NORTH BANK: TIME FOR A RETHINK

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It is possibly said to be TOO LATE but it may, no should, not be. These SHEDS are full of potential, potential that if realised will put jobs in the community and a diversity of income opportunities and community amenity that might not otherwise be there. 

There has been no realistic wide ranging consultation in regard to this so called development on the North Bank. It seems that a huddle of self appointed opportunists worked out a way to get some public money and their slice of the pie. That's not too bad, but obviously opportunities have been overlooked if they were looked for at all.

Now most, well some, of those people might now have a chance to think laterally and find a more inclusive, more equitable, more enterprising, SET of solutions. These are not solutions that come in bottles ready to be applied to an annoying group of issues, they need to be worked on and in open and transparent ways. 

BUT there is a hurry. Why the hurry? If anyone can answer this it would be good to hear what it might be.

This is where the community comes in. Rather than imagine that the problems are too big for ordinary people it turns out that they have proven too big for whoever gave themselves the task of redeveloping community property. Its time to stop and start over and this time to look for win-wins!

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NOW HERE IS AN IDEA ... HAS ITS DAY COME?

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A BLOODY GOOD STORY ... "Imagine your local council didn't exist. In its place, a small group of people performed only the bare functions of government. Generic tasks were outsourced. Rate collection and capital works were outsourced too. Part-time contractors were employed by the council for specialist work. If service delivery was not satisfactory, the council could switch suppliers quickly. .... Read more here

For mine I think it is time to totally rethink this council idea when we elect 'representatives' and they are persuaded to hand all the authority we give them to an unaccountable GM and his 'underlings'!

The current model is BROKEN! Its time to fix it! While considering amalgamation lets start thinking outside the box ... let us invent a new model. Tasmania would be just the place to give this a go!

Proper Wealth for Launceston

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Local Government is going to be faced with ever increasing demands to be more accountable and more inclusive socially. Constituents are looking at wealth creation in different ways and their council needs to keep them on their game and not some interest group's, developer's , whoever's, looking to make a quick buck.

So if communities are becoming more assertive in regard to their right to be informed as well as being more engaged in, and having more influence in, decision-making processes – Government's, Councils' and other public institutions' decisions – it is not too surprising.

Faced with the demands of their constituency, council officers and Aldermen, should be looking for new ways to evaluate their performance and in particular Aldermen should be mindful of evaluating their own performance and and their level of engagement with their constituents.

Strategic planning in Launceston needs a review because up until now this Council and its officers are planning for a future that is unlikely to happen. As a consequence Launceston Council is debt in order to keep the 'council overlords' in 'underlings' – and the ratepayers out of pocket.

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody 

ought not to be trusted by anybody.” 
Thomas Paine

MORE WATCHERS ON BOARD IT SEEMS

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This group is on Launceston City Council's case too! They are, they say, committed to turning up and watching what goes on at TOWN HALL and good on them. The more people doing that and the more transparent Launceston's local government becomes the better.

Each individual, each precinct group, each business network, every ratepayers group, whoever that opens a case file on Launceston Town Hall, well the more engaged "the elected 12 around the table" are likely to be.  Local government all too often has an unhealthy smell about it.

What is really really worrying is that there are still people in local government that think that "the punters out there elected us to make decisions" when the "punters" thought that they were actually electing representatives. They also probably thought that their representatives would consult with then once in a while. Let's make sure they do!

Anyway it is good to see a network of ACCOUNTABILITY KEEPERS evolving in cyberspace keeping the city's representers on the game representing them and not some nefarious self-interest group trying to clamber under the wire.

IDEA TO PONDER # 2

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody 

ought not to be trusted by anybody.” 
Thomas Paine

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A TRUTH?

TOWN HALL LAST SUPPER

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody 

ought not to be trusted by anybody.” 
Thomas Paine

PLEASE LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS BELOW

LCC'S LAST SUPPER AT TOWN HALL

Well Monday Oct 27 and the mystery is who will be at the table feasting on the hapless ratepayer's largess at this LAST SUPPER. The meeting's agenda is loaded with potentials for last ditch payoffs that one day will come to light. THEY ALWAYS DO! Some of these last minute 'decisions' could even bite us Launcestonians on the bum. THEY OFTEN DO! The question that really needs to be asked is, why do these decisions need to be made at 5mins to midnight? They do not! WHY? Because those round the table will not be around, necessarily, to be ACCOUNTABLE. Some are going willingly, and others, well the ratepayers and residents might decide very soon to see them off. And as for the GM, well he is in the lap of the GODS. We can always wait for the minutes but they may not tell us much. THEY OFTEN DO NOT! AND the Examiner's reporter is on hols so not much hope there. THERE RARELY IS! Let's look forward to the new Council in the hope that it'll be ACCOUNTABLE in ways that we wish to become accustomed to!

