Belmont Resident and Ratepayer Action Group Inc.

29/08/2026

ERASING the public record? Not on our watch.

The BRRAG Committee has officially gone over the City of Belmont’s head straight to the Minister for Local Government.

Why? Because the City has been caught out using "Rule E" found on the back of the Public Question Time form, which is not voted on by council to completely delete the BRRAG Presidents question from the official meeting minutes from July..

This is a breach of the Local Government Administration Regulations, 11 e which state that minutes MUST include a summary of public questions.

If they can delete one uncomfortable question, they can delete anything.

Check out the full letter below to see exactly how your public records are being managed.

What do you think? Should the council be erasing public records to suit themselves? TRANSPARENCY at its finest!!!

Let’ us know what you think

26/08/2026

Council votes to STOP the Agenda Briefing for six momtjs

Gone is Transparency and as per the comments made by Mayor Rossi why not keep the ABF and just add Public Statement Time to the OCM? That is a very good question for a council that voted that they wanted the residents to have more say and claim to support transparency.

Mayor Rossi also reminded councillors that an ABF is for councillors to ask questions of the Administration. Why dont these councillors want residents to hear the questions they are asking???????? What is there to hide????? The fact that there is no voting done at an ABF in our view is irrelevant.

ABF gives residents the chance to listen, see the Officer presentations, hear the questions and most importantly do submissions and deputations so the council has a week to consider anything that a resident may have said. Now thats been taken away from residents.

A fact that came out last night. Originally they were going to allow 30 minutes for statement time and now it is 15 minutes according to the motion in red up on the screen. We can see how much they wanted to hear from residents.

Both Mayor Rossi and Cr Jarod Harris raised very good arguments as to why they voted against this and the residents thank both of them for listening and wanting transparency and community involvement.

As for those that voted in favour of the motion the most disappointing comments in our opinion came from former mayor Phil Marks. For someone who always stood for residents having a say to now vote to have us lose deputations and submissions and get 15 minutes for Public Statement Time. Really?????? We can see how you have obviously changed your views since you were the Mayor.

Ct Sekulla was happy to name Martin as bringing agenda briefing to his attention. Anyone who has listened to public question time will see Martin has been persistant asking 8 questions per meeting on agenda briefing for the last year or so. The same or similar questions. Did this have anything to do with them cancelling the ABF all together?

As far as Cr Kulczycki's comments went, we did not agree with him. If he had genuinely wanted to streamline things why move a motion the Officers did not recommend and why not move a motion as per what the Mayor suggested? Keep the ABF and add a statement time????? Residents would have applauded that.

The following councillors voted to Stop the ABF and instead give 15 minutes of public statement time at an ordinary council meeting..

Cr Chris Kulczycki
Cr George Sekulla
Cr Deb Sessions
Cr Phil Marks
Cr Bernie Ryan
Cr Abedin

Cr Davis was not at the meeting nor did she do the meeting online as per what Cr Harris did. Thanks Cr Harris for making the effort given your away at the moment.

With elections coming up next year we will be providing results of what is voted for to residents to make their own decision at election time. . It is time that residents knew what goes on so they can vote out people that do not support the residents.

This decision in our view does not support transparency and nor does it give the residents more access it actually gives us far less access to make our views known.

24/08/2026

TRANSPARENCY at the City of Belmont, WA

What is going on here why do our councillors think transparency is unimportant to the residents and ratepayers?

The council records Agenda Briefings. They do not release these to the public. We have been asking that they consider releasing these to the public so it addresses transparency concerns. There would be no cost other than putting it up on the website.

Not one of the nine councillors considered moving a motion to release the recordings of the Agenda Briefing which indicates in our view they dont think transparency is important.

Instead of doing advocating for transparency, Cr Chris Kulczycki has a councillor motion on the agenda to stop Agenda Briefings for a sic month trial. The reasons were dismissed by BRRAG in a post a couple of days ago which provided our Deputation.

