Congratulations to Jayne Stinson on being elected as the member for Badcoe and to David Pisoni on being returned in the seat of Unley. I look forward to working with you both to better our local community.
Now that the dust has settled on the State election it is now time to turn our attention to Local Government. Yes! Council elections are scheduled for November this year.
It is my intention to put my hand up again. I will be looking to continue as one of your two Clarence Park Ward Councillors.
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Why Councillor? Why not Mayor?
Many people have asked me in recent times to run for Mayor, which is certainly flattering. I believe however my true value to council and to its ratepayers is to focus on being a Ward Councillor.
The elections will see a significant turnover of elected members. Two members, one being the Mayor, have already resigned. Two other councillors have announced that they will not be renominating. A fifth is considering his future.
Five of 13 positions on Council will therefore see a change of member.
Two, maybe three, of our current membership are considering running for Mayor. Given anyone losing the Mayoral race will not be on Council this means a turnover of 7 out of the 13 positions. If I were to run for mayor too the change will lift to 8, 9 if an outsider won the Mayoral race.
Change is usually healthy. It is good to see change after each council election. New ideas, new perspective, new energy etc. If the extent of change is excessive however this can be unsettling.
This is because the learning curve when stepping into the elected member role is extreme. New members therefore need time to settle in.
Running for Mayor, with so many others considering it, would increase this risk.
Do you see any positives for the local area as a result of the Libs being in? The rate capping is obviously something the Councils don’t want. In general we’ll see less money being given to the environment. Less money on public transport. Less money on anything that residents are likely to find part of their day to day life. Am I seeing this the right way? Or are you optimistic that ‘wait and see’ might uncover some good?
I definitely believe that we should wait and see. Because they have been in the wilderness for so long we simply don’t know what they are capable of.
My concern with rate capping, noting tonight we start serious discussions on our upcoming budget, that taking our budget to (if you wish) an umpire takes you out of the equation.
What I am looking forward to is getting detail from the new minister for planning, who happens to be the member for Unley, on their approach to planning reform. Likewise I am keen to know more about the GlobeLink I think they call it. This, if it is possible to achieve, will see no more freight trains speeding through the Clarence Park Ward.
There will be much to observe in the near future. With a 100 day plan I am sure we will be hearing probably daily from them.
Legislatively we also will not know the composition of the Legislative Council. That will have a big bearing on what is implemented or not.
Good. Let’s hope so.
True, making suburbs freight train free would be a big win….but I feel like it’s way too big a project to get off the ground. Still. We may dream!