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody 

ought not to be trusted by anybody.” 
Thomas Paine

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Click here to read the ratepayer's contributions

Click here to read about HPS(Tas) Inc.

“A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody 

ought not to be trusted by anybody.” 
Thomas Paine

PLEASE LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS BELOW AN ENTRY

COUNCILS: Placemakers OR Business

PLACEMAKING = [1] • [2] • [3] • [4] • [5]  Click on a number

BUSINESS = [1] • [2] • [3] • [4] • [5]  Click on a number 

UPG: Unconditional Positive Regard & Rankism

In medical situations, particularly in the area of mental health, ‘cares’ are required to have, need to have, productive and healing relationships with their patients /clients/ charges. This was once left to intuition and as something a ‘good care’ would innately know about and put into practice largely as an outcome of experience. Largely it is still the case.

Carers cannot ”love” their charges albeit that in some caring relationships it might be said that they do in a kind of way. Not romantic, erotic or spiritual love but something else.

What else? Increasingly ‘caring practices’ while regarding such emotional attachments between the cared-for and the carer as inappropriate/ unprofessional/ improper/ unhealthy, there was still a need to ‘theorise’ the ‘ideal relationship’ in a contemporary and professional context.

Thus “UnconditionalPositive Regard” (UPR), was the term that had some resonance, and that won some currency, in the increasingly intellectualised world of mental healthcare and other branches of healthcare.

The humanistic psychologist Carl Rogers is said to have coined the term to describe the basic acceptance and support of a person regardless of what the person says or does. Supposed a less complex and more easily applied concept than ”love” with all the baggage that idea carries.

By extension, UPR might well have some currency in regard to the world’s of governance and management.  It’d be not only unrealistic but also totality inappropriate to require politician to love their constituents. Nonetheless, in an ideal world both politician and constituent might well be expected to hold each other in ‘high regard’ and quite possibly in UPR.

Arguably when we vote, what we’re aiming to do is divine this UPR kind of relationship and vote accordingly. Largely it’s probably done intuitively and subconsciously. When we vote it might be useful, when looking for ‘accountability’, to look for the UPR factor, or its potential at least, when ranking the candidates.

In local government, a Council that had collective and mutual UPR for the constituency and visa versa would be utopian. It might be unlikely but it is worth shooting for!

And then there is “RANKISM”.  The author and citizen diplomat Robert W. Fuller says “rankism is an assertion of superiority. It typically takes the form of putting others down. It's what "Somebodies" do to "nobodies." Or, more precisely, it is what people who think they're Somebodies do to people they take for nobodies… It turns out that rankism is the source of most man-made suffering.“

The prospect of governance unblighted by rankism and in a community where there is mutual UPR between governance and constituents is perhaps too utopian to count on but it is worth aspiring towards.

MONEY MATTERS

Anecdotally, gaining access to 'Launceston's Accounts' has been described as all too difficult. There may be reasons for this but one cannot ever be that it is inappropriate. Surely, asking for such information may place an extra load on the accounting team. However,in the days of computer records most large corporations can supply same day analysis of money matters for operational managers.

Launceston is a $100 million operation and it would be cost effective to be able match performance levels in the private sector. Furthermore, Aldermen armed with clear up to date financial reporting they would be better placed to develop more appropriate, and issue sensitive, policies.

At LCC over recent years its often claimed that the distinctions between government and management have been blurred. Civic administration 101 tells us that the dividing lines are is clear:

• Governance determines the policies and priorities to do with what, why where & when; and
• Management is charged with the task of implementation, the  how & the who.

Below are two sets of figures that are not routinely accessible to governance for what anecdotally appears to be a myriad of reasons. Given that Council is managing ratepayer's money to provide ratepayer services there is a case for ratepayers/ constituents / the financiers to have ready access to Council financial reporting in order to facilitate a more productive, more inclusive, discourse between Council (the service providers) and the constituency ( the serviced). It should lead to effective governance.

Increasingly social media in concert with the evolving information technologies will better enable fast access to real time records. With current technologies that bis almost the case or maybe that point has actually been arrived at.

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IDEA # 3

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IDEA # 1.001

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Should politicians be held financially responsible for promoting false statements?

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NOT A BAD IDEA REALLY

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IDEA # 1

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IDEA # 2

IDEAS TO PONDER #1

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WATCH THIS SPACE

This site is intended as one where the issue of accountability in a local context can be explored and tested. Accountability is a contentious and emotive idea and one that is often laced with innuendo. It's an idea, a big idea, that very often occupies tender ground where its meanings and substance comes under unwelcome scrutiny. Nonetheless, whenever it is achieved, and to the satisfaction of those contesting an issue, the outcome is generally one of healed rifts plus better and more inclusive understandings.

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