Community board surprise

Western Bay of Plenty's re-elected Mayor Garry Webber has stated that he wants to restructure community boards. We don't think Mr Webber can restructure the boards apart from emasculating them even more (if that's possible). But we think he is allowed to set up community committees for the areas not covered by community boards. We think these committees will have a couple of token councillors but will mainly be made up of his mates. His appointees will be paid a lot more than community board members and he will make sure the committees have lots of money to throw around to buy votes for the next election. All the funding will come out of general rates. It will be the local government equivalent of the Provincial Growth Fund.

To be able to announce his intentions two days after being confirmed as mayor indicates he has been planning this since his proposals were turned down by the Local Government Commission in April. To propose such a major change without consultation with newly elected councillors should be cause for concern by everyone who believes in democracy, and especially those new councillors.

Mr Webber's proposal will have serious consequences for our district so he should tell us why he never mentioned it during his election campaign.

The parts of Kaimai Ward and Maketu - Te Puke Ward that are not covered by a community board deserve better representation. But that representation should be democratically elected community boards subject to the same rules as the other community boards.

Keith Hay, secretary of the Katikati-Waihi Beach Residents and Ratepayers Association.

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