Carol Altmann – The Terrier

A simple but unsettling question underpins this Sunday’s membership drive for Lyndoch Living: why is Lyndoch so scared of the community it serves?

Why has it not allowed one single person from outside Lyndoch to join its membership ranks in the past two years, if not longer?

A not-for-profit, community owned organisation is normally hunting like a hungry Scottie for members who care enough to at least, on a good day, turn up to the AGM.

Speaking of the AGM, here’s another curly question: why are there no annual reports available on the Lyndoch website, other than the most recent? Odd.

And why, in the past two years, has Lyndoch not advertised to fill any board vacancies as they arise?

Every single vacancy has been filled by invitation only.

Is it you?

Is it, gulp, me?

Are we so terrifying that we must be kept at arm’s length from poking around and tearing a hole in the delicate fabric of the Lyndoch Living image?

Surely the community is not that scary, after all, we are talking about the same people whose parents, aunts, uncles, friends and families helped to create Lyndoch in the first place.

Without the community, there would be no Lyndoch.

Believe it or not, the community still owns it.

Admittedly, I don’t expect to be on Lyndoch’s Christmas drinks list. I have never met the CEO and I have never received, like one journo, a string of love hearts on Facebook from a board member. I get that I am never going to be allowed in.

But YOU – as a member of the wider Warrnambool community – YOU should be welcomed with open arms.

So why has Lyndoch – metaphorically – gone and changed the locks while you weren’t looking?

Perhaps, and this is only a theory, Lyndoch is nervous of the potential power of members.

Under its constitution, members can, if they like, ask questions.

Maybe Lyndoch is also twitchy about members being able to call general meetings, where they can pass resolutions, like, say, a vote of no confidence.

Members don’t have to do these things…but they can.

Members, as a group, can be powerful.

Perhaps that’s why Lyndoch is so scared of the community it serves, because its comfort zone has become a place of total control and losing control is, well, terrifying.

If you apply to become a member of Lyndoch on Sunday, and I really hope you will, this theory will be tested.

Applying to become a member does not mean you will be accepted, and therein lies the challenge.

We shall see how many, if any, make it through.

[The sign-up will be held this Sunday, August 15, Civic Green, 11am to 1pm. No fee required. Forms provided. Bring a pen, wear a mask. You can find a membership form in advance here, and the Lyndoch constitution here.]

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Well, well, well…. it turns out former Warrnambool Racing Club chief Peter Downs resigned from the Lyndoch board months ago, but, oddly, officials weren’t told until the very day after The Terrier post on Facebook.

Mr Downs resigned on 18 December 2019 and the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) is supposed to be told of such changes within 28 days.

Despite this, and despite Lyndoch having held at least one board meeting since then, ASIC wasn’t formally notified until 17 February – the day after the Facebook post on The Terrier.

Mr Downs’ profile was also suddenly whipped down from the Lyndoch website.

Funny, that.

As it stands, there has been no public statement by Lyndoch about Mr Downs’ departure after three years on the board, and just three months after he was re-elected for a second term.

While I am sure we’re all happy to help Lyndoch to keep up with its governance free of charge (!), the bigger picture here is cause for concern.

Who replaces Mr Downs?

As we now know, while Mr Downs’ seat at the table sat empty, the Lyndoch board was rejecting membership applications left, right and centre.

You have to be a member of Lyndoch to become a board member.

No new members = nobody can nominate for the board.

Memberships were discarded instantly because the applicants happened to know me, however closely or distantly, or have ‘liked’ a post from The Terrier.

Wow, to think that passes as acceptable.

Board vacancies no longer have to be advertised, as they were under the old rules of Lyndoch that were changed without any of us noticing.

Now, when a vacancy arises, the board members and CEO just hunt around for their preferred applicants.

If any other public body worked this way – imagine the WCC councillors and CEO deciding who could be on the council – there would be rioting in the streets.

For the wider community to have no chance to nominate for the Lyndoch board is an outrage.

In any other world, this would be called branch stacking, or insider trading, or a closed shop, or a cabal, yet we are supposed to accept it as normal.

I keep saying it, Lyndoch is owned by the community and run by the board on our behalf.

That board will hold its monthly meeting on Tuesday.

There it will decide who will replace Mr Downs. The names are in.

It will also decide which membership applications, including that of Vicki Jellie AM, will be accepted or tossed in the bin.

It’s going to be a very interesting test.

There are troubles at Lyndoch. I am going to keep saying it, despite the attempts to silence those who say the Emperor is naked.

Does the current board feel happy with how things are being run? Do they agree with this shutting out of the community? Are they monitoring the numbers of staff on sick leave? Are they happy to sit back and watch and then say they knew nothing and did nothing?

There is a lot to be learnt from what is now unfolding at the Warrnambool City Council about speaking up and standing up.