In the report it states they will have ANOTHER Information Forum on the night we would ordinarily have the Agenda Briefing. All done closed doors no public. What is there to hide? Why the secrecy? Why dont they want us to know what is going on by closing sown the Agenda Briefing.

This is a disgrace!!!!!

Next year it is election time for the following councillors
Cr Kulczycki
Cr Abedin
Cr Marks
Cr Harris

We will also have to vote once again for Mayor. Last time the following councillors ran for Mayor - Davis, Sekulla and Rossi. Will they all put their hand up again????????????

We will let you know the outcome of the vote on this including who seconds the motion. The councillors that vote for this will be voting not to have TRANSPARENCY!!!

We have lacking transparency in both State and Federal government It is time we vote out those in local government that do not support residents and transparency.

20/08/2026

For those residents emailing councillors, it may well be your email is ending up in the spam folders.

At the moment there is some sort of email issue at the City of Belmont. The Director has been notified but has not replied as yet. Cr Sessions appears to be aware of the issue and has taken the time to check her spam folder and found emails there.

19/08/2026

Council to vote next Tuesday on LESS TRANSPARENCY and LESS PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Cr Chris Kulczycki' has moved a councillor motion to :
Key Issue:
The trial proposes that Agenda Briefing Forums would not be held during the trial period, and Public Statement Time would be introduced at Ordinary Council Meetings.

We are not at all happy about this and nor should any Belmont resident be happy about it as one day there may be something on the agenda you want to address with council. Many residents have done this in the past. They may have done a submission or better still a Deputation which gives councillors the opportunity to ask you questions on what you have said.

If this motion gets up this will STOP. They are instead going to add a Public Statement Time at an Ordingary Council Meeting. The catch unlike other councils where it can be on any topic it has to be on an agenda item. No questions will be allowed from the councillors. If there is more than ten people at the meeting with only a 30 minute time frame and no extensions some will miss out.

To top it off with the cancellation of Agenda Briefing there will be no transparency. The meetings are now public. Instead they will have an Information Forum. Closed to the public and it will give councillors more freedom to express opinions. What do the people we vote in want to hide from the public?????? Why not be transparent with their questions and let those that attend assess them and understand where they might be coming from???

Councillors get far more benefits than they once did and the Tribunal sees they get a decent pay for what they do. They have less work nowadays since planning which was once a major part of their workload is mostly with the State and the residents are getting listened to less and less.

If this motion gets through there will be less transparency with the loss of the ABF and less opportunity for residents to be heard by our council.

It is time residents sent a clear message to the councillors. It may be you that gets affected at some stage. We need to get rid of councillors who are not supporting the community and that should be a community consideration when we advise the outcome and which councillors vote for this. Both the position of Mayor and several councillors are up next year.

We have attached the deputation presented so we are transparent with residents which is something we have strongly stood by. It provides more details including what we think are ridiculous reasons for it and our response to them.

We urge residents to contact the councillors as this is the only way we might be in with a chance to stop this. Yet another level of government who is trying to give us less rights to opinion and speech and hide what goes on from the people who elect them

Here is their contact numbers:
Mayor Rossi 0408 693 584
Cr Sessions 0403 907 856
Cr Kulczycki 0404 767 583
Cr Sekulla 0431 963 660
Cr Harris 0478 256 196
Cr Marks 0417 998 229
Cr Ryan 0418 941 328
Cr Davis 0413 579 390
Cr Abedin 0423 789 551.

29/05/2026

This is why Belmont residents are not happy about the cameras for the livestreaming. The photo with the motion up is what you witness the entire time that councillors are debating. The other picture shows a resident asking questions. As you can see the residents are far more visible than any councillor (with perhaps the exception of the Mayor) at any time during the meeting.

Regulation 14 I 2(b) if, or to the extent that, the recording is a video
recording (with audio) — the quality of the recording must be sufficient to allow persons effectively to watch and listen to the deliberations and communications that are part of the meeting’s proceedings; and

Wonder if others think they are able to watch the proceedings as most of our residents say they cant identify the councillors and which one is speaking.

