Misleading CEO report against councillor — Cr Walkom, 2014.04.04

2014.04.04

Dear webmaster,

I was recently provided by the CEO the opportunity to respond to his item 10.3 of Council Agenda regarding actions I was to have undertaken at the direction of Council. I responded with these comments thereunder, but was then advised this would be heavily edited. I then withdrew these comments completely, advising I was not prepared to be misrepresented with edited comments.

I also reiterated at the time I withdrew the comments that the CEO’s report to Council contained a number of factual errors, and demanded that these should be addressed before publication, or I would publish them in full elsewhere. My requests were ignored, I therefore submit my original comments in full to be published on KIpolis.net

Cr Gr. Walkom

[Addressed to the Mayor, Mrs Jayne Bates]

Compliance With Council Resolution 10.3 of 22 Jan 2014

Thank you for the opportunity to comment under Natural Justice provisions against the report to council by Mr Andrew Boardman on whether or not I have complied with Council’s resolution 10.3 of the 22 January 2014 KIC meeting, and note particularly that this appears to be the first time that council has extended  natural justice principles to councillors in any matter. I truly welcome this implementation and trust that it remains an essential part of process in future.

More specifically, I am very concerned that Mr Boardman submits such a profligate and misleading report to council: in that it contains several serious errors of fact and appears to be much more a personal attack on me as a councillor, rather than objective and accurate information and advice to council.

The CEO states that Mr and Mrs May were in the gallery on 22 January, but fails to point out that although Mrs May lodged a complaint against me, this was dismissed by the LGGP for the clear and obvious reason I had never made any remarks to her on this or any other matter, directly or indirectly. In other words her complaint as distinct from Mr May’s was mischievous. Neither had I directed any remarks on this matter to any other party. If others were inadvertently included by the recipient and the others took offence, then that is an unfortunate consequence of someone else’s actions not mine. Never-the-less I will extend my apology here to anyone else who took offence by my remarks to Mr May, whilst again emphasising the LGGP did not identify anyone else.

It should be remembered that my original remarks to Mr May were a plea for the expectations of those seeking finances from council to understand the dreadful and deteriorating finances of this council. In my email response to Mr May on 8th September 2013, I stated “In recent years, council has accumulated a deficit of circa $23 million. This has essentially resulted from not spending on and maintaining our roads. Without this sort of extreme weather event council started this year adding to this deficit at over $12,000 every calendar day ($4.6million for the year 13/14).” In the short time since those alarming facts, council has managed to blow these numbers out to more than $14,300 every calendar day (or now $5,252,194 for this financial year, compared to the originally budgeted amount of circa $4.6million.

In my view, it has always been apparent that Mr Boardman does not understand just what is contributing to this increasing deficit and accordingly has made quite ineffective efforts towards this problem. Further in my view, Mr Boardman’s understanding of direct and indirect costs that affect this council’s deficit appears rudimentary at best, as evident from his advice to council in his attached report that costs associated with prosecuting this matter further would not be significant: obviously he does not see that the four hours on this attached report to council alone have direct and indirect costs to council of more than $800 based on Mr Boardman’s hourly rate of $200 (cash and on costs). Full council costs in considering and establishing the facts as distinct from the misrepresentations made by him in this report may total several hundred dollars and hour, and then legal representation to the Ombudsman and OPI several thousand more.

In conclusion, I find Mr Boardman’s references to me having failed to comply with a council resolution 10.3 of the january 2014 meeting as both ludicrous and extremely hypocritical, when considering the number of resolutions of this council he as the CEO of this council either not implemented or not complied with – some for more than two years.

Thank you again for allowing this input to the next council agenda.

Graham Walkom
Elected Member
Kangaroo Island Council

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Webmaster comment:

Further reference to the matter addressed by Cr Walkom can be found on

Council opts for handouts rather than fixing roads — Cr Walkom 2013.09.22

KIpolis will not be drawn in the censuring and silencing of Cr Walkom — G. Bittar, 2014.02.08

What exactly do the CEO, Mr Boardman, and the Mayor, Mrs Bates, want?

1. Cr Walkom has apologised, in public and in full accord of what was demanded from him by the Council majority. So what Mr Boardman states in his report (which can be found on http://www.kangarooisland.sa.gov.au/councilmeetings) is simply untrue.

2. Cr Walkom has apologised on KIpolis.net (which Mr Boardman never mentions by name, but one can deduce from the date he provides of 22.9.2013 that he has this forum in mind). So again what the CEO states is untrue.

3. The initial post on KIpolis was not removed, whatever the CEO states. Cr Walkom asked for it to be removed, the webmaster refused for sound reasons. So, for a third time, the CEO misrepresents the situation.

Considering that Cr Walkom advised both the Mayor and CEO that the CEO’s report to Council contained blatant and brazen errors / untruths, one has to conclude that this is all deliberate. If Council operated in a sound and honest manner, this should be reason for instant dismissal of the CEO.

On their side, Mayor Bates and the Council majority more than share responsibility in this, and they should pay the political price of creating, by their incessant legal and administrative harassment of opposition in Council, a detestable atmosphere which has made of Kangaroo Island Council a dysfunctional one.

As a ratepayer, I also strongly resent that, in the last three years, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent by Council on this harassment policy.

 

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