TWO CITIES – WOLLONGONG UNDER ADMINISTRATION

Having attended the last Wollongong Council meeting on 3 March 2008 – a real one with elected Councillors – I attended the first Council meeting (25 March 08) conducted under the new Administration in order to compare the difference.

What follows is not an account of the meeting as such but an analysis based on what I experienced – and I share my thoughts with you. My theme is the importance of proper Council-community committees in the absence of elected Councillors. As we do not know if there will be an election before Sept 2012, we must plan for the worst.

When I arrived, just before 5pm when the meeting was due to start, senior Council managers had their name plates on the Councillor positions formerly occupied by our elected representatives.

Someone must have realised that this was not a good look, and they relocated to their usual position on the sidelines. Someone probably realised that it is better not to make it too obvious (too soon) that Wollongong City is now under the control of State appointed technocrats working with senior Council bureaucrats

A bit to quick, for my liking, for the staff to jump into the positions ‘vacated’ by State proclamation. The Councillors’ seats were hardly cool yet.

I have seen no signs from the senior staff of any real solidarity with those who regard the workings of our democratic process – and the need to reform WCC to remove the Level 10 factor – as being a crucial issue facing us at this time.

In place of the Lord Mayor – the three Administrators – Colin Gellatly, Gabrielle Kibble and Robert McGregor – assisted by General Manager David Farmer.

KOORI WELCOME TO COUNTRY

The meeting opened with a Welcome to Country by Uncle Rueben Brown. He spoke at length about the significance of places along this part of the coast from Sandon Point and south, and about the role of family and connectedness to local country according to Aboriginal law.

A “Welcome to Country” is a process which should ensure that what follows gets the spirit right. It is not a mere side show of political correctness.

There is a real risk that this otherwise ‘welcome’ innovation could be too cute for words given the lack on indigenous voices in Wollongong City Council since the abolition of the Aboriginal Liaison Committee and the lack of Koori Councillors.

As Uncle Rueben made clear, there are many difficult issues for Koori people in Wollongong, not the least been those caused for traditional owners by the arrival of indigenous people from other traditional living countries. And to which, from prior workshops on Treaty matters, we can add the urgent need for land, services and genuine forms of recognition and affirmation.

In such a context, compounded with the unfair dismissal of our elected Councillors, it is possible that inviting Uncle Rueben to provide a welcome is itself another act of shameless expropriation of indigenous culture by non-indigenous people with no real commitment to recognising Koori rights in the Illawarra.

The Administrators and the General Manager will now have to work very hard to ensure that this is not the case. It would be interesting to hear the views of the former WCC Aboriginal Liaison Officer – who can be very scathing in relation to WCC – on this subject.

The Council prayer was then read. Maybe this will help?

CONFIRMING THE MINUTES OF THE PREVIOUS MEETING

As none of the Administrators were present at the previous meeting (!) the Minutes from that meeting could not be confirmed. The advice they had was that the minutes be ‘noted’.

COMMUNITY ADVISORY GROUP FORUM – WHERE THE BLOODY HELL IS IT?

Councillor David Martin and Councillor Cartan both addressed the meeting speaking of the great importance of community consultation and the resolution passed at the last Council meeting to hold a forum on Community Advisory Groups.

This resolution was passed at the meeting of 3 March by Councillors extremely mindful that, with their full knowledge that they were about to be unfairly dismissed and our City and communities would be left without forms of representation within Council.

Even ALP Councillor David Brown, who had vehemently attacked Neighbourhood Committees in 2005, spoke in support of putting some means in place for community voices in lieu of elected Councillors.

There was no good reason given at this Council meeting as to why Council’s General Manager and the new Administrators had not acted on the resolution (CM25/08) to hold a forum on Community Advisory Groups within the last two weeks.

The wording was clear and unambiguous, and the failure to stage the forum within the timeframe points to a possible act of bad faith by those in a position to implement this Council resolution. This in itself provides no grounds for community confidence in the new cosy arrangements between State technocrats and Council bureaucrats.

