Brian Anderson The Western Front www.sunlive.co.nz

I had a ring last week from a ratepayer upset with his $800 rate rise.

He wrote a polite letter asking council for an explanation. He received a reply signed by a senior administrator that assured him that his rate rise was only 1% and suggested that he should be grateful for the work the council had done on his behalf. He knew his last year's rates were not the $80 000 which would be needed to match a 1% real rate rise. What should I have told him? I went through his rate demand answering his numerous questions but his channels for actually communicating and getting any sense out of council are extremely limited. Council's recent responses to our submissions have been very revealing.

Don't bother with a community board. We have a hint that they are on their way out. Council has just determined that community board chairs can attend workshop sessions but as these are confidential there is no way that the chairs can report back to you even if they could take your message to council. The concept of the chairs voting on relevant issues has also been rejected because it would be unfair to Kaimai and Te Puna who don't have community boards. The possibility of the new wards having boards that might act as communication links between council and the public has been formally rejected. It makes you wonder why we accepted this new three ward system if it has no democratic purpose whatsoever. Don't go to a councillor to get help. They have been issued with instructions not to push issues from their area. Their responsibility is to the district as a whole. Responding to council proposals has been a totally wasted exercise. The council has gone ahead with its proposed outline numbers game and added their own version of community of interest and effective strategies that further isolate the ratepayers. I did have hopes for a democratic public forum concept at a meeting this week but my dreams were dashed. Our forum was asked to vote to deny ourselves the right to vote on any issue and to ensure that any information released from the meeting would be impartial and not contentious. Nothing was decided at the meeting and the Mayor left laughing noting that that is what you always get from a forum.

If you have any ideas or suggestions on how we can get through to council the messages that they need a total rethink and that they need to get back to basics and start working with the ratepayers, then let me know. This Monday is the last day for objections or appeals on council's planning to the local government.