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If anyone is looking for an evening of high farce then a local Council meeting is the place to be.
The Kiama Council meeting held on Tuesday, April 17 was like a scene from a B grade movie.
The item under discussion was a DA for 4.6 hectares on the eastern edge of Jamberoo Village which council had previously rejected 8:1.
The players were:
Councillor Way, directed by Councillor Watson who leant across and stabbed an angry finger at some obviously written script, said, “ We should vote for this DA as it will only come back to bite us”. Really??
Councillor Reilly had to explain to Mark Way that this DA was never coming back because it had been referred to the Minister for Planning for the final decision.
Councillors Way and Watson obviously hadn’t bothered to read Council’s briefing notes. Councillor Brown – you shouldn’t leave town and leave these two without a minder.
Next came Councillor Steel who proudly said, “I gave my word to Geoff that I would stick with this and in 22 years, Mayor, I’ve never gone back on my word and I ain’t going back now”.
And what about the other 13,000 + residents he is elected to represent? Does Councillor Steel have no regard for Governance issues? And is there anyone out there with a controversial DA they want to get passed by council – Councillor Steel could be your man!
But the final accolade goes to our Mayor, Councillor Honey.
The quote of the week was ,“It has always been part of my mission to preserve as much of the prime agricultural land that we can in this community”.
Then he promptly voted in favour of this development which will see 4.6 hectares of prime agricultural land covered in dense housing.
Thank you Mayor for listening to the majority of your residents. We will remember this episode when it’s time to vote!
Fortunately, we have some intelligent, thoughtful Councillors such as Neil Reilly and Kathy Rice who gave logical, well-reasoned presentations which sadly missed the mark for all except Councillor Westhoff. Councillor Sloan’s logic was badly missed.
Council voted 4:3 in favour of the DA. Tune in for the next exciting episode.
G Millist, Jamberoo
- Letter received April 26, 2018.