We feature two articles from today’s Caulfield Leader. In particular, we draw readers’ attention to the almost word by word regurgitation of the Council spin on the proposed budget – including the totally misleading figure of a 3.5% rate hike. Unless residents are hawk-eyed they may entirely miss what possibly passes for a ‘correction’ in the box to the right.
Glen Eira Debates 
May 14, 2013 at 1:59 PM
“Modest rate”, “small rate increase”? Yes, if they got their facts right it might be considered these things. I don’t call a 6.5% increase small or modest and not when it’s on top of last year’s 6.5% and the year before of 6%. This isn’t a budget – it’s long term promises that won’t have any bearing on next year mainly in the open space category. There’s no guarantee that even any of these promises will be fulfilled on time when Glen Eira’s history of lagging behind project after project is taken into account.
The Leader shows itself once again to be a useless rag that gets its stories straight from Paul Burke’s media releases without bothering to check and double check.
May 14, 2013 at 3:34 PM
How about a strong council response Delahunty and stop putting it on residents all the time. Fix the bloody planning scheme so this can’t happen.
May 14, 2013 at 7:18 PM
I notice that both articles have Andrea Kellet’s byline, but whether she wrote them or they were ghost-written, and whether she was pressured into portraying Council in a positive light, I’m sure will remain confidential. Yes rates are going up faster than CPI and MAV’s LGCI, but the one-off changes to Fire Services Levy gives Council an opportunity to obfuscate the true increase in rates. But then, there’s nothing sustainable about our Council’s policies or population growth. [BTW Council’s pricing of rubbish bins is truly bizarre—cheaper to have 2 x 120lt bins than 1 x 240lt bin, unless you’re in the undocumented category that gets (large?) Family price.]
Andrea’s second article I suspect has mangled the truth concerning the Alma Club redevelopment, and its a neat twist to describe plans submitted in support of an application for Planning Permit as “concept plans”. While the submitted plans may bear little relationship to what emerges after they’ve gone through the planning sausage machine, its a fairly safe bet that there will be few if any 3-bedroom apartments. As the article stands, its suggesting there will be *no* 2-bedroom apartments. Almost certainly the application is for a mixture of 1- and 2-bedroom apartments and no 3-bedroom apartments, in defiance of the Higher Density Residential Guidelines. While the site is in a Minimal Change Area, that is almost meaningless these days—VCAT have in effect replaced GEPS with their own (unpublished) scheme.
May 14, 2013 at 11:21 PM
A former reporter from that tissue once told me the paper can’t afford to get off side with the council as it relies very heavily on it for copy. In my view it is nothing more than the public relations arm of the council.
May 15, 2013 at 7:27 PM
Please note that today’s Moorabbin Leader contains the same article BUT THERE IS NO CORRECTION! The false statement that the rate increase is 3.5% remains.