Campaigns for the people by the outsiders

So much propaganda by our Council spokespersons  in recent years lacks depth and credibility , Take the outside funded "Colac promotion"  combined with the high rates .  How long can the facade of spending money,  as outsiders think we should , dictate how we keep this place going ?
Surely  If we keep and attract businesses,  rather than just " people " we keep professions and people.two wins
How can we keep good teachers if our students study in Geelong ? If Council officers don't actually live here  they can be expected to  keep employing outside professionals to tell us how to live and improve our lot . Take the overly simple dumb campaigns to just attract "people "recently in TV ad campaign .The money could have made a lotta signs !  " Just come here to cruise eh ?" 

If our leaders don't want to live here,  how can they decide why others should ? People come here , not because there is work here,  but because houses are cheap -     shallow and unsustainable leadership thinking.

Sometimes I wish Brian Crook would take himself seriously ( prove that locals are just as professional as anyone ) and say " no more outside dictation , or at least,  " explain yourselves instead of this old rhetoric that we have consulted and noone  came ( = not interested ) or "  we must trust those we made commitments to …….on behalf of the people "  " they know something we don't " even Cheeseman left town.and paved the road outta ere . Not very credible when Colac Otway is indeed a great place to live . 

Performance pay is NOT appropriate

Senior management and the Mayor are very happy with our planning executives and CEO's  performance, but the people of the area are not ( public meetings in June ) . Our Council spends 1.5 million dollars on Information management and still manage to lose lots of files
Here is  another issue they don't seek to resolve conflict -not even talking about the above uneccesary disasters waiting to happen ALL over the Shire .
Our roads are disaster areas and noone on Council has acted to change the dangerous situations occurring all over the Shire . Clearly some Councillors take more notice of closet conservationists than they do of practical ones.This is plain obviuos to any objective observer.
Its not clear therfore ,  in their rush to put through another overlay imposing vegetation controls (C70 ) on their roads that the Colac Otway shire really have control over their own roads .
I wonder if their information management system has this problem even listed . These unresolved edge issues all around the Shire could cost a life or two if they don't finally DO something to stop others from telling them what to do.
 In some sort of strange paradox C67 is the Shire telling the long suffering ratepayers how to prevent damage to their own infrastructure. as if they don't already know about soils

How can you justify performance pay when no objective performance evaluation has occurred

Councillors ; It all very well saying your staff are doing a great job.
It may be only words and  impressions ; if the people don't believe you , you need to check yourself .Find out what is really going on .Ignorance is no excuse . Maybe you are too afraid to ask questions that threaten those in power,  but whose weapons are information but who are supposed to be our servants ( and propely answer questions) . Information is power and you are entitled,  if you don't know - to get a straight answer ; One that you know both You and the member of the Public can understand , even if they don't accept .

1. What you need to do is make sure the process is working efficently  ( The time it takes and the  public and private cost  it takes to get permits and answers  for example);
2. Does dissatisfaction registered at the counter register up the top? . You can STOP reading right now if you can tell me the place where these facts are dealt with  .
3. Then convince the people of the Shire that they are listening and acting on specific concerns , not just running random and expensive surveys  that may well mistarget areas of real need for improvement .

Lets face facts : none at the time of writing really believes you are really properly acting on genuine concerns expressed by sensible citizens in relation to delays in processing applications.Tell us about 1 , 2 or 3 or all three .
Have your surveys identified for you where the real need for improvement is ? , which Departments / tasks are performing most poorly  and then - esp the executives who are ultimately responsible;
The people want objective review and objective lists of what staff do and what they have achieved .
Monday nights meeting is too late - too little,  too late.

Is it the job of our Shire CEO to tell us whether we need Wards? .

Is it the job of our Shire CEO to tell us whether we need Wards? .

What do our representatives think on the matter..... or doesn't it matter  ?
  Is the  system better or worse since Mr Kennett decided that bigger is better; that less reps are more, and they need to be paid more in order to to be credible? 

Surely briefing 1 local rep  is better than trying to brief 7 who get votes from all over the place . Does changing the people who sit on the now seven seats ( cf 11 before) stop the system from being easily stacked and silent on controversial matters? 
How many recent planning decisions,  like the one that cost the southern ward years of wasted work on the Barham River floodplain, and the North eastern ward a non starting new quarry , would have been nipped in the bud by better informed and more representaive counsellors? How much have all these non starting developments cost the council and the reputation of planning departments , let alone some of our now much poorer ratepayers ?  

If  the Liberals want to win back Corangamite they need to do more than impose big signs and big government on us.  Do the Liberal party think we are stupid and need more business people in government .?  Living off the land, we are not stupid. We can tell that  others are making decisions for us for which we have no part , which are often not well informed and go nowhere , and which cost us a lot more than they need to.  
We notice d you recently supported a house to be built down on the coast - all your pictures in the paper 

WE pay you to know, not to employ consultants

A subtle shift has overtaken local government in the last 20 years . Either the staff we employ are less capable or the decisions those staff have to make have got harder . There is a case for saying that the staff have infact got smarter because we have fallen for the later idea . Somehow the engineers and planners of a previous generation managed before when infrastructure decisions were more complex and were more far reaching . Now we can't even study the traffic without employing a consultant.
I can't see the point too with the totally ineffective expenditure on north Apollo bay beaches over the last 20years why they pay someone to tell them to just put more rock and different pipes when: after all, the land is sand and that's what we want to remain . http://otwaysonline.blogspot.com/2006/12/welcome-to-our-beautiful-rocky-beaches.html Pipes come first - its what you'd expect if engineers made environmental decisions.

You can't please everybody - just make defendable decisions

--Based on sound sustainable environmental and planning advice. You and I might know that good decisions for our future are not going to please everybody, but our Councils , it often appears, avoid hard decisions .
After decades of advising 3 of Victoria's Coastal shires directly and more privately on environmental planning it gives me no joy to see them now snowed under ,more than ever, by paperwork, consultants and processes that avoid decision making. Please gentlemen, I am happy to help . Save yourself the embarassment of having to keep defending those who avoid making decisions and ask for help.

When will you ever come out and say

What you are doing to
1. Fix up the mess in development affecting the northern beaches of Apollo Bay
2. Properly deal with the feasibility of a bypass through the Lake
3 Discuss the future of lake issues before all the money for roads and all the talk of it is gone .
4. Ensure there is decent safety information for travelers on the Apollo Bay to Forrest Road in the event of bush fire.
5. Request that the State allow the burnoff period to go beyond the wettest month of the year ( Frank is appalled )Posted 6th November 2010 Show day