Administrator McGregor finally spoke on this matter at the end of the meeting. He said that they were mindful of the resolution and had asked for a full report; did not want to be rushed in order to get it right; had not put out of mind the idea of a forum; and hopefully come up with a paper on best approach as it is extremely significant. (words to that effect).

That would be fine in other circumstances but Council Resolution CM25/08 has already been passed and is a clear expression of the will of our elected representatives to hold the forum (open to public invitation).

The resolution is binding and is not the plaything of State appointed Administrators to re-interpret after the fact as they wish – if they also wish to maintain a relationship of good faith (limited as this can only be under the circumstances of unfair dismissal of our elected representatives) with the wider community.

Make no mistake about it – Council staff cannot tell their new bosses what to do. The only effective avenue for reminding the Administrators of their limited role as servants of the State (working on our behalf) is via well-informed and actively engaged people-in-community.

FROM DEMOCRACY TO TOP-DOWN COMMAND

The fact that our democratic process, in which we elect who represents us on Council, has been replaced by a ‘command’ process was made abundantly clear when an agenda item dealt with Code of Conduct matters.

The General Manager, subject to the Code, is under the Administrators – but the Administrators are not subject to the Code of Conduct since they appointed by the State.

Without reflecting one way or the other on the personal or professional qualities of the three technocratic Administrators that arrangement can provide no great grounds for confidence. The State in question is under the control of the ALP – and it was the ALP at the local level which controlled WCC for nearly two decades.

We did not elect these Administrators; the people of Wollongong were not consulted about who would be appointed as Administrators to replace our chosen representatives; they were hand picked by the State government. And hand picked in a situation which some people regard as a process in which the State government sought to head off the threat to its own longstanding political and associated interests in the Wollongong area.

The onus is on the State’s Administrators, on behalf of their superiors, to earn our trust and on them to build a working relationship with our communities in order to get us through this period (to the next Council election) in good order.

WELL … BUT

In joining others to wish them “well” – since we may have to learn to live together – it is “well” only in the sense of the well-being necessary for the full restoration of local democracy.

Restoring or maintaining confidence – as is well known in relation to the position of Judges, for example – requires ensuring that matters of perception are addressed as well as matters of established fact.

Many reasonably informed people regard the extent of corruption to extend into the heart of the State ALP. Calls for a Royal Commission in to corruption could prefigure the eventual demise of the Iemma Government before the expiry of its present term.

At the very least, there is a major question mark over the extent of corruption as evidenced in Wollongong into the higher levels of the Iemma Ministry.

Given this context, we really need to insist on some form of institutionalised and organised involvement by our communities in the processes of local governance.

Without such means, other parts of the effort to restore public confidence cannot achieve the maximum benefit.

“OPEN MEETINGS” – WITHOUT COUNCILLORS!

For example, last night there was a stated commitment from the Administrators (Colin Gellatly in particular) to hold open, rather than closed, “meetings”. But the fact that these meetings take place without our democratic elected representatives means that this ‘openness’ can only take on a hollow ring.

The new Council ‘meetings’ are a mix between theatre and ritual rather than a meeting in the accustomed sense. They are a venue for public statements of Council business transactions with little real likelihood of real debate.

It was clear from the mechanical and almost ‘tick-box’ means by which Council business was decided without debate that ‘openness’ is a secondary consideration. (All actual business done in under 30 minutes.)

In the absence of some institutionalised means by which our communities can have an organised means of participating in local community business, the openness of Council ‘meetings’ is beside the point.

People in our communities need to know what is happening well in advance, pool our collective experience and to have the chance to consider the local issues involved. This is how the former WCC Neighbourhood Committees worked – deadly dull and boring most of the time I must say, but it was good for community business.

UH OH = THE OX(LE)YMORON OF “GOOD DEVELOPMENT”

This was reinforced when Administrator Kibble, declaring her preparedness to work for a positive future for Wollongong, spoke of her commitment to ensuring that there is ‘good development’ in Wollongong.

