Shonky Local Governments WA

30/06/2024

Seems there are still issues at tge City of Melville?

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/qnaFsEHT7pZ2EXgW/?mibextid=WC7FNe

Cr Tomas FITZGERALD appears to have been naughty and is being held to account. The MRRA don’t know the specifics of the subject Standards Panel complaint, and we will likely have to wait to the 10 am September 2, 2024, SAT hearing to find out. SAT hearings are open to the public, people just need to show up.

The MRRA has experience with Tomas’ poor conduct. For example, in an internal City of Melville email, in response to an email we directed to Mayor Katy MAIR and CEO Gail BOWMAN, Tomas stated:

“I am sure you agree that this email is quite unacceptable. Any elected member who sent this email could expect to be disciplined for breach of the code of conduct.”

“I asked what plan we had in place to deal with continued inappropriate behaviour from the MRRA if they did not change.” [ ie that is the MRRA asking questions and quite reasonably expecting answers]

The MRRA rejects Tomas’ adverse statements. Our “crime”, in Tomas’ eyes it appears, was to politely and factually write to the Mayor and CEO complaining that the MRRA's public questions put to February 20 Council meeting, about serious concerns with respect to the City’s poor FOI performance, its building compliance enforcement functions and advice from McLeods Barristers and Solicitors, were mishandled and not answered properly.

Our email concluded:

“This is yet another example of the City’s poor transparency, oversight and governance, and should be added to the Department of Local Government's growing list of governance concerns for further investigation [https://www.melvillecity.com.au/CityOfMelville/media/Documents-and-PDF-s/COM-Letter-from-DLGSC-Governance_November-2023_1.pdf ]. We are tied of the City’s persistent poor handling of public questions.”

It appears Tomas took exception to the MRRA expressing an opinion about the community’s poor view of Council’s governance, transparency, performance and accountability demonstrated by some City officers. Tomas was the previous Chair of the Council Governance Committee, at the time the DLGSC raised serious concerns about the City’s governance.

The DLGSC conducted an Authorised Inquiry from 2017-2019, because of the community’s concerns, which made adverse comments about the City. It is clear from the DLGSC’s more recent letters some material issues are still to be resolved. The MRRA still has serious concerns about Council’s oversight and governance of the City’s administration.

Tomas should not denigrate the MRRA, as it appears he has, or other community members that express their opinions and seek to uphold the community’s expectation of transparency and properly answers to public questions; something Tomas and other Elected Members are elected by individual residents to oversee and govern.

Tomas’ adverse reflections are inappropriate and unwarranted. Had we known about Tomas’ February email earlier we would we have submitted a Minor Misconduct complaint to the Standards Panel about him. This not the first time Tomas has made untrue and adverse comments about the MRRA.

Cr Tomas FITZGERALD please add your comments if you feel we have omitted or misrepresented anything material. Feel free to apologise here for your February email.

Please see:
DLGSC Governance Concerns: https://www.melvillecity.com.au/dlgsc
DLGSC 2019 Authorised Inquiry Report: https://www.dlgsc.wa.gov.au/docs/default-source/local-government/inquiries/report-of-the-inquiry-into-the-city-of-melville.pdf?sfvrsn=7ead4f05_1
Council February 20 minutes: https://www.melvillecity.com.au/our-city/our-council/agendas-and-minutes/ordinary-meeting-of-the-council/2024/february/ordinary-meeting-of-council-minutes-20-february-20

















Note: The MRRA has raised the above issues and expressed its opinion on matters which it believes are in the public interest based on information available, all in good faith to promote a healthy democracy.

29/10/2023

LOCAL GOVERNMENT BUILDING COMPLIANCE FALLACIES - A clutch of WA local Council administrations are spruiking fallacies about their building compliance roles. Such behaviour says such administrations cannot be trusted to unbiasedly carry out the much needed 5 point inspection regime for new homes, or other enforcement.

Three major fallacies wrongfully spruiked are :

1. That the 2011 Building Act removed from local councils their responsibility and authority to carry out inspections of buildings that they issue building permits for.

