Shifting sands on racehorse access to coastal reserve
Carol Altmann – The Terrier
Thankyou to the Walkley Foundation for funding part of my investigative work with this on-going story.
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WCC suffers mortal wound in Mayoral election bloodbath
Carol Altmann – The Terrier
The Fallout: Oh, if looks could kill.
How on earth does the W’bool City Council come back from the Mayoral showdown?
On Monday night there were more knives out than an episode of Masterchef; more blood on the floor than the Red Wedding, if thankfully of the invisible variety.
(If you missed the audio, it is a must listen. You can find it on the WCC website).
The truth is, it can’t recover.
You can’t un-say that someone betrayed you, that you were set up, that you were manipulated, or that the place is run by two political wolves in Crs Gaston and Neoh who urge you stick with them, then eat you up for breakfast.
You can’t un-say, as our Mayor elect did in a phone call, that you did a c*** act.
So here we are, right back to square one after three years, with a council split right down the middle.
For the council to keep blaming the media for eating its own head off is ludicrous.
This is a shambles all of their own making and it’s the natural outcome of backstabbing, disloyalty, power plays…and an obsession with control.
It is the sort of political bastardy that might happen when you are running for state politics, but it doesn’t wash here.
So the council will limp along with one arm and half a leg, like the Black Knight from Monty Python’s Holy Grail (“a mere flesh wound, sire”), until we get to the next election.
That election is 12 months away, but the search for fresh candidates must start now.
Who would you like to see re-elected? And who do you know who should be there? Your time starts now. #election2020
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WCC tearing each other’s heads off in mayoral race
Carol Altmann – The Terrier
Isn’t the selection of Warrnambool’s next Mayor going well!
As of next Monday, we are most likely going to have a Mayor in Cr Tony Herbert who doesn’t want to be Mayor. Woo hoo!
Tony has told his fellow councillors he is tired, not sleeping at night and he doesn’t want any more of the stress that comes with leading a city that is finding its voice, even if it pays around $77,000 a year.
Tony is done with the top job and fair enough.
But wait, you can’t just leave, Tony, because the Mayoralty is not about putting people INTO the role, but keeping people OUT, don’t you get that?
This is why Cr Peter Hulin will never, ever, ever be Mayor, even though he is the second-most experienced councillor in the joint.
And this is why Cr Robert Anderson became Mayor five minutes after he was first elected and bumbled along as best he could for the first 12 months.
And this is why Cr Sue Cassidy won’t be allowed anywhere near the big chair, despite leaving the meeting with her fellow councillors last Monday night thinking she had the gig.
I heard she even opened a bottle of bubbles when she got home.
Sorry, false alarm, because Tony also went home, sat down, probably swigged a giant scotch, and realised he wanted to be mayor after all. Yeah, right.
Barry the Bullshite Detector can smell a political power play at 100 paces and senses his fellow political animals, Crs Kylie Gaston and Michael Neoh, were all over Tony’s change of heart.
If Cr David Owen was well enough to be the next Mayor, he would have been their choice.
But with Cr Owen out, Cr Anderson out, themselves out (unless Mike was mayor for the 400th time), and Cr Herbert out, the unthinkable loomed: a loss of control.
And we can’t have that.
So Tony has booked into the Hotel California and propped himself up for another round.
Ah, such is democracy, Warrnambool style.
If there was ever a case for the direct election of Mayors by the people, rather than by the power brokers, it is this one.
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Hold your bark back: speaking up is a now a crime
Carol Altmann – The Terrier
I want you to meet Foxy. I will tell you more about her at the end of this piece, but we need Foxy, because speaking up is now a crime.
If you raise your voice and shout at a Warrnambool City Council meeting, you face an $825 fine, or, to put it into council currency, one Pickled Pig dinner, six bottles of shiraz and two creme brûlées.
This is a local law that was designed to protect councillors and staff from aggression or violence toward each other, or from the public. It is now being used to shut people up.
Not all people, mind you, just the Neanderthals, as Cr Michael Neoh likes to call them.
These “Neanderthals” include the everyday people of Warrnambool who don’t wear suits and who have callouses on their hands from physical work, or tired faces from holding down two jobs while raising three kids.
According to Cr Neoh and Cr Kylie Gaston and our CEO Peter Schneider, these people now need to be shut down for shouting, like they did at last Monday night’s fiery meeting.
If police need to be called, Cr Gaston is happy to use speed dial.
And yet no police have been called by the WCC for the almost $4000 in ratepayers’ funds that were mis-spent by a former senior manager.
