Interesting that almost everyone else has accepted the need for a reduction in salaries and a scaling back of future plans etc apart from every council in NZ.

What is it in the genetics of councillors that makes them so greedy, unsympathetic, careless with our money, don't give a damn for people's unfortunate circumstances etc etc.

Let's hope the current mob that fill council seats will agree to the referendum request asked of them by a group of half a dozen or so organisations that are based in the Tauranga area.

Tauranga ratepayers have had enough of being ripped off by a succession of reckless, fiscally inept councils over the last 16 or so years.

The TCC needs to sharpen its collective pencil and look at what we can do without over the next ten years and look at the essentials only like water supply, sewage and waste and of course roading.

NZ will not be like it was six weeks ago for many a long year - maybe a generation. So come on TCC show you have heart and prove to us that you are fiscally capable of running a council energetically and intelligently by not inflicting a rate increase.

A Bourne, Bethlehem