Not correct. WA's Building Minister has stated: Part 8 Division 2 of the WA Building Act provides powers to local councils to inspect, test and enter premises where building work is being carried out in their geographic area. The local government also maintains powers to enforce compliance with applicable legislation and building standards.

2. Defective and/ or non-compliant building work is pretty much a property owner’s responsibility and, "by law, a local council has no responsibility for building inspections and therefore cannot accept any complaints about non-compliant building work."

Not correct. Successive Building Ministers have stated: Responsibility under WA’s Building Act for enforcing building permit conditions ( s.27 ) and compliance with applicable standards ( s.37 ) rests with
local councils as building permit authorities.

3. Whenever a retaining wall on or near a property boundary is not addressed under the Dividing Fences Act ( 1961 ), then it can be addressed by the Magistrates Court in parallel with the dividing fence. This jurisdiction comes under the Magistrates’ Court Act ( 2004 ) and is not within a council’s jurisdiction.

Completely incorrect. Numerous Magistrates have stated : "It is not in my power to make orders dealing with an application under the Dividing Fences Act for retaining walls. Retaining walls are not something which are within the scope of the Dividing Fences Act, so there is no jurisdiction to make any orders in respect to them."

See more at: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7109002837904281600/

https://www.industry.gov.au/news/building-ministers-meeting

01/08/2023

28/06/2023

https://www.facebook.com/MelvilleResidentsRatepayersAssoc/posts/649306187239448

e:[email protected]
An incorporated community organisation for the benefit of residents and ratepayers of the City of Melville.

27/06/2023

https://www.facebook.com/MelvilleResidentsRatepayersAssoc/posts/647079704128763

The PRIVACY of our PERSONAL INFORMATION is definitely NOT a PRIORITY for our Council, having voted 7/5 in favour of CEO Marten ‘Tin ear’ Tieleman’s recommendation to ignore the Electors Motion calling for the prompt introduction of a Council Privacy Policy that was unanimously passed at the February Electors AGM.

'Tin ear' Tieleman’s recommendation is to do nothing and not even start to develop a Council Privacy Policy until the Labor State Government introduces Privacy laws, possible by December 2024. But who knows when it may happen.

Deputy mayor Cr Tomas Fitzgerald and Cr Katy Mair led to charge to ignore the Electors wishes. Mayor ‘Gotta Go’ Gear, Cr Karen Wheatland (a no show for the vote), Cr Nic Pazolli, Cr Matt Woodall, and Cr Nicole Robins all fell into line and voted with them.

Cr Fitzgerald, a practicing lawyer, injected his own legal opinion and arguments, that were not raised in CEO Tieleman’s report to Council, that “Australia’s Privacy Law is a complete shambles” and “there is privacy law federally, it is I think on any fair assessment it is one of the worst set of privacy laws in the developed world”.

Cr Margaret Sandford, a fellow practicing lawyer, led the opposition to CEO Tieleman’s lazy recommendation that ignored the Electors’ wishes. Cr Sandford took exception to “Cr Fitzgerald and the Officers asking us to operate in a vacuum for potentially another 2 years” and argued that the City should adopt an interim Council Privacy Policy, based on what some other local governments have in-place today. Cr Sandford argued “Don’t let the perfect get in the way of the good”, meaning Council could introduce a Privacy policy now, to protect the privacy of an individual’s personal information as best it can, and then review and update the Policy when the privacy laws change; that is business as usual for any Council.

Resident and ratepayers’ privacy protections will remain in a vacuum thanks to Council voting to defer the development of a Council privacy policy,

This is unacceptable given the City’s repeated failures to protect our personal information, including the most recent release of ratepayer banking details.

Don’t vote for the tone deaf Elected Members that voted against community’s calls for Council to implement a privacy Policy, especially Mayor Gear, Cr Nic Pazolli, and Cr Katy Mair who have all declared their desires to become the Mayor at the October 2023 elections.

