The Year of Governing Shamelessly (again)

 

This is a brief chronological recap of the most notable(*) outcomes from the 21 ordinary and 3 extraordinary meetings of the Hills Shire Council this year.  Notable, that is, from the point of view of this page - in other words connected or relevant to climate and environment.  So, of course, it is very selective - there have been many other matters considered by council that are not relevant to our mission and not described here.

Regrettably, this account is mostly negative.  There have been one or two positives, such as steps towards a community recycling centre (yet to be realised), but overall this council’s consistent and continuing denial cannot be disputed.

Do they value their "intuition" above solid, incontrovertible science?  Or do they simply value material wealth above humanity and nature?  Or their sense of personal power above the well-being of all other people?  Or their twisted, contorted "ideology" above the continuance of a safe and secure society?

Whatever the case, the drop-in Liberals on the Hills Shire Council are firmly in denial when it comes to the climate and environment crisis.

And their record in 2022 not only continues that but demonstrates a ruthless and opportunistic readiness to abandon democratic norms and suppress dissent in their efforts to exert maximum control over the narrative and in pursuit of their factional agendas.

Truly a year of governing shamelessly!

NOTE: This account is prepared by reference to the published meeting agendas and minutes.  We are not so masochistic that we listened to the meeting recordings (with a few very particular exceptions).  If you see any error or know of anything significant that we have missed please let us know so that we can correct our account.

January

The previous council had resolved to prepare a renewable energy strategy.  The new council so abhorred this very sensible decision that they called an extraordinary meeting (Jan 11) with extraordinary haste and malign intent to undo it - while many councillors were on leave and new councillors had not even had the opportunity for induction.

They succeeded.  Of the Liberal cohort, only Councillor de Masi opposed the move.

February

A feature of this year in council has been their largely successful efforts to shutdown criticism and dissent.  At the first ordinary meeting (Feb  8) Council wasted no time in this endeavour by resolving to  exhibit a new code of meeting practice.  Amongst other things, the proposed code  would:

• Eliminate the community forum at council meetings;

• Prohibit councillors asking questions without notice;

• Restrict members of the public speaking on listed agenda items to 1 each for and against, at the mayor’s discretion.

March

Council considered a draft voluntary planning agreement with Mirvac in respect of the demolition and redevelopment of the former IBM site at West Pennant Hills (Mar 22).

An amendment was proposed to increase Mirvac’s monetary contribution but was defeated by the Liberal mayor  and councillors present.  The unaltered agreement was placed on exhibition.

At the same meeting and continuing council’s campaign to suppress dissent and control the public narrative, council unanimously voted to place on exhibition a reactionary and repressive draft social media moderation policy.

The policy, amongst other things, would prohibit any public comments on council’s social media accounts that council considered to be “political”.  Comments that named councillors would also be prohibited.  Experience before and since has shown that council considers comments relating to council’s woeful record on climate action to be “political”.

April

Council voted to place on exhibition a reckless and irresponsible draft Hills Shire plan for 2022-23 (Apr 26).

The plan contains almost no reference at all to the threat of climate change, nor any measures to address it.  Introductory texts by the mayor and by the general manager completely failed to mention climate change.  This is despite the increasingly visible and deeply damaging effects of warming-induced weather events on the shire and its inhabitants over recent years.

May

The draft code of meeting practice that was put on exhibition in February was unanimously adopted without further change.  No submissions were received.

As described above, the code of meeting practice was modified from its previous form to  reduce opportunities for community participation and to prohibit the opportunity for councillors to ask questions without notice.

June

Council voted (Jun 14) to adopt the reckless and irresponsible Hills Shire Plan 2022-23 that was placed on exhibition in April.  Only councillors Burton and Kasby opposed the plan on the grounds that it failed to address the impacts of climate change.  Councillors Hay and Tracey supported the plan but urged greater climate action.

Council dismissively shrugged off, without action, 16 submissions from concerned community members relating to action on climate change.

At the same meeting (Jun 14) council voted to adopt a maximum remuneration of $31,640 for councillors and $92,180 for the mayor.  The mayor has previously claimed to be committed to his role full-time.