The ENORMOUS problem here is ‘good’ according to whose criteria? The risk is that it becomes a closed shop monologue between developers, planning staff … and, there being no Counicillors, Administrators.

The former WCC CEO, as was revealed in the ICAC inquiry, was also highly committed to ‘good development”.

I recall that, on television news afew years back, he regarded Stockland’s Sandon Point development as a ‘good development’ at a time when a great number of people in the local community were saying exactly the opposite, with mothers and children getting arrested in an attempt to stop the heavy equipment moving onto the ‘site’.

The previous CEO’s thinking involved appeared to be “development is good, this is development, therefore it is a good development”. Not so.

The crucial test for ‘good development’ is the genuine and informed consent of members of our local communities.

“WCC – WORKING QUITE NICELY WITHOUT YOU”

From what I saw at the meeting, there is a very cosy relationship emerging between these two groups now that the messy business of democratic representation is out of the way. Noses down, make no waves, superannuated futures await.

We need to make sure that they are not cosy and comfort for too long – and that the convenient working relationship which is developing is not allowed to become the norm. With no democratic representation on Council, this is an abhorrent ‘abnorm’!

As things are at present, in the absence of genuine Council-community committees, there can only be more real power to the General Manager and his senior managers due to the enormous loss of local knowledge (that represented by Councillors) as the Administrators try to find their way around a city which requires years to understand.

Just what did three Administrators make of “Agenda Item 13 – Popes Road Woonona, Road naming Proposal”? This was one of three agenda items on road naming proposals. Do they have a clue where Popes Road is? For some reason, I can never go passed it without thinking of local historians and heritage minded people like Michael Organ and Joe Davies. It’s a matter of being able to appreciate the ‘flavour’ of places by associations which may defy easy rational explanation.

The one Administrator comment should give you a clue about where things are heading. Administrator Kibble requested that, in future, multiple road naming proposals be bundled as one agenda item. Busy and important people – get Council meetings down to as short as possible. GM – agreed. Tick. Next.

Not good enough. A healthy alternative would be for the Administrators to know what local people had to say abut such matters.

ADMINISTRATORS CONFLICT OF INTEREST?

And the next item, as it happened, was “Tabling the Returns of Disclosures of Interests”.

No doubt the three Administrators have already made a full and comprehensive disclosure of their interests and will be able to stand aside from voting on matters which involve their interests. We need to see it.

But what happens, in an arrangement where we have three Administrators and a Council meeting requires a quorum of two, when two of the three have a common interest in the matter under consideration?

It may only be hypothetical (and is probably something which has been dealt with in other Councils under State Administration) but it may point to an underlying structural problem which is indicative of a serious defect in the present arrangements which concentrate important powers in far too few hands.

We really need to share those powers across the City, for the duration of the suspension of democracy, in properly constituted and properly resourced Council-community committees.

LOCAL AREA MEETINGS NOT THE SOLUTION

An attempt may be made by those who see benefits in the present lack of effective Council- Community Committees to fob us off with Local Area Meetings as being adequate to the new heavy workload which will be placed upon them with the loss of our elected Councillors.

LAM’s were set up both to fail (via burn out) and to be disowned when convenient (such as when community opinion went against that of the ALP Caucus).

The Local Area Meetings (LAMs) which exist in a kind of limbo land under Council’s present Community Engagement Framework (as it is at present) cannot perform this function.

WCC has always been careful to distance itself from Local Area Meetings. Council’s website says

“Local Area Meetings
In addition, local area meetings are community facilitated, operated and managed meetings. They are independent of Council. Local area meetings provide an opportunity for communities to meet locally and discuss issues of interest. Agendas and charters are set by the participants themselves.

