City of Launceston appoints Michael Stretton as new general manager

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Michael Stretton has been appointed the City of Launceston’s new general manager.......Mr Stretton will replace outgoing general manager Robert Dobrzynski, who announced his resignation earlier in the year........ Launceston Mayor Albert van Zetten said he was delighted with the appointment of Mr Stretton following a rigorous and highly competitive process that saw more than 80 quality applicants apply for the position........"With more than two decades of experience in local government, we believe Michael has the integrity, passion and expertise to lead Launceston into what will be an exciting future,” Ald van Zetten said........ Mr Stretton is the current general manager at Waratah-Wynyard Council........ He has previously worked in Launceston as the council’s director of development services. Mr Stretton said he was excited at the prospect of re-joining the City of Launceston as general manager........"I look forward to applying all that I have learned to guide the organisation as an industry leading best practice council, which continues to deliver a progressive and innovative agenda for the city," Mr Stretton said........ "My family and I believe that now is the perfect time to re-locate back to Launceston as it promises to be such an exciting stage of development and growth for the city through initiatives such as the City Deal, City Heart Project, UTAS relocation, North Bank redevelopment and many others.”....... Mr Stretton will officially start at the City of Launceston in mid-October.

NOTE: There are many ratepayers out there looking forward to this news and many have expressed relief that this appointment has been made within Tasmania given the prospect of “yet another GM from elsewhere” being appointed. Local Govt. by anyone's measure is in a state of flux and/or crisis. With an elections (Local Govt & State) due next year the upcoming period prior to them will undoubtedly be a time of reassessment on many fronts. 

Launceston, Rubbish and Bureaucracy

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Launceston Council is apparently totally dedicated to growing the ‘council bureaucracy’ rather than servicing its constituency. Ratepayers are becoming increasingly aware that the Local Govt. Act is being perverted to the benefit of the bureaucracies involved rather than the constituency. 

Why? Notably, SECTION 62 of the Act allows the General Manager and thus her/his underlings, “may do anything necessary or convenient to perform his or her functions under this or any other Act” and dam the constituents. Increasingly the consequences of this legislative folly become clearer and clearer.

Serially the aldermen are sidelined it appears and if they advocate on behalf of their constituents all too often they find that everything has been "stitched up well away from the table” for this or that reason – and of course because SECTION 62 allows for that to happen. Its rubbish, but not of the kind sent to Launceston’s ‘WASTE MANAGEMENT CENTRE” where there is a predisposition to waste resource rather than recover them albeit that some recycling goes on there.

This week ratepayers received in the post marketing material for the ‘kerbside FARO' (Food & Garden Organics Kerbside Collection Service) and the standard of performance persists. It needs to be noted that this service(?) has been in gestation since March 2016 only now to be implemented. Difficult stuff this bureaucratic planning! 

The video marketing the service can be viewed b clicking here  So far so good in a way as it does seem that eventually, at operational convenience, a resource might well be recovered but there is no mention of the intentional dividends and their anticipated level. 

Likewise, there is no mention of the fact that this ‘waste’ is being diverted from landfill while council continues to build more and more landfill cells. If there is a contradiction here its not being explained – or possibly its not being acknowledged. Interestingly, entrepreneurial Councils in other jurisdictions reward their constituents for providing organic material for their RRCs – Resource Recovery Centres – via loads of compost or mulch and a side benefit being that their ‘operational costs’ are contained rather than expanded as it appears is the case at the ‘Lonnie Tip’.

The Launceston FARO ‘Green Waste Collection’ hardly passes the ‘pub test’ and especially so compared to and contrasted with local jurisdictions that mean business, offer a service and are they entrepreneurial. It seems despite ratepayers paying the highest rates in Tasmania they cannot expect to get commensurate services or even a commitment to delivering ‘a bang for the bucks’.

But there is more! It seems that the two free entry vouchers come with conditions. The word is that the ‘gate keepers’ at the ‘waste centre’ are photographing number plates and if your doing your parents a favour taking their surplus resources to the waste centre twice you cannot do the same for your elderly neighbour, Uncle Jim, your Gran or anyone else sng the same vehicle. Neither can your hired help use your vouchers it seems. If you imagine that handing over the ‘FREE ENTRY VOUCHER” is enough bureaucratically forget it!

Yet there is this other question hanging in the air. Is it actually legal to photograph people’s number plates? Is this an evasion of privacy? OR does the General Manager under SECTION 62 have the authority to do anything convenient to him? 

But the big question is as follows, is there an alderman who will take this issue up and represent their constituency? It’s understood that there is a book being run on this with quite a few dollars invested.