See:
The June 22 PerthNow Article on Council’s rejection of the wish for a Privacy Policy now: https://www.perthnow.com.au/local-news/perthnow-melville/city-of-melville-delays-implementing-privacy-policy-weeks-after-data-breach-c-10988208
The June 1 PerthNow article of Melville’s banking data disclosure: https://thewest.com.au/news/perth/city-of-melville-assures-ratepayers-recent-information-leak-not-caused-by-malicious-activity-c-10807570
MRRA Written submission presented to Council pushing for a Privacy Policy Now: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/melvilleresidentsratepayers_city-of-melville-council-privacy-policy-delayed-activity-7073561244862992384-uvMx?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
The Council Minutes from page 44: https://www.melvillecity.com.au/getattachment/2313d916-70c8-4264-a416-47f9570db62d/minutes-ordinary-meeting-of-council-20-june-2023
Audio of the Meeting from 2:00:00 mark: https://www.melvillecity.com.au/our-city/our-council/agendas-and-minutes/ordinary-meeting-of-the-council/2023/june/audio-ordinary-meeting-of-council-20-june-2023

27/06/2023

https://www.facebook.com/MelvilleResidentsRatepayersAssoc/posts/647160474120686

19/06/2023

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=643687807801286&id=100064802166688&mibextid=qC1gEa

CEO ‘Tight lips’ Tieleman won’t answer our questions on the City’s legal spend. We want to know as the Dept. of Local Government has formally raised “concerns in relation to the City’s governance include….. increasing costs for legal advice and legal services”.

Councils are meant to be open and transparent, so what’s ‘Tight lips’ Tieleman hiding”?

Is it money they have spent on matter relating to Mayor George Gear? Is it money they have spent on protecting other City failures they don’t want us to know about? Is it the money they have spent protecting underperforming City officers?

Read the question we put to last Tuesday’s ABF meeting, then read the response. You'll agree that whoever wrote the “response” would have failed a simple year 8 comprehension test as the ‘response’ does not answer the crisp questions asked.

Firstly, let’s look at 1. It tells us that the 2023/2022, 2021/22, and 2020/21 total legal spends were $ 479,757, $ 131,146, and $ 492,363 respectively. However, we did not ask this question.

Secondly, let’s look at 2. We did not hear the Presiding Member of last Tuesday’s ABF make a ruling that answering these questions was too hard for the City, thus they would not be answered. So, ‘Tight lips’ Tieleman must be making this up, unless we missed it during the meeting?

This is a classic example of the City’s obfuscation; providing what looks like a plausible answers to questions; but which actually does not address the questions asked.

You will agree that this is a simple question that should be answered, particularly as the Dept. of Local Government is concerned about such legal spend; and as such Council should be equally concerned and thus direct their CEO to answer the questions properly.

Let’s see if this Council cares about good governance and directs the CEO to cough up the honest and fulsome answers to our questions.

See Dept. Local Government’s concerns about the City’s governance, what’s real and what’s not? https://www.melvillecity.com.au/dlgsc

02/04/2023

The City of Melville Council’s September 2021 report on Bronwyn Weir’s investigation into the City’s Administration has attracted much media attention across a number of banners including The West and the Fremantle Herald (see links below)

The City’s Administration released the report under FOI last week, with much redacted in accordance with FOI Act’s strict privacy provisions, for the reasons given below.

Residents and ratepayers should be very concerned about what can be seen:

“It is inappropriate for the City to approve the CBACP which allows for significant amount of multi storey construction in a residential area, without being willing to actively manage the impacts of construction on the community. It is unacceptable for the City to say that they don't have the resources or that it is the responsibility of WorkSafe or the builder to manage these issues.”

“It was not reasonable that the City did not agree that there were errors in the plans following X’s complaints about this issue in March 2017 when it was first raised, or in August 2017 when he continued to raise the issue. It took the City almost 3 years to seek independent advice and concede that the ramp design did not comply with the Standard. This is unreasonable and unacceptable. I agree with X that the error in applying the standard should have been obvious to anyone that looked at the standard and the approved plans. It was not reasonable for the City to rely on the builder's engineer in the circumstances where an important safety concern was raised”.