27/05/2026

COUNCIL VOTES to keep residents on camera during Public Question Time and they voted against livestreaming Agenda Briefing Forums.

Cr Jarod Harris moved a motion to have residents being removed from being "on camera". Voices during Public Question Time would remain. He also moved a motion to have the Agenda Briefing Forums livestreamed.

When listening to this video you will see they broke Cr Harris's motion into two parts and two separate votes. The first on the Agenda Briefing and the second on the removal of the camera on residents during Public Question Time.

Some of what came out was an eye opener. In respect of the agenda briefing forums we now know Cr Chris Kulczycki - City of Belmont - West Ward would like to have the public removed from attending these forums and them be only for councillors. Transparency right there!!!!

Cr George Sekulla and his three questions were astounding. You would have thought he should have known after eight years on council if an agenda briefing forum has a decision making function at all and what the legislation states about livestreaming an ABF. These questions have previously been asked and answered at ABF and council meetings before. Asking the number of residents who listen to the livestream versus the population of Belmont was interesting. You can see those figures of number of views on You Tube and meetings generally get on average 150 views. Apart from these questions he had no further comment.

As for Mayor Rossi and his comments residents have been refused on many occasions the opportunity to do deputations and submissions at an ABF by the Mayor. He refuses them on the basis that the person asking to do one is not "directly affected" which is not defined in the Standing Orders. He has the ultimate control of who can and cant speak on items on the agenda. Residents would probably be shocked to see how this goes down at an ABF and to see the manner in which it is often done.

Voting- Cr Jarod Harris, Cr Deb Sessions - Deputy Mayor, City of Belmontand Councillor Khandoker Abedin Belmont South Ward were in favour of livestreaming the Agenda Briefing Forum and the rest of the councillors voted against it.

Second Motion was the removal of residents from being "on camera" during Public Question Time."

Cr Harris was quite correct in all of his statements. It is not a requirement that video of residents asking questions must be recorded only the voices. A handout by the President of BRRAG was given during Public Question Time that provided the requirements for livestreaming from the Department.

"In the case of video broadcasts and recordings, members of the public do not need to be visible but do need to be heard if they are participating in the meeting (for example public question time)

:
Cr Deb Sessions - Deputy Mayor, City of Belmont comments about the numbers of people asking questions as a result of the camera has not been well researched. The facts are prior to the camera being installed in Feb 2024, for the 11 meetings in 2023 there were 114 residents who asked questions. For the last 11 meetings from May 2025- April 2026 there were 73 people who asked questions. Neither group had quest ions on planning matters. Phone, email and other methods of correspondence do not result in the questions being recorded and minuted. Evident last night when a resident in desperation after speaking to council on a matter for a significant period, decided he had to come to the meeting so questions were on public record.

Cr Chris Kulczycki - City of Belmont - West Ward had similar sentiments to Cr Sessions and we have provided the numbers from the minutes on attendance asking questions which has gone down from 114 to 73. It was astounding that as a councillor who would be fair to say is a numbers man provided the statistics of residents in Belmont versus the 9 people who have contacted him about the livestream. Why is he comparing the entire population of Belmont when only about 150 on average according to You Tube figures watch the livestream either on the night or later. The rest of those 46 890 Cr either do not know we livestream or are not interested. You should compare it to the numbers who watch, participate or are interested with those 9 people.

The vote was supported by Cr Harris and Councillor Khandoker Abedin Belmont South Ward and the rest voted to have the public front and centre.

After those two individual votes they went back to the original Officer Recommendation which did not include Agenda Briefing or the removal of residents on camera.

This vote was two against being Cr Harris and Councillor Khandoker Abedin Belmont South Ward and the rest voted for it.

We would like to that Cr Harris who put in a significant amount of work and research on thee two motions he put forward. Thanks also to Councillor Khandoker Abedin Belmont South Ward for voting to support the residents. It is great to see our two newest councillors listening to the residents and standing up for them. Wonder if at the next election we would be best to get more new councillors rather than those that have been around a while?