The way we plan? Should plan? Could plan?

A group opposing the state government’s new planning scheme reforms has also put Labor and the Greens “on notice”. ........... On Thursday [July 6], Planning Matters Alliance Tasmania, a coalition of more than 40 community groups, launched its campaign to lobby political parties to reverse the reforms proposed under the Tasmanian Planning Scheme. ........... The TPS will take effect in early 2018, seeking to consolidate several disparate schemes under a single statewide system. But PMAT claims the new scheme will impact on quality of life in Tasmania’s urban and suburban areas. ........... The group says the TPS is a “weakening” of the state’s existing planning laws. ........... PMAT spokeswoman Sophie Underwood said the group intended to campaign in the lead-up to the state election, endeavouring to “improve” the statewide planning scheme. Ms Underwood said the new scheme would impact on housing density, heritage values and national parks and reserves,. ........... She also said Tasmania would see taller houses being built. ........... “Someone can build a house right next door to you that’s eight-and-a-half metres high, it’s built close to your fence and it can take your views, your privacy and sunshine and there’s not a lot you can do about it,” Ms Underwood said. ........... Mr Gutwein said the prospective establishment of a statewide planning scheme was a policy the Hodgman government had taken to the 2014 election. ........... “It has already been comprehensively consulted on, has passed through both houses of Parliament and been through the required statutory process,” Mr Gutwein said. ........... He said the TPS would put “consistent rules in place right across the state, removing the previous patchwork of different rules”. ........... The state government, Mr Gutwein said, was committed to implementing a “faster, fairer, simpler and cheaper” planning system. ........... Opposition planning spokeswoman Madeleine Ogilvie said Labor “support[ed] and encourag[ed]” the formation of PMAT and looked forward to working with the group “in a collaborative way, drawing upon the collective experiences of its members to improve planning regulation and policy for Tasmania”. ........... Greens planning spokeswoman Rosalie Woodruff also welcomed the formation of PMAT. ........... She said the Greens wished to retain the structure of a single statewide planning scheme, with some caveats. ........... She said a “substantial review” of the scheme was needed, so as to take into account communities, the environment and built heritage and aboriginal heritage values."

General Managers, Councils, Ratepayers & Accountably

LAWYERS for Glenorchy general manager Peter Brooks say if they can prove that the Board of Inquiry into the council is jurisdictionally flawed then they will ensure the inquiry is killed and the draft report never sees the light of day.

Mr Brooks has taken Supreme Court action against the Board and its members Barry Easther and Lynn Mason over the process of the investigation and the findings of the second draft report into the council.

At Wednesay’s hearing for an application to show cause, Mr Brooks’ representatives Justin Zeeman and Launceston-based barrister Shaun McElwaine SC both sought for Associate Justice Stephen Holt to either close the court or issue a suppression or non-publication order of Mr Brooks’ claims against the Board and its investigation.

After ruling against Mr Zeeman’s request for the affidavit not to be read out in open court in the morning session, Associate Justice Holt stood the hearing down until the afternoon where Mr McElwaine made his argument.

Mr McElwaine said the claims and findings against Mr Brooks in the report were “grossly defamatory” and “impugned his [Brooks’] professional reputation in a most damaging way”.

Mr McElwaine also said Mr Brooks had not been afforded natural justice in the investigation, which he said was an unlawful one.

“We say the entire procedure is unlawful,” he said. “If the inquiry has been unlawfully conducted, it must be shut down.”

Associate Justice Holt adjourned the matter to next week, but said he was surprised that Mr Brooks’ representatives found it difficult to “get over that very low hurdle” of an order to show cause.

Acting Attorney-General Matthew Groom joined the lawsuit on Monday on behalf of the State on the side of the Board of Inquiry in a bid to release the report to Local Government Minister Peter Gutwein as soon as possible.

MORE: GOVERNMENT JOINS GCC INQUIRY CASE

Also on Wednesday, lawyers for suspended Glenorchy alderman Jenny Branch-Allen launched another action against the Board, Mr Easther and Ms Mason. Ms Branch-Allen took the inquiry to the Supreme Court last year, arguing that it was engaged in an unfair process.

Lawyers for her fellow suspended alderman Christine Lucas also sought to enter Mr Brooks’ action against the inquiry.

Suspended aldermen Jan Dunsby and Matthew Stevenson attended the hearing representing themselves to argue that Mr Brooks’ affidavit should not be subject to a closed court or any suppression or non-publication orders.

The dates for the two trials have been pencilled in for early next month with both expected to take two to three days to complete.

Mr Brooks did not attend the hearings.

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