At their June 28 meeting, council voted to adopt the deeply repressive social media moderation policy they had put on exhibition in March.  Councillor Tracey opposed it, as did Councillor Kasby on this occasion.  But they were alone. Even Labor Councillor Burton inexplicably supported the move.

Council proceeded with their hugely flawed policy, despite an alternative and reasonable model policy becoming available from the NSW Office of Local Government.

The move received vociferous and unanimous condemnation on social media posts by this page, by the Hills Shire Times and others.  It also received negative coverage in the Daily Telegraph and even in the editorial of that newspaper.  Six community submissions opposing the policy were dismissed by the council.

As part of the resolution adopting this flawed policy, council officers were tasked with producing a replacement policy based on the Office of Local Government model.  As far as we  know, nearly six months later, this has still not occurred.

At about the same time we have reason to believe that an unidentified council member or officer took a much more egregious step to suppress dissent.  It appears to have been totally successful.  Unfortunately we are not in a position to say more about this.  And those that can and should, apparently will not.

July

At the meeting of July 12, a mayoral minute called for raising the Warragamba Dam Wall.  Given the council’s decades of denying the climate crisis contributing to the flood emergency and the powerful cultural, environmental and economic case against the wall raising, this was a clear case of cynical opportunism.  Congratulations to Councillor Tracey for being the only councillor present to stand against this.

At the same meeting, council nominated all nine Liberal council members to be voting delegates to  the Local Government NSW Annual Conference.  None of the remaining four councillors were assigned voting rights.

At the December 2021 election, in all contests there were 208,885 formal votes cast.  Of those the Liberals received just under 57% on first preference.  Yet they assigned themselves 100% of voting rights to the LGNSW conference - because they can, of course!

August

Council considered a motion for a feasibility report on a Community Recycling Centre (Aug 23).  Pleasingly six of the nine Liberals supported it, along with the two non-Liberals in attendance.  However it was perversely opposed by Liberal Councillors de Masi, Ellis and Jethi.  Nevertheless, the motion having been carried, we await the report and outcome with interest.

At  the same meeting, Councillors Kasby and Burton moved that council’s proposed submission on the state government draft plans for the Cherrybrook Station Precinct be amended for more affordable housing, more accessible  dwellings, urban heat protection and energy efficiency, amongst other things.

This is the same development referenced in an ABC Four Corners program earlier in the year and for which the developer TopPlace is one of the proponents.

The motion for these highly desirable and beneficial changes was defeated by eight of the nine Liberals present.  Councillor Boneham was the only Liberal councillor to support the motion.

September

Council resolved to enter into the Voluntary planning agreement with Mirvac that was first put on exhibition in March.  This related to the demolition and redevelopment of the former IBM site at West Pennant Hills.  (Mirvac’s monetary contribution was, of course, not increased as had been proposed by some councillors in March.)  The motion was supported by all nine Liberals and  opposed by all non-Liberal councillors present.

October

A motion was put by Councillors Kasby and Tracey that council lobby the state government for the protection of native wildlife via enforceable and consistent standards for Fauna Management Plans for developers.  The Liberals in attendance voted as one to defeat the motion.  It  seems not even the slightest inconvenience to developers can be supported by these Liberal developer proxies!

Fortunately Hornsby Shire Council had resolved to move a similar motion at the upcoming NSW Local  Government conference.  At that conference, Hornsby’s motion was carried and LG NSW will  therefore lobby for these measures.

Voting records for the LG NSW conference are not publicly available as far as we could determine.  But our council had, in July, assigned our shire’s voting rights exclusively to the Liberals on council.  We must assume they voted against the motion at LG NSW too.

November

Council’s annual report and financial statements were quietly put on exhibition.  Again, they are almost entirely devoid of any acknowledgement of climate change.

December

Only one meeting in December and nothing adverse to report in our area of interest (as far as  we are aware), thankfully.  One month out of twelve - it must be Christmas!

Of course, pre-Christmas is a popular time of year for all governments to announce unpopular or unconscionable decisions or actions.  So let’s stay alert!