Editorial: We have right to a review  

RATEPAYERS across Melbourne have a view about how much their council chief executive is paid. It is one of those perennial topics that takes on a particular pungency when rates go up. Now, one council has decided to approach the State Government to review CEOs’ salaries. 

The decision by Hobsons Bay Council sets up a debate about what constitutes a fair deal for those nonelected officials who run our councils. It seems contrary at best that Melbourne City Council’s CEO package of between $360,000 and $379,999 is more than either the prime minister or premier’s wage.

The average council CEO’s salary package is about $307,000, up almost $40,000 in four years. 

These are big packages that are designed to ensure councils attract the best people for the job. While most ratepayers understand the sentiment, they would quite rightly argue that capping a salary at even $250,000 is not likely to downgrade the position much at all. At a time when thousands of households are struggling, it is entirely appropriate that CEO salaries be reviewed. 

But to make no attempt to review the generous packages looks like a lost opportunity to help increase council accountability and transparency at the corporate level. 

Letter to the Editor: Wash excuses down drain  

GLEN Eira Council should better represent the needs of our community. The areas of Ormond and McKinnon flooded by storm water on February 4 are known flood areas. Our council should have been more proactive in preventing an inundations of this scale (‘‘Storm devastation’’, Leader, February 8).

If the contention is that Melbourne Water did not upgrade the drainage, why did Glen Eira not advocate more strongly for this to be done? Why did Glen Eira not put the drains in itself? Enough of the cost-shifting excuse. 

Why was the drain over which the Frankston railway line runs not adequately maintained? If this is not directly a Glen Eira responsibility why was it not advocating for this to be done by the responsible authority? Ironically, three days later, council contractors were blowing grass clippings into the drains just to clog them up again!

People’s lives and livelihoods have been severely impacted by this extreme event the scale of which could have been prevented with a more proactive council.

We need a council that is less obsessed with cost shifting and more interested in representing the needs of the community that it is supposed to represent.  Further, our council needs to remember that Glen Eira’s boundary extends south of North Road.

Item 9.7 – Flooding – Melbourne Water Overlay

We’re told the purpose of this paltry one page report is to “recommend further representations to Melbourne Water to improve drainage in areas susceptible to flooding” – in other words, another example of passing the buck, or the pretence of doing something following last Friday’s disastrous flood and the damaging media in this week’s Leader! The emphases throughout is on ‘MW drains’ and Melbourne Water responsibilities. What is unclear from the included map is where MW responsibility lies and where Council responsibility lies. The SBO came into force in 2002 and since then it appears that all Council has done is “made representations to MW asking it to improve capacity in order to avoid flooding of housing and businesses during intense rainfall.” 

The recommendation is: “That Council make further representations to Melbourne Water and to the Government to improve Melbourne Water main drains to reduce the risk of flooding of housing and businesses”. In other words, more of the same!!

Far too much is left unanswered and unaddressed here. Firstly, how much of the flood damage is due to the drains ‘capacity’ to handle the volume of water, and how much is due to the lack of maintenance by council and its role to clear and clean drains? If the drains were largely free of debris, could much of the flooding have been avoided? Once again we have reports handed down that contain no detail, no facts or figures. All is smoke and mirrors and passing the buck  It is far easier for council to simply lay the blame at the door of Melbourne Water and that’s the end of the story! Yet, on council’s own website there is this notice:

http://www.gleneira.vic.gov.au/Page/Page.asp?Page_Id=222&h=1

The 2008/9 Annual Report tells us that of this 450 km of drains only 30 km were cleaned. And in 2009/10 the huge achievement of 25 km was reached. We figure that at an average rate of 30 km per year, this should take about another 10 years! Again by way of contrast, Bayside has a ‘Drainage Management Strategy’ as well as a ‘Municipal Emergency Recovery Plan’ – all available online. All Glen Eira can tell us is that it will continue to ‘update’ its Municipal Emergency Plan (Item 9.8) and that the ‘Plan is available for Councillors to view in the Councillors’ Room.” As for future ‘action’ – there is this ‘after the horse has bolted’ recommendation – 

“During 2012 the MEMPC plans to develop a flood emergency sub-plan for the MEMP as well as review existing pandemic and heatwave sub plans” 

What’s wrong with 2011? Or does Glen Eira live in the hope that nothing will happen in the next 2 to 3 years that would again reveal the shortcomings of maintenance and emergency planning?

Floods fallout fury in McKinnon

Moorabbin Leader: 16 Feb 11 @ 07:00am by Jessica Bennett

OUTRAGED residents in McKinnon and Ormond have slammed Glen Eira Council’s reaction to flash flooding that has left them homeless and facing a mammoth clean-up.

More than 40 homes were extensively damaged and the streets Station Ave, Murray Rd, Cadby Ave and Wheeler St resembled a war zone when flash flooding hit on February 4.

Twenty-five residents attended a heated meeting with Glen Eira Council last Thursday.

Some were reduced to tears over the extent of their homes’ damage.

“There are fences down, couches and mattresses on the street and rubbish strewn every where,” Cadby Ave resident Fran Harkin said.

Ms Harkin and her husband, Tim, had spent six months renovating their home and were due to move in the day after more than 100m of rain hit the area.

“In the street the water was up to our chests and cars were floating away, ” Mr Harkin said.

“Our house will be uninhabitable for another six months … the damage will be about $150,000-$200,000.”

Residents at the meeting slammed the council’s reaction to the flooding, claiming it was too slow and not co-ordinated.

