Council's Public Access session mainly falls on deaf ears

Once again the Mayor failed to show to the monthly Public Access session that invites members of the community to present on issues to Councillors. The Public Access session has come a long way under the reign of Mayor Innes. It was once a well regarded and widely used platform that enable members of the public to come forward and present, face to face, to their councillors twice a month on any matter relevant to council. From the cleanliness (or lack thereof of) of Public toilets to complaints around the size of aggregate being used by Council in beach side urban areas rendering the roads impossible to walk on for man or beast and making them incredibly noisy to boot. But under Mayor Innes all this changed. The Public Access sessions became monthly and required a written submission of the presentation to be provided, along with registration, by 12 noon the day before. Once when there was a discretion for extension of an unfinished presentation the Council voted to allow seven minutes precisely with the speaker to be cut off mid sentence. The Public Forum session prior to Council meetings that were once live streamed were also constrained with the requirement to provide submissions and registrations the day before. It was argued by Council that this gave Councillors more time to read the submissions and develop reasonable and intelligent questions for the speakers. If only this was the case. The fact of the matter is that Council wanted to be sure of what was being delivered, and has been the case time and time again, to formulate questions to be asked by the same puppets that many speakers have complained of saying the questions do little other than bully, belittle or attempt to negate the presentation. Today saw two speakers present. Dr Brett Stevenson and David Grace. Missing their presentation were Clr Liz Innes, Clr Rob Pollock and Clr Jack Tait. Once again ably chairing the Public Access session was Clr Anthony Mayne with ex-mayor Lindsay Brown once more delegated to the back seats to work on whatever rhetoric he might be able to muster to win voting favour of anyone watching. He didn't miss his opportunity today but half way through his offerings he was cut short and told to stay on topic. Both speakers presented well in this morning's Zoom session (when will we return to the Council Chamber for these sessions). Their audience today was Clr Phil Constable, Clr Pat McGinlay, Chair Anthony Mayne with Clrs Brown, Nathan and Thomson present as well though James Thomson chose to leave the session for the bulk of David Grace's six minute presentation. Clr Maureen Nathan didn't disappoint with her question to David Grace in regards to his presentation on the lack of Public Consultation (in this case around the EOI raised on the Bowling Club site at Batemans Bay) Rather that indicate she had actually paid any attention to the exasperation of the community in not being told of the potential 30m tower block development and empathising with their surprise of the announcement in a newspaper advertisement the councillor instead launched into another of her rhetorical questions preceded by "Are you aware..." It is a shame that these sessions are not live streamed so that the community can watch the body language and see first hand the immediate go-to facial responses of "It wasn't me, the dog ate my homework, it is somebody else's fault, I was never told, don't believe what you read in the rag of a blog, I'm right and therefore you aren't." Fortunately we still have Clrs Constable, McGinlay and Mayne who appreciate the presentations and reflect on them when, and if, their vote is required on an issue, seeking out more information outside of the echo-chamber of staff briefings.

Daydreaming of the return of genuine public engagement rather that the tick-box authoritarian controls in place .... "oh to be like Bega or Shoalhaven... or any other NSW Council where a community opinion matters".