Council supports local area meetings by providing subsidised access to Council owned facilities throughout the local government area. Council also assists with access to subsidised training facilitation and meeting etiquette…”

(http://www.wollongong.nsw.gov.au/YourCouncil/haveyoursay.asp – accessed 26 March 2008)

The Council monthly ‘subsidy’ – for the use of Council’s own buildings – would run to about $30 in the case of the Coledale Senior Citizens Hall! As it is the local area meeting group (Clifton to Coledale Neighbourhood Committee) meets at the local RSL up the road. $30 a month – and what value do we place on the many hours of volunteer work by committed community members – and their accumulated wealth of local and professional experience?

From my knowledge of social organisation, Council’s present Community Engagement Framework was designed (consciously or unconsciously by staff ‘intuiting’ their ALP political masters unspoken will) around two main factors:

1. to disable effective and organised community participation in Council business by way of Council committees - that is, to remove any suggestion of official legitimacy for the people attending those meetings

2. to remove any need for Council to provide the resources necessary for such groups to act as effective and honest brokers of community business.

In place of hard working WCC Neighbourhood Committees (which embodied great local experience), Council came up with a variety of other flimsy community ‘consultation’ methods including ‘kiosks’.

We heard at the last Council meeting on 3 March how even ALP Councillors were embarrassed by ‘kiosks’ with one event which had local people turning up wanting to see the plans for the new kiosk they thought was going to be erected in the local park.

But what has gained a much greater significance is the fact that the 2005 Community Engagement Framework which replaced Neighbourhood Committees was built around the existence of COUNCILLORS!

With the State government sacking our Councillors – and with no Wollongong elections scheduled until September 2012 – we are now in a very different situation in relation to community consultation.

With the dismissal of our elected Councillors, the whole basis of WCC’s Community Engagement Framework also collapses.

ALTERNATIVE’S TO COUNCIL – COMMUNITY COOPERATION?

With all bets now off, if the present Administration will not promptly move to implement CM25/08 and host a forum on Community Advisory Groups, there should be a peoples forum, to which Council Administrators and other staff are invited.

It is also possible, on the basis of the ‘studied’ approach adopted by the Administrator (representing them all) to the Community Advisory Groups forum last evening, that the Administrators just may decide to show us just who is in charge here now – and attempt to institute and establish ‘control’ early in the process.

They just might be tempted to adopt a high-handed approach regarding providing people with a democratic means of participation in local government matters.

The Administrators are already saying that they are meeting with interested community groups such as the Illawarra Business Chamber and South Coast Labour Council. While that combination shows an apparent ‘even-handedness’ it may be more apparent than real.

Former Council CEO’s and disgraced Councillors would have said the same thing about a willingness to meet with all interest groups. It is not, and cannot be in itself, a solution to the problems of corruption. The power of money to corrupt takes many different forms.

What is required is not merely series of ad hoc meetings with existing special interest groups but with a means of systematic engagement between Council and community on the wide range of community-council business.

In that case – and in the absence of a genuine good faith relationship with the active and engaged people motivated by their genuine care for our places of residence – people power and acts of civil disobedience may be required to encourage those in positions of power to see the very good sense in forming a working relationship with the people of the City of Wollongong.

AN OVERRIDING COMMITMENT TO DEMOCRACY

Our Charter, formed under a democratic process during which we had elected Councillors, says (in part):

“The charter of the people of Wollongong

We the people of Wollongong are determined:

• to ensure the right of all our community to enjoy equal rights and be treated with equal respect, regardless of colour, race, ethnicity, creed or religion;
• to maintain Wollongong as a culturally diverse tolerant and open society, united by an overriding commitment to our nation and its democratic institutions and values; “

We either have a right to participate in Council as a democratic institution all the same as other people in New South Wales – or, given our overriding commitment, we have a duty to fight to ensure that we obtain one.

We do not need more chaos in our lives and the interests of good governance will be better served by the State Administrators, aided by the WCC GM, to:

1 - take prompt and effective action to hold an open public forum the role of Community Advisory Groups (in the absence of elected Councillors)

2 – take prompt and effective action implement the outcomes of that forum.

Then we can get this new show on the road.

There is much other important community business to attend to – and it has already been delayed too long thanks to a corrupt few.

Bruce Reyburn

Coledale

26 March 2008