3 July 2020
Media: Local Democracy Reporter
Topic: Former mayor's criticism of Council's 2020/21 Annual Plan
Enquiry
Kia ora Mayor and councillors,
I have been speaking with former mayor Grahame Hall who has some criticisms of the 2020/21 Annual Plan.
I've attached his submission on it and below are comments he has made to me.
Some are about council staff / the council as an organisation while others are about councillors. I invite you to respond to these comments where appropriate.
For the Mayor and councillors, I am most interested in whether you agree or disagree with Mr Hall's statements regarding governance and leadership and why.
I've included statements that don't necessarily require a response for context, so you have the wider picture of what Mr Hall has said.
For the council (org) - I invite the council to respond to these comments and the submission where desired and or appropriate.
Response
The reporter was informed there was no comment from the council organisation but the mayor provided the following response:
From Mayor Steve Chadwick:
I'm proud to say this Council is focussed on doing all we can to cushion the impact of COVID-19 and position our district for economic recovery. It's a time for bold leadership and innovation, to back our community and in particular our business community. It's not a time for old thinking that is off the pace and out of touch.
I'm hearing first hand that people want us to get on with it and to move at pace.
This week business leaders involved in Rotorua's economic recovery strategy, people putting skin in the game, told me Council also needs to keep investing in our district to build back confidence.
Economists and Central Government have urged the same.
At a challenging time like this, retrenching and reducing services and staff would just send us backwards. That's not our strategy and is not what the majority of people are telling us we need to do.
We are fortunate Rotorua Lakes Council is in a good position - and that hasn't always been the case. In 2013 I inherited an organisation that had a poor relationship with iwi, a failed sewerage project, a history of unsuitable low rating driving high levels of debt, and under-investment in infrastructure giving rise to failing facilities, amongst other things.
There's still a lot to do but we have corrected poor practices of the past. Today we have sound relationships with Government, iwi and our wider community, and that has resulted in confidence in Rotorua and Government investment at levels never seen before - more than $100 million to date in the past few years including the $55m announced this week.
Negativity and hand-wringing is not what we need. Our annual plan is a progressive plan to enable us to move forward. We are investing in infrastructure and managing prudently, and I'm particularly proud that at such a challenging time, we are working together to build back better.
I have huge respect for Grahame but we all have our time and a lot has changed in the 16 years since he was mayor. The local government sector, legislation and expectations have changed. There is a totally new paradigm, new ways of working, localism, partnerships - it's not just about essential services and infrastructure anymore.
