A report 'Keeping tabs on councillor attendances' recently highlighted an aspect of councillor accountability regarding their attendance at, for example, meetings and workshops. It's a pity that some councillors don't feel accountable in other ways.
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In January and February we sent an email three times to all councillors, firstly congratulating them on their election and then asking for their response to six matters we wanted their feedback on. To their credit we received detailed responses from Councillors Pontin, Tickle and West; a short response from Cr K Smith and somewhat later an acknowledgement from Cr Sandilands. Despite sending a fourth email (early March) about who had and who had not responded and expressing our disappointment with this, no further responses were received from councillors Bell, Epov, Fowler, Howard, Miller and D Smith.
Some councillors indicated that to help get themselves elected in December 2021 that they would be listening to and connecting with their community. Indeed one has to only re-read some of their electioneering material to know this. Regarding accountability, Cr Sandilands is quoted as saying " ... purely to demonstrate to the community that we as councillors are fulfilling our obligations to the community".
Apparently, this 'obligation' does not apply to responding to emails from residents and ratepayers.
