just more dysfunction …
At the commencement of last week’s ordinary meeting,
Cr Bain unsuccessfully attempted to raise an item of Urgent Business relating to council’s
Long Term Financial Plan (LTFP),
Operational Plan & Budget 2021, in particular her stated concern that councillors had been made aware of errors in the
LTFP by a member of the community,
Mr Lucas Scarpin, at the
Public Forum held two hours earlier.
In her address to council, Cr Bain said:
“In particular, I cannot fathom/understand – my only description is gobsmacked – to hear that a member of the community, as Mr Scarpin is, announce to all councillors, without our knowledge, that the LTFP figures were incorrect & we did not know that.
We were not advised by anybody: you as Mayor, the general manager or any other councillor. And I am really sick to the core to know that the figures that we have gone over – the 1,000 pages of papers that all of us have gone (& the most important part of our job is the financial matters of council) were incorrect & we found that out via a Public Forum told to us by Mr Scarpin.”
While the association shares Cr Bain’s concerns about the importance of timely communications, it is also concerned about the accuracy of what is communicated, particularly after being publicly attacked by councillors for sharing information from council’s approved & published Annual Report which, as it turned-out, was wrong.
Indeed, during his address to the Public Forum, Mr Scarpin was at pains to make it clear that his purpose was to ensure council was still determined to address his earlier voiced concerns around council’s Cash Reserves & forecast Cash Position, as the LTFP document tabled at the meeting suggested to him that such might not be the case.
Mr Scarpin was careful to parry some questions from councillors by making it clear that people not employed by council, including himself, did not necessarily have access to sufficient information to be able to answer them with any degree of certainty.
What became clear through subsequent explanations by the Mayor & general manager was that Cr Fitzpatrick had apparently raised concerns with the accuracy of some figures in the LTFP during the weekly Financial Workshop held two days earlier on the Monday. Apparently council staff then checked the accuracy of those numbers & confirmed that a significant error had been found in the LTFP caused by a programming error in the financial modelling tool being used by council management.
While that information had been communicated to the general manager on the same day as the Public Forum & council meeting, unfortunately it had not been relayed to councillors prior to those meetings.
Even so, anyone who listened to Mr Scarpin’s presentation to the Public Forum (including Cr Bain who attended that meeting) would know that the alleged errors in the LTFP were identified by Cr Fitzpatrick & not Mr Scarpin.
While there is clearly a problem in communications between some councillors, efforts to resolve those difficulties will come to nothing as long as councillors don’t & won’t pay sufficient attention to the facts of the matters they are dealing with.
Just more dysfunction.
John Richardson
Secretary/Treasurer
Bega Valley Shire Residents & Ratepayers Association
Tel: 0264945669
Email: secretary@begavalleyshireratepayers.asn.au
Website: http://www.begavalleyshireratepayers.asn.au