Shellharbour’s passions against a merger with Wollongong have not cooled in recent weeks, with one councillor encouraging his northern colleagues to “stick Wollongong fair up their backsides” during this week’s meeting.
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In an emotional debate on Shellharbour’s merger submission to the NSW government’s delegate, Cr Paul Rankin slammed Wollongong councillors for stating the name of any new council should contain the word “Wollongong”.
In a spiel peppered with explicit language, he also hit out at Kiama MP Gareth Ward for not crossing the floor in state parliament last week to vote against the merger, and indicated the state and federal governments have “got their heads up their arse”.
“One of the councillors from Wollongong said the government would go after councils that make the most noise and Wollongong city council has a considerate, careful approach,” he said.
“Well that doesn’t wash with me, because we need to make as much noise as we can to stand up for the residents of our city.”
Earlier in the meeting, the council’s independent advisor Jenny Franke, of government consultants Morrison Low, gave a scathing assessment of the state’s proposal.
“We’ve constructed what we believe is the strongest possible argument, for this council and this community, against the proposed merger,” she said, referring to a 129 page submission.
Ms Franke refuted the government’s assertion that Shellharbour was not financially fit, saying the merger was based on an incorrect notion it would address problems with the council’s financial position.
Ms Franke said Morrison Low’s modelling showed service and other costs would rise under a merger.
“The merger proposal creates significant and disproportionate financial disadvantage for the community, including through loss of investment returns, liability for infrastructure shortfalls in Wollongong, and the sunk cost of recent financial investments, mainly the Shellharbour civic centre and IT upgrades,” she said.
Ms Franke also said Morrison Low had to remove 200 staff from the council’s organisational structure to achieve any savings, and noted this would have negative effects for the Illawarra.
“Overall the merger proposal significantly and disproportionately affects the residents and ratepayers of Shellharbour,” she said.
Mayor Marianne Saliba said she was sad her city was facing a “gloomy” outlook, but hoped common sense would stop the merger.