Residents and ratepayers need to know what its elected Council is going to do to fix this mess.

City Administration's reasons for its decision to redact parts of the Weir Report were:

"After due consideration, I believe that the information refused would have provided sufficient information to identify the third parties and if released would be contra to the legislative safeguards for personal information contained in Clause 3(1) of the Act.

"Furthermore, I consulted the third parties (Parties A and B) in accordance with S32 of the FOI Act and they have refused to give their permission for the release of personal information about themselves. All information deleted if released would assist to identify these parties as such I have refused you access to all matters about them.

"Limitation to Clause 3 is based on a public interest test on whether disclosure of exempt matter would on balance be in the public interest. However, on balance I am of the view that safeguarding the privacy of individuals prevails over other disclosure issues and have affected deletions of matter that would reveal personal information of third parties."

See the Weir report at:
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/citizens-for-building-reform-wa_city-of-melville-bronwyn-weir-investigation-activity-7048118042488180736-Ac5j?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

See the Fremantle Herald's Melville Dysfunctional article:https://heraldonlinejournal.com/2023/03/23/dept-sends-melville-stern-warning/

See The Western Australian Paul Murray's one eyed factually incorrect opinion piece, article published 1 April; perhaps as The West's April fools joke?: https://thewest.com.au/opinion/paul-murray/paul-murray-power-the-gory-inside-melville-council-exposed-c-10210410

11/02/2023

Are CEO Marten 'Tin ear' Tieleman, 'Head' of Governance Ms Corrine Newman, or other officers, grossly incompetent, dishonest, negligent or wilfully blind? You decide.

Their excuse for not having answers to our questions on the night of the AGM is akin to "the dog ate my my homework". B%$!*T!!!!.

Councillors Macphail, Barber and Robins, as teachers, should be able to call this out. We thank Cr Barber for her efforts in locating the email on her laptop and pointing Ms Newman to them on the night.

Do you seriously believe Tieleman and Newman missed the email and attachment?

What if we we told you that the email with our questions sent to Tieleman and Newman was short and very clear, stating "attached are our additional questions" in the only sentance in the email and that Tieleman, Newman or others have misplaced material for public meetings numerous times before?

We believe the Administration were wilfully blind and did not tell the truth on the night. They likely did not want to publicly read out or answer our questions; which they still haven't.

If you take time to look at our questions in the minutes (link below) and the City's inadequate responses you may conclude that the City has not provided open, honest, forthright and specific answers to our very clear and specific questions.

This is the way the City's Administration operates, it is one of the many cultural issues we suffer. You must note that "Response" does not necessarily equate to being an answer.

We have found that the City is adept at obfuscating, deflecting, lying or otherwise confusing readers so that the answers to questions remain a mystery, as is the case with the City's response to our questions put tothe AGM.

We have been told that the CEO is accountable for the answers; so Council should actually hold him to account to ensure he gives proper answers. If Tieleman can't do that, then he should be coached to move to an occupation where such conduct is acceptable.

6 February 2023 Electors AGM Minutes: https://www.melvillecity.com.au/our-city/our-council/agendas-and-minutes/annual-general-meeting-of-electors/2023/february/minute-annual-general-meeting-of-electors-6-februa
a

01/01/2023

There are thousands of Western Australians who are wanting a system of pro-active building audits & improved compliance with mandatory inspections for all new residential and buildings.

But moreover WA also suffers from a serious compliance gap with no oversight by the State Building Regulator of local councils in meeting their building permit and compliance obligations. We have hundreds of Western Australians who have suffered serious damage due to failures by some local councils to correctly fulfill their obligations under WA's building legislation.