20/05/2026

Livestreaming Update

Earlier this year council took their first look at updating their livestreaming policy. The Administration who drafted the policy put before council wording which in effect allowed the administration to remove parts of the livestream and have no council oversight.

Thanks to the fantastic effort from the residents who contacted their councillors a backflip has been done on the draft policy at last nights agenda briefing forum and now has the wording “b) Provide an unedited broadcast of the council meeting proceedings, including the discussion and decision-making process.” If the council vote in favour of the changes it is because there was a lot of community input to councillors and they listened.

Now there is another issue on this policy that needs the community to have their say. so a change will be considered for next Tuesdays meeting.

Since the implementation of livestreaming in February 2024 which we support, the policy written by the Administration and NOT challenged by the councillors puts the residents (who are not public figures) who ask questions of council more prominent in the livestream than any councillor with the exception of the Mayor.

To top it off the Mayor reads out ta statement prior to each ordinary council meeting which in part states:
“If you do not consent to your voice and image being recorded and livestreamed to the public you will need to leave the meeting. By staying at this meeting you consent to your voice and image being livestreamed and recorded.”

Given the Mayor controls the meeting, some of us find this offensive as he is in a position of power during the meeting and what he says goes whether or not we either like it or agree with him.

After asking at least three times to be provided with the section of the Act or Regulations which requires residents asking questions to be “on camera” (voices must be heard) with a response each time “because it is livestteamed” (which incidently does not answer the question) we cant find anything that states this is the case.

What we can provide is a copy of an interview on 6 PR between Gareth Parker and Minister John Carey who was the person responsible for getting the livestreaming changes to the Act implemented in the first place. Although this discussion took place some time back when the legislation was in the process of being drafted, He stated, “If there are concerns about the privacy of individual residents for example some councils do not show residents speaking to the chamber so that gives some privacy.”

Minister Carey's comments start at 4.00 although the entire audio clearly shows the trouble we have had with livestreaming in the past and worth a listen.

https://www.mixcloud.com/BelmontResidentandRatepayer/livestream-6pr/

Since the implementation of the livestreaming the numbers of residents asking questions and dropped significantly. Some residents have asked us to ask questions for them as they dont want to be “on camera.” Some wont even sit in the public gallery. Some residents would have genuine reasons such as being in domestic violence situations, English as a second language, a job that requires them to have a low profile or maybe they are too nervous of public speaking.

There could be a couple of options available to help residents return to participation at meetings:
1. The first is turn the video (not audio) off completely.
2. Give residents a choice as to whether they want to camera on or off
3. Film from behind so residents dont have their face on the camera being more prominent than any of the councillors around the chamber.

We are asking residents to contact the councillors and get some support for the potential options we have suggested. We need people coming to meetings asking questions as this is the best way to keep things transparent as it is recorded. It also helps to hold the council accountable.

We do wonder if having such a prominent camera turned on residents who want to be involved, has achieved the intended outcome. Less people getting involved. The Minister certainly seemed happy for residents to have some privacy. Lets see if our councillors agree they would like to see more public particpation. With the support of residents we might get them on board.

Here is their contact numbers:
Mayor Rossi 0408 693 584
Cr Sessions 0403 907 856
Cr Kulczycki 0404 767 583
Cr Sekulla 0431 963 660
Cr Harris 0478 256 196
Cr Marks 0417 998 229
Cr Ryan 0418 941 328
Cr Davis 0413 579 390
Cr Abedin 0423 789 551

Listen to Livestream 6pr by BelmontResidentandRatepayer

25/03/2026

LIVESTREAMING Update

Thanks to all those people that contacted their councillors over the livestreaming. As per our previous post the council will have to vote as to whether or not it should be left to the CEO to edit the livestream as he sees fit. Here is the previous post for those that missed it. https://www.facebook.com/residentandratepayer/posts/pfbid02d5mTGJEBvZrddfQ2sbLXk2ZvCLwuCJ4XRdRckLJhpZUhv1Vyoj2obUqAWGu2yHDDl

At the meeting last night all of the policies that were being reviewed are going back to information forum for further discussion. They will be next on the agenda in May and as such will will keep you posted on this.

