally posted on facebook page of Monika's Doggie Rescue

A DoggieREscue .com supporter has asked for candidates for Hornsby Council to put their hands up if they will put forward a motion for Hornsby Council to operate a No Kill pound. 

I can go 90% of the way. I will be happy to put a motion that Hornsby Council use a no kill pound located either in the shire, or no more than 15km from the Shire boundaries.

Richard Boult, A ward candidate for the Greens.

The Greens have a comprehensive policy on Animal Welfare, including Companion Animals, which can be summarised as:-

VALUE ANIMALS LIVES
The way we treat animals reflects the way we treat ourselves and our society. The Greens work to ending unnecessary animal cruelty.

For more detail see http://nsw.greens.org.au/policies/animal-welfare 

• Richard B Active-Citizen PS: Our dog Timmy came from Doggie Rescue, and features on the family photo in my election leaflet.
  https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4Erw5XofB58Mm40aU5SQXZ2QUU/edit 

  Monday at 18:56 · Edited · 
• 
  

  ~~~~~ An outstanding pledge for man's best friend!!

  Monday at 16:32 · 
• 
  

  Richard B Active-Citizen Timmy was featured in the Hornsby Bush Telegraph, and was part of our family within a couple of hours of me telling the kids we could probably get a second dog.

  Monday at 19:05 · 
• 
  

  ~~~~~ Our second dog Siena was a 6 month puppy about 2 hours away from being killed when we saved her by fostering via the Australian Working Dogs Rescue Inc. She is so affectionate that she is now a permanent member of our family. We had to go out to somewhere around Camden to get her. I agree with ~~~~ that this is an outstanding pledge from one of our Greens candidates.

  19 hours ago · 
  

My personal involvement with Save the CWA Building

My personal involvement with the Save the CWA building campaign is a useful illustration of my approach to representing the community.

I first heard about the problem when attending a local Greens group meeting at the CWA building, our regular meeting spot. One of the members circulated a petition to "Save the CWA Building", without much explanation.

As I was keen not to give the council any excuse to delay the new Aquatic Centre, I declined to sign the petition at that time, but decided to find out more. My initial thinking was "this building is not as old as me, how can it be Heritage?"

Best way to find out more was to go along to the newly formed Save the CWA building "committee" (STCWABC). I attended a number of  meetings. As I found out more - how much it meant to people in the area, how it was listed by various Heritage organisations, how it was a perhaps rare example of the architecture, I came to appreciate the building more, and people's passion for it.

Now I was faced with a dilemma. Would I support saving the building, if it meant a long delay for Aquatic Centre while other alternatives for access were explored.

Fortunately, Mark Cambourn came up with a very, very realistic, viable alternative, that actually looked better than the council's own proposal. (and to this day I am still convinced was a better proposal, despite all the lobbying and mumbo-jumbo council managed to convince the JRPP with). So now my decision was a lot easier.

• I happily promoted the petitions to Save the CWA building. 
• I wrote to the Hornsby Advocate - see December 2011 blog entry 
• When  STCWABC  was in need of funds to put out adverts about the coming protest meeting, I took that situation to our local Greens group, and they agreed to fund the advertising.
• I asked if it would be OK for our NSW MLC Spokesperson on Heritage matters could speak at the meeting, and got the approval from the STCWABC (well, Judy Hopwood), and I managed to get David Shoebridge MLC to come to Hornsby and address the meeting. (Personally I had other commitments that day so unfortunately could not attend in person)
• I spoke in defence of the CWA building at the Joint Regional Planning Meeting.

Useful illustration of my approach to representing the community.
I believe this illustrates my openness to listening to, engaging with, community groups, understanding what is important to the community (regardless of my own prior opinion), why it is important, and then making sure their voice is heard in the right places, and do what I can to support that group, to empower that group.

This is what you can expect from me if I am elected as Councillor for A ward. I want to engage with and empower* community groups. Not just on heritage, but on all matters of community interest, including local area community groups and interest groups such as sport, arts, environment, social action etc.

Provided only that the issue is not in opposition to any of the Greens core Principles, which are values shared by the vast majority of community groups - Grass Roots Democracy, Social and Economic Justice and Equity, Sustainability and protection of the Environment, Peace and Non-Violence.

*By Empowerment I mean

• making sure the group has all the information available, to help them develop a real knowledge of the issue, 
• has the resources to properly function as a group and consider an issue -  perhaps a meeting place, a minutes secretary, a professional facilitator, expert advice, distribution of information, notices etc,
  and 
• that people know the group is being recognised by council as a legitimate voice of the community that must be listened to, properly recognised and responded to.

By publicly recording this, I have also empowered the community to hold me to account. :-)

Do you trust your councillors ? Do they really listen to you ?