This man was an actual Neanderthal, but he wore a suit and was regarded as a “good bloke” by our Mayor and others while he ripped off ratepayers and bullied a string of council staff mercilessly.
Not a word was raised last Monday night about that Neanderthal’s bullying behaviour.
Instead, within hours, the finger was pointed back on the people who have had a gut full of years of waste and not being heard.
The main agitator, ratepayer Ben Blain, who was facing a fine, was loud, no doubt about it, but he was not abusive, or threatening. In fact he was pleading.
Here’s a theatrical but accurate transcript of the full exchange. Warning: contains foul language like “sack ’em” and “cheat” and “you have not got your house in order”.
——-
Lights up. Agenda Item 5.4: Council decides to increase its carbon footprint by flying 31,000km to and from Mariestad, Sweden, to learn how to reduce its carbon footprint.
Ratepayer Ben leaves his seat, walks to the front of the public gallery, his pants trembling with nerves:
(Cue loud voice….aaaaaaand action!):
“Peter Schneider was the council aware of anyone’s involvement? We have sat here and listened to the council try and hide every single cover up that has happened in this place and we are not going to take it anymore.
We are the ratepayers, we are the ones that have voted you in, and you think it is alright to sit here and lie, cheat and steal. Listen to the ratepayers.
What we want is transparency. That is what we want.
How do you think we are going to put up with this?
(Mayor Herbert: Ben, Ben, I have asked you to leave.)
How do you think we are going to put up with this?
(Mayor Herbert: Ben, I have asked you to leave.)
Have you? I am not leaving.
(Ratepayer chorus: No! No!)
Sack ’em! Sack em’!
(Ratepayer chrous: Sack ’em! Sack ’em! Sack’ em! Sack ’em!)
It is absolutely disgusting. We can’t afford to run the city with the rates we’ve got and then you want more to go to Sweden.
You have not got your house in order. How do you think the ratepayers….
(Mayor Herbert: I have asked you to leave.)
(Ratepayer chorus: Nooooo! Nooooo! Noooooo!)
(Mayor Herbert: Right, councillors, we will adjourn the meeting please.)
(Ratepayer chorus: Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh.)
Meeting adjourned for 10 minutes while CEO Schneider spoke quietly with ratepayer who had returned to his seat.
Councillors re-emerge.
Meeting resumes and picks up again at item 5.4.
Meeting rolls on for almost another hour with a few jeers and moans and groans.
Subdued crowd reignited fully by Cr Gaston’s speech about The Terrier (aka Fox Terrier News), during which Cr Gaston reveals her preference for media that behaves like a toothless tiger, rather than a blog that bites.
Lights down. We all go home.
This is democracy in action and I am determined to keep fighting for it.
As part of that, and because Cr Gaston said she would like my fact checking to be public, I have hired Foxy the Fact Checker. She works 7.6 hours a week alongside Barry the Bullshite detector and she will have her first outing shortly.
We don’t want ‘sexy’, we just want sensible spending
Carol Altmann – The Terrier
Isn’t it fascinating how most of the W’bool City councillors take zero responsibility for whacking us with more rates, as if it all just happened around them?
Like a dog that destroys the couch, the councillors are anguished and tormented once the damage has been done, but did nothing to stop the damage in the first place.
Instead – they plead – the problems that have led to us paying 4.5% more in rates for the next two years were “inherited”.
They also plead that WCC is “special” compared to every other council in Victoria because, after all, 77 of the 79 councils will keep their rates capped.
Hold on.
What we have “inherited” is more than 10 years of most councillors being too weak to ask probing questions of former CEO Bruce Anson and his senior staff.
Not only did these councillors avoid any probing questions (and here Crs Neoh and Gaston, I am looking at you), they kept ticking off on Mr Anson’s annual performance reviews and pay-rises because he and his team were apparently doing such a terrific job.
We paid Mr Anson and his senior staff handsomely because they were in charge of the ship: the captain and his crew.
And we elected our councillors in the belief that they would raise their binoculars, keep an eye on the ship and steer it well away from the rocks.
We didn’t ask to be “sexy” or “special”: we just wanted the council to do its job.
In this, we are like residents of every other city and town across Victoria.
But here we are, on the rocks, for the next two years at least, and the couch is wrecked, yet our councillors are still expecting a pat on the head.
Not this time.
Good on the ratepayers for biting back. We need Warrnambool to be guided by watchdogs, not lapdogs.