In addition to continuing education and support for local councils the following legislative changes are required :

1. Proper oversight by the State regulator ( Building and Energy ) of local government authorities in the discharge of their duties under WA's building legislation. This includes permit authority functions, compliance duties, issuing of retrospective building approvals, etc. In particular, for Building and Energy to have the capacity to accept complaints, carrying out investigates, report findings and as necessary initiate corrective action in much the same manner as Building and Energy can do in regard a complaint against a building services provider.

2. Capability for Building and Energy to provide advice to council elected members as to the role & duties of a district building permit / compliance authority;

3. Require Local Government Authorities to include building function performance in their annual reporting. Currently there is no annual building function audit nor building performance reporting to ratepayers. While this enhancement could equally be part of changes to the Local Government Act Part 11 of the Building Act should be amended so as to assist the regulator in achieving the appropriate level of transparency.

4. Improve Building and Energy's oversight and controls of professionals in the building industry; typically building surveyors and structural engineers. Currently there is no mandated code of conduct for Building Surveyors and no regulatory governance of Structural Engineers.

5. Extend legislation & regulations to incorporate retaining walls for both broadfield subdivisions and individual lots. Also extend legislation to address unapproved changes to natural ground levels thereby closing the current gap that has allowed developers / builders to avoid prosecution when illegally making changes to natural ground levels prior to any building approvals.

6. Adopt specified ' design life ' structural warranties ( already offered by a number WA builders ) in order to discourage delinquent building behaviour and support consumer confidence. Where ' design life ' is a guaranteed structural life stipulated as part of the of the building contract.

[email protected]
Citizens for Building Reform WA

01/01/2023

Western Australians Against Corruption in Local Government predicted some months ago the re-emergence of the strategy of punitive action against wronged ratepayers who dare to speak up as has been perpetrated against ratepayers by the new CEO at the City of Swan.

Whistleblowers and the like need to be thanked and protected; not bullied and persecuted. The laws need to change to protect those that call out bad government. https://www.hrlc.org.au/whistleblowers-on-trial-richard-boyle-and-david-mcbride

In 2023 what any ratepayer who is concerned about these attempts to silence wronged ratepayers should be doing is taking their concerns about such tactics by some local government administrations and their desire for more honest, transparent and accountable local government to their local state MLA and MLCs.

Pick up the phone and make an appointment to speak with your elected parliamentarians and let them know what you think of the dishonest behaviour that occurs in some local government administrations here in WA.

Geoff Keally
[email protected]
West Australians Against Corruption in Local Government

30/11/2022

MELVILLE's TREE CANOPY CARNAGE. IT's OFFICIAL. 84 ha of tree canopy has been lost over the past 6 years according to the recent report prepared by the City of Melville.

That is up to a 23% loss of canopy in Alfred Cove.

This is a disaster and demonstrates the City Administration's failure to properly execute Council's strategies and policies to protect and enhance our tree canopy.

Council needs to take real action, and do it now. Elected Members should be embarased; some should resign.

The report's next steps include:

1. Increased Tree Planting –from 2021 through to 2026 the City will aim to plant 2,500 trees per year in City Parks and Streetscapes

2. Revegetation of bushland, wetlands and foreshore areas-continue planting programs within the Natural Areas

3. Education and Awareness Raising-continue to communicate the benefits of trees to the community and the importance of trees in addressing the impacts of climate change

4. Investigate designating mandatory verge tree planting zones

5. Tree Retention on Private Land

- Investigate the effectiveness of Significant Tree Registers and identify the regulatory mechanisms to best support (e.g. LPS, Policies etc.)

- Review of Local Planning Scheme 6to consider options for retention of trees on private property (e.g. City of Nedlands LPS Amendment proposal)

- Communicate outcomes of tree canopy review to residents (communication campaign)

- Consider other mechanismsand opportunities(e.g. rate incentives?)

Council needs to slow the real loss of mature trees on private land (like the recent Matheson Rd Applecross massacre) and should follow the City of Nedands lead by changing planning schemes and policies to protect the canopy.

Please email the elected members and express your concern, and call for immediate action:

Mayor:
[email protected];
Deputy Mayor
[email protected];

Councillors:
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];
[email protected];

Let's see if they care....