“No one from council came to see us until Thursday,” Ms Harkin said. “They did not recognise this as an emergency and failed to respond in time.”

Resident Chris Spencer slammed the council’s maintenance of stormwater drains, which he said exacerbated the flooding.

But council engineer Peter Waite said two of the drains were operated by Melbourne Water, which had refused to pay for upgrades.

Mayor Margaret Esakoff admitted the council had not adequately responded to the floods.

“We have relied on a chain of reporting … that feeds down to us and the communication has failed somewhere,” she said.

“We understand this is a devastating time and we will do everything we can to meet the needs of the people whose lives have been turned upside down.”

We reported last year on the number of officers receiving over $200,000 per annum in Glen Eira as opposed to most of our benchmarking councils. We’ve repeated the exercise for 2010 and note that nothing much has changed. Our figures come from the published Annual Reports of the various councils, as well as the latest ABS population predictions for each of these areas for 2009. The numbers exclude CEO salaries.

Residents need to ask themselves why other councils can apparently manage with a leaner and less top heavy bureaucracy?

Moorabbin Leader, Nov.17^th 2010

Fury over attack in park

Residents say their concerns over Memorial Park safety after dark are ignored

 McKINNON residents are outraged a man was attacked and robbed in Memorial Park after their calls for lighting to be installed in the park were ignored. The 27-year-old Malaysian man was assaulted by a group of men while he was walking through the park, at the corner of Wattle Grove and McKinnon Rd, about 12.45am on Saturday, November 6. One man punched the victim in the face, and when he fell to the ground two other men began kicking and punching him before stealing his backpack. 

Embona Taskforce Sgt Andrew Collison said police did not believe the assault was racially motivated. But the incident has appalled residents, who say they have asked Glen Eira Council for years to put lights in the park to improve safety. The park’s complete darkness provided a ‘‘haven for scumbags’’ resident Annie Morrell said.

‘‘This attack could have been prevented,’’ Ms Morrell said. ‘‘I rang the council and asked them to do something about it and I was brushed off. It’s ludicrous. Someone will be attacked again.’’ Kate Deneiffe said she wrote to the council four years ago asking for lighting be installed at the park. But director of community relations Paul Burke said one reason the council did not install security lighting in parks was because it could ‘‘encourage the very antisocial behaviour we all try to discourage’’.

 GLEN Eira Council has taken the unusual step of laying hundreds of metres of artificial grass on an Ormond roadside median strip. The median strip, between Tucker and East Boundary roads, separates a service lane from busy North Rd. Similar strips on the west side of North Rd are filled with concrete.  

Director of community relations Paul Burke would not reveal the cost of installing the synthetic grass, but Mary McKay from Easy Turf Melbourne said most companies would charge $ 65-$ 80 a square metre. This meant the cost of the median strip turf could have run to tens of thousands of dollars. Mr Burke said the council installed the turf because the narrow strip posed a ‘‘significant safety risk’’ to workers mowing and maintaining real grass. ‘‘(This) meant traffic management controls had to be put in place each time the strip was maintained. ‘‘While these controls protect the safety of the men and women in the work area, they can be a cause of frustration to busy motorists.’’ Mr Burke said the synthetic grass would be cheaper to maintain than real grass and ‘‘a further positive outcome was grass clippings that used to end up in the stormwater network no longer do so’’. 

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With this logic, we can assume:

• Safety of staff is valued more highly than safety of residents
• Spending millions on sports lighting is more important that lighting for safety

2006

Joyce Park –  $1,069,000

Princes Park Pavilion – $1,972,000

Caulfield Park – design – $258,000

Bricker Pavilion – $1,782,000

 2007

Marlborough St. Reserve – $235,000

Swimming pools manager – $260,000

Caulfield Pavilion – $3,833,000

Caulfield Landscaping – $1,773,000

Murrumbeena Reserve –   $539,000 

2008 – 2010

Princes Park – Sussex Rd. Carpark – $400,000

Sportsground Lighting – $1,500,000

Duncan McKinnon – $700,000

King George Reserve – $250,000

Koornang Park – $292,000

GESAC – water slides – $568,000

Packer Park – $450,000

Princes Park oval – $600,000

Victory Park Oval – $300,000

GRAND TOTAL  –    $16,781,000.

In the 1998 Walsh report there is this comment:

“In total there are 11 positions at ‘Senior Officer’ level (defined in the Act as packages of more than $70,000 p.a.). Glen Eira’s five neighbouring councils have an average 20 ‘Senior Officer’ positions, one of them as high as 28.”

That was 12 years ago and the population of Glen Eira stood at roughly 118,000. Andrew Newton was Director of Corporate Management then and Jeff Akehurst was Director of City Development. Both have moved up! With Margaret Douglas’ sudden resignation, Newton became CEO. What impact has this had on Glen Eira?

We’ve done some research and discovered some fascinating facts and figures. Our sources are the 2006 census figures, and the 2008/9 Annual Reports from neighbouring, benchmarking Councils. The only variation is that the figure for senior staff for Port Phillip is even more current – ie. 30^th June, 2010 – since they’ve already released their draft Annual Report.

The table we’ve subsequently drawn up reveals several major findings:

• Glen Eira has the highest number of ‘fat cats’ sitting on over $200,000 p.a. compared to the figures released by the other councils. It also has 30 individuals sitting on over $100,00 p.a.

In a time of economic downturn, where most organisations have ‘rationalised’ their staff and wages, Glen Eira appears to have bucked this trend.

So, do we have too many ‘fat cats’? Are residents getting ‘value for money’? More on this in the coming days!