The BRRAG President asked the following question of the Mayor last night in regards to this and he directed the question to the CEO as he didnt have the information at hand.

Question- As the Mayor can currently in conjunction with the CEO may mute or exclude any part of a meeting considered in appropriate I would like the Mayor to tell me which section of the Act or regulations allows for the livestream to be muted or excluded if considered inappropriate?5

We believe the response did not answer the question as he referred to the Local Government Act 1995 and items that are confidential. The wording of the current policy is far broader than that as the policy does not say confidential items. The policy clearly states "it can be muted or excluded if considered appropriate?

Perhaps we will try again next month. It is frustrating when in our opinion your questions are not answered. It is for this reason when they are not we attend the following meeting repeat the question and the response we were given and we try again.

Trying to get the administration to provide the specific sections of the Act they rely on for different things is like pulling teeth. As far as we are concerned telling us" they are following the Act "is a nothing. If they are following the Act, the governance department should clearly be able to tell us (even if On Notice) what the relevant section is if they are following it.

If you watch the council meeting LIVESTREAM in future you may be seeing a version with edits done by the Administration.

As it stands right now, if any part of the livestream has to be removed there is oversight by our councillors. The CEO must report it to them and the decision is with them as to whether it is put back on or remains off.

It seems there is a chance once again if the councillors support this proposed change (which incidently has been written by the Administration) and dont take a stand that the Administration will be running this and deciding for us what we can and cant see.

What do we pay our councillors for??? They are suppose to oversee what the Administration is doing but more and more is being done by the Administration.

Our councillors CAN take a stand on this. They can say NO to the change and be the ones that make the decision if something needs removing. It should NOT be the Administration.

We are calling on residents who want our councillors to be in charge of this to contact them and tell them it should be their job and that is why we have them. They are voting to have more and more things delegated to the Administration and their fees and benefits go up.

If you agree with us, we urge you to contact the councillors as in the past people power has achieved and put a stop to bad decisions.

Here is their contact numbers:
Mayor Rossi 0408 693 584
Cr Sessions 0403 907 856
Cr Kulczycki 0404 767 583
Cr Sekulla 0431 963 660
Cr Harris 0478 256 196
Cr Marks 0417 998 229
Cr Ryan 0418 941 328
Cr Davis 0413 579 390
Cr Abedin 0423 789 551

18/03/2026

If you watch the council meeting LIVESTREAM in future you may be seeing a version with edits done by the Administration.

As it stands right now, if any part of the livestream has to be removed there is oversight by our councillors. The CEO must report it to them and the decision is with them as to whether it is put back on or remains off.

It seems there is a chance once again if the councillors support this proposed change (which incidently has been written by the Administration) and dont take a stand that the Administration will be running this and deciding for us what we can and cant see.

What do we pay our councillors for??? They are suppose to oversee what the Administration is doing but more and more is being done by the Administration.

Our councillors CAN take a stand on this. They can say NO to the change and be the ones that make the decision if something needs removing. It should NOT be the Administration.

We are calling on residents who want our councillors to be in charge of this to contact them and tell them it should be their job and that is why we have them. They are voting to have more and more things delegated to the Administration and their fees and benefits go up.

If you agree with us, we urge you to contact the councillors as in the past people power has achieved and put a stop to bad decisions.

Here is their contact numbers:
Mayor Rossi 0408 693 584
Cr Sessions 0403 907 856
Cr Kulczycki 0404 767 583
Cr Sekulla 0431 963 660
Cr Harris 0478 256 196
Cr Marks 0417 998 229
Cr Ryan 0418 941 328
Cr Davis 0413 579 390
Cr Abedin 0423 789 551