I, for one, am waiting to see who from the Lyndoch board emerges as a Bernadette Northeast – on the front foot – or as a Cr Michael Neoh – far too little, far too late.

If you would like to help The Terrier keep digging, please visit the Tip Jar here.

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Carol Altmann – The Terrier

In the past two years, Lyndoch Living spent more on lawyers, consultants and accountants than it did on food for residents.

In 2018 and 2019, Lyndoch shelled out an astonishing $2.318 million on accountants, lawyers and consultants, while it spent $2.194 million on food supplies.

In 2018, the gap between the two was especially stark, with less than $1 million spent on food supplies – $994,068 – compared with $1.238 million on accountants, lawyers and consultants.

Chew on that for a moment and I suspect you will feel the same sense of indigestion that came over me.

These unpalatable facts are among the many that fall out when you take a close look at Lyndoch’s financial statements – and a lot of terriers are now taking a good, hard look at the figures, both old and new.

This is how we know that in 2013 the food bill was $992,516, which is not that far off the $994,068 that was spent five years’ later.

Did I miss something? Has the cost of groceries gone down?

I can tell you that what residents pay to live in a nursing home has certainly not gone down nor stayed the same for the past five years.

If you are going to cut costs, surely as an aged care home you don’t start with the food bill?

Judging by the 2019 financials, there is plenty of fat to trim elsewhere, starting with administration costs and the ever-growing number of staff  in the corporate area (59 and counting).

Not surprisingly, the cost of food vs lawyers/consultants/auditors was not mentioned at the Lyndoch Living annual general meeting last October and we can only make the comparison now because of two things:

The full figures have finally been released via the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profits Commission, and, for the first time, legal fees and consultants’ fees have been published in the audited statements.

Speaking of auditors, wow, has that bill shot through the roof.

Last year, Lyndoch’s auditing costs tripled from $13,950 in 2018 to $48,500 in 2019, which is five times what Lyndoch paid for auditing in 2013 ($9800).

Lyndoch changed auditors from local firm McLaren Hunt (which used to be Coffey Hunt) and replaced them with RSM Australia.

Perhaps a stack more number crunching needed to be done because Lyndoch decided to become a company limited by guarantee, buy two medical centres and also the May Noonan nursing home in Terang (I will write more about the medical centres soon).

But even the auditors were paid small beans compared with the $2.25 million spent on lawyers and consultants in the past two years.

$2.25 million.

Oh my goodness, I really am in the wrong business.

This $2.25 million would include hiring consultants for the $100 million masterplan and to write the (secret) business plan for the new medical centre that Lyndoch intends to start building soon, even though it’s still not sure how much money it needs to borrow to pay for it.

The lawyers, I assume, would also have been hired to guide the masterplan, to set up Lyndoch Healthcare Pty Ltd, and to oversee how Lyndoch now operates as a company limited by guarantee.

There are also the less obvious fees, such as the solicitor “retained” to provide advice to the company secretary, who doesn’t have legal or accounting qualifications.

All of this – millions of dollars in consulting, legal, accounting and administration bills – is such a long, long way from where Lyndoch started as a much-loved, community owned facility for our aged to see out their final years in comfort.

Back in the beginning, people donated their time and their own money to make sure Lyndoch found its feet and this is why there remains such a strong, emotional connection between Warrnambool and our iconic aged care home.

The board needs to get that.

Lyndoch has to grow and keep up with the times, we all get that, but how it is growing – and at what cost – remains at the heart of this investigation and we will keep going.

More soon.

If you would like to see The Terrier keep digging, click on the link below to throw something in the tip jar.

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

It isn’t pretty, but this old shed speaks volumes about the waste that has gone on within the Warrnambool City Council (#notallWCCstaff) over the past decade.

Long-time followers of this site may remember that this shed cost the council more than $100,000 in 2015: $40,000 to buy it and $63,000 to pull it down and relocate it from Wangoom Rd to west Warrnambool.

It is my understanding that it has since been sold off by the WCC for $2000.

$2000.

It has basically been reduced to scrap metal, at a loss of $101,000 to ratepayers.

That is $101,000 that could have been used far more productively elsewhere.

The back story to this shed is that it was supposed to become part of the WCC depot, but the cost of reassembling it, and its poor, rusty condition, saw that idea tossed out the rollerdoor before it had even rolled.

The WCC tried to cut its losses early by auctioning off the shed before it was moved from Wangoom Rd, but it was passed in at $20,000 after failing to attract a single bid: nobody wanted to pay good money for a rusty old shed that would cost a mozza to move and re-assemble.

We – the poor old ratepayers – were stuck with it and have since taken a $101,000 hit.

How does this sort of waste happen? (#notallWCCstaff)

This is the question underpinning the push for a forensic look at all council spending from the last 10 years and the decision making and policies around this spending, because it is this decade of waste that is now coming home to roost.