Standing as a candidate for council, I find many of the candidates across the political spectrum say the same things – stop overdevelopment, protect the suburbs, cut costs and waste. And they promise to listen to community groups.

But the track record of many councillors is far from this. So why should we expect more from Greens councillors? Why should we trust them more than independents or Labor or Liberal party councillors?

The Greens councillors are bound to a few key principles – grass roots democracy, social and economic justice, sustainability. Greens councillors will always judge decisions on these principles, as well as local input, local knowledge and wisdom, and if they are tempted to waver there are plenty of people to remind them of these principles.

This makes Greens councillors quite different to independent councillors, often single issue candidates, who, once they are elected, have no checks and balances to keep them to their promises, don’t have published principles and members to keep them on track. Too often Independents are swayed by developer interests, or their own or friends personal interests or opinions. Greens councillors are always reminded of the principle that they are there for the community.

On the other hand, councillors from the two big parties have usually had their selection influenced by the party machine, and are beholden to the party hierarchy. At any time they can be told to pull their head in, if, for a current example, they conflict with the State party over matters such as planning laws, state developments etc. In contrast, Greens councillors are selected entirely at local group level, and the local group is autonomous from the party head office, provided only that they stick to the core principles. But Greens councillors  are empowered by the group knowledge and power of over 100 councillors and mayors throughout NSW, with a growing number of representatives and support and research staff in parliament.

And Greens councillors don’t just listen to their communities, or consult with them based on predetermined positions. Our commitment to grass roots democracy incorporates three key aspects that make us different, that truly empower communities.

Firstly, we are committed to open, transparent and accountable councils. So the community know all the facts and figures. No “we know more, but we are not prepared to tell you” excuses for making decisions the community do not want. Away with the culture of secrecy. Make information easily accessible, in a very understandable forms. Not reams of paper with thousands of words but too often missing the crucial information.

Secondly, we believe the council should empower the community, by empowering community groups to better engage with council. Help groups form, help them recruit members, gain skills in running a group and democratically representing their members and community, have an active program of engagement between council and the groups, funded by council.

Thirdly, we don’t believe council, in its councillors and the council staff, have any monopoly on wisdom and good ideas. We believe that the community often is as well or better equipped with both. True council engagement should be seeking to bring forward those ideas and that expertise to combine with those from the professional staff, with their role more one of melding the ideas into the overall council proposals, plans and actions. And by using local expertise perhaps cutting the costs of outside consultants, who anyway too often just say what the council wants to hear.

Council must engage with the community from the start to build Vision and Future Plans, not just late in the game going to the community to “consult”, often in reality to sell and get approval for a decision already made internally. Not one 3 minute say at a council meeting, but properly facilitated workshops with brainstorming sessions and other processes to draw forward ideas, to develop realistic plans, to fully engage a knowledgeable and empowered  community.

So let’s build a council we can trust. Whoever else is on council, make sure there are enough Greens councillors there that are truly committed to making grassroots democracy a reality. Use your preferences wisely.

Mining Billionaires

Commenting on Wayne Swans article in The Monthly - 

The 0.01 Per Cent: The Rising Influence of Vested Interests in Australia

Responding to one of the comments

@aussiegreg - re “Mining billionaires are not just speaking for themselves, but at the very least for their thousands of employees and tens of thousands of shareholders, including our superannuation funds.”

There is no way you should assume they speak for their workers. They simply buy their labour with $, and implicitly threaten them with loss of $ if they speak out against them.
Hey, if Palmer or Reinhardt are prepared to pay me, I’ll work for them. And then donate a large slice of my income to fund anyone willing to fight them.

Each is just one man/woman with one vote in our democracy. His/her vote, and his ideas, are no more worthy of consideration than mine, and no less. But he/she has the $$ to buy what they cannot sensibly argue for, their continued enrichment at the expense of our environment, our climate.

Those thousands of workers could just as easily work in Renewable Energy projects. But the .01% don’t want to invest there, because, screw the common good, that doesn’t make them as rich!

The minerals are a common good, and we should demand a decent return on letting them go. Don’t let the billionaires hoodwink you into thinking their fortune will be willingly shared, or used for the common good.

- Clive Palmer didn’t get his way in soccer, now he’s prepared to wreck the whole sport out of spite. Other people’s passion is just his plaything.
- Gina Reinhardt (who inherited her wealth) doesn’t like the way she is represented in parts of the press, so she wants to buy up that press. What will she care about real reporting and journalism. (Which is why I’ve just subscribed to NewMatilda!)

If you trust these billionaires, then you are a mug. At least Bill Gates and Warren Buffet made their billions without polluting the planet, and are determined to give the money back to the benefit of society. No sign of that with our “Rich Bastards”.