Shellharbour Mayor Chris Homer should resign over his "gross and ongoing incompetence" for participating in Kiama MP Gareth Ward's airport announcement bungle last month.
On September 25, Mayor Homer and Deputy Mayor Kellie Marsh joined Mr Ward at Shellharbour Airport to announce Shellharbour City Council had received $15.97 million in the recent state budget to extend the runway.
But there was no such funding in the latest budget - the $15 million was allocated in 2019 and is carried over every year until the project is completed.
Mr Ward said the mishap was the result of budget papers provided to his office that listed the funding for the Kiama electorate in this year's budget - though several Labor MPs called for Mr Ward to apologise.
One of those was Shellharbour MP Anna Watson, who in parliament on Tuesday also took aim at Mayor Homer.
She announced her intent to move a motion that "condemns" Mayor Homer for attending the press conference and "notes that the mayor publicly thanked the member for Kiama for securing funding that never existed for the Shellharbour Airport upgrades".
She also felt the mayor should step down "for not undertaking due diligence, for misleading the community and for failing to apologise for his gross and ongoing incompetence".
Ms Watson and fellow Labor councillors on Shellharbour City Council have been engaged in an ongoing series of skirmishes with Mayor Homer since the last council elections.
At the last council meeting Labor councillors questioned why the airport announcement had been left off the mayor's record of activities.
In October last year, Ms Watson made the extraordinary jibe that some councillors were "drunk on power" and in June the pair locked horns during a public forum.
Labor councillors have also gone on the offensive since the mayor took office, including staging a walkout at a council meeting in April.
Mayor Homer's response can be read here.
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Glen Humphries
I'm an award-winning senior journalist with the Illawarra Mercury and have well over two decades' worth of experience in newspapers. I cover the three local councils in the Illawarra for the Mercury, state and federal politics, as well as writing for the TV guide. If I'm not writing, I'm reading.
I'm an award-winning senior journalist with the Illawarra Mercury and have well over two decades' worth of experience in newspapers. I cover the three local councils in the Illawarra for the Mercury, state and federal politics, as well as writing for the TV guide. If I'm not writing, I'm reading.