It goes beyond the council’s 81 corporate credit cards, even though credit card spending is a full-colour, big-calorie category that leaps off the page.

It extends to rusty sheds, and roundabouts, and toilet blocks, and Flagstaff Hill upgrades, and $3 million blowouts on Liebig St, and trips to China, council marquees at the racecourse, endless conferences, blowouts on the Simpson St tunnel, the exorbitant contract to run the pound….you get the picture.

Ratepayers expect to pay rates.

But what ratepayers also expect is a clear return on their investment.

We want to see the council spend our money wisely and cautiously: every cent of it.

It doesn’t matter if the dollars are coming from ratepayers or taxpayers – it is all public money and this is why Ratepayers Victoria is taking such a close interest in what is happening in Warrnambool right now.

Ratepayers Victoria has written again to the council this week, in light of Mayor Tony Herbert saying he didn’t believe there was a need for an independent audit into the council, even though all the other councillors now agree that there should be one.

RV is joining the call for a full review of council spending, going back 10 years:

“We would respectfully suggest that unless council conduct a 10-year retrospective audit of all council staff and councillor expenditure and publish it fully and frankly then you will not sufficiently address the groundswell of community anger,” the letter says. (Read the letter in full here).

RV is spot on there.

At the end of the day, all ratepayers are asking for is transparency and accountability: two little words that roll off so many councillors’ tongues and turn up in so many council reports.

Transparency, accountability…and showing us value for money.

It’s not much to ask for, and the community is asking for it now.

If you would like to support the work of The Terrier, please consider throwing something in the tip jar.

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Carol Altmann – The Terrier

The Warrnambool City Council may be wishing the whole credit card mess would just dissolve into the background, but that is not going to happen.

Ratepayers Victoria has today sent a powerful letter to the Local Government Minister, urging him to intervene.

The letter, a copy of which has been sent to local media, pulls no punches as it describes the need for an “urgent investigation” into the serious allegations around misconduct and inappropriate use of public money.

Ratepayers Victoria is the peak body representing ratepayers across the state.

The WCC may be clinging to the days of keeping its messy secrets tucked behind closed doors, but outsiders are determined to fling up the windows.

Local MP Roma Britnell has already flagged her intention to raise the issue in Parliament after it resumes on August 14 – a move which saw WCC chief Peter Schneider and Mayor Tony Herbert race to cut her off at the pass by trying to get to the Minister first. This letter reveals that they met with his chief of staff.

Importantly, the letter also raises concerns about the long-term financial viability of the council, saying it is unsustainable to have 86% of rate revenue spent on staffing costs.

I will let this letter speak for itself and run it in full below:

A letter from Ratepayers Victoria to Local Government Minister The Hon Adem Somyurek:

We write in reference to some serious allegations circulating in the media in relation to WCC and alleged misconduct.

Several local councillors have made media commentary that we would consider to be contrary of the Local Government Act and the Code of Conduct of Councillors.

There is already evidence of at least one staff member misusing their senior position and corporate credit card resulting in the repayment of thousands of dollars of public money.

It is now being reported that there are current staff holding other external senior positions whilst remaining the incumbent in senior WCC roles.

Media coverage indicates a potential dysfunctional relationship between councillors and conflicting statements by several parties to the events.

I am also aware that the Local Member, Roma Britnell, has been looking into this matter.

I have personally spoken to the Mayor and whilst I found him open to discussion, I was alarmed at the indifference he displayed to my questioning over the sheer number of credit cards held by staff for a regional council.

As you may be aware the Mayor went on local radio (3YB FM) on Friday 2/8/19 and conducted an interview making statements such as “I’m putting my neck out and it gets cut off all the time”, “What in the hell am I putting myself and my family through” and “The CEO has seen the local government minister”.

We do not believe these statements are consistent with the best interests of the community. We believe that the CEO has not met with you personally, rather with your chief of staff and it is misleading of the mayor to say such things on local radio.

This council has recently sought and been successful at gaining an increase in rates above the 2.5% cap.

Approximately 86% of rates are allocated to employee costs in WCC’s 2019/2020 budget. This is commercially unsustainable and must be benchmarked and reviewed immediately. (See attached for your reference)

We believe that WCC is in peril and that failing intervention, an administrator may need to be appointed which is a disastrous outcome for the city and ratepayers.

Ratepayers Victoria formally asks you as the governing Minister to urgently intervene and investigate these serious allegations including councillor and executive conduct and the inappropriate use of public funds.

We urge you to formally ask the Auditor General to review all council staff credit card expenditure to ensure confidence can be maintained in Council and its spending of public monies.

Lastly, we ask you to consider investigating whether the “alleged reporting by the CEO” of credit card misuse met the legal requirements of same.

We look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely,

Dean Hurlston

President- Ratepayers Victoria