Friction over ratepayers' water book ...
From the Toowoomba Chronicle (annotated):
20 January 2005
Friction over ratepayers' water book
It may be a new year, but there is still a prickliness in the air at the Toowoomba City Council chamber.
Mention the Toowoomba Water Futures project and some councillors really bristle.
The push is to open the door on all future discussions.
Cr Keith Beer wanted to know why the water book, to be sent to ratepayers to promote the proposed recycling project, was not included as an agenda item. [Note to Cr Beer - to hide it from the dissenting Councillors and the public until it is posted.]
Council's Director of Engineering Kevin Flanagan said the book, which was expected back from the printer at 3pm yesterday, was still in draft form and not yet a "public" document. [So Councillors can't have access to it? Maybe the Mayor told him not to give it to them.]
Cr Sue Englart, feeling the friction, called for scrutiny of the book to be deferred.
"If you try to keep track of when things are discussed there is no set date on record - and it's near impossible to track", she said [That's why it should have been an agenda item - then it's easy to track.]
Other councillors wondered why the rush. A call for the book to be distributed to councillor at the next round of meetings, in two weeks, failed.
Cr Michele Alroe protested.
"I'm very keen to get as much information as soon as I can. I'm a councillor for the people and I need to be informed", she said. [Some friction developing with the Mayor?]
Mr Flanagan said the information was nothing new and merely a compilation of the information on the Toowoomba Water Futures website and the public presentation. [Great - soon to be renamed the "Book of Half-Truths".]
Mr Flanagan then tabled an extensive breakdown of the costs of the Toowoomba Water Futures project so far.
The information was the final response to 10 questions posed previously by Cr Keith Beer.
posted by Concerned Ratepayer at 4:49 PM
3 Comments:
I would like to see the councillors answer the question put to then about the breakdown of the money paid to CH2M Hill. In this breakdown there is a figure of $221,000 and it is for Public outreach and education program. If this is to print a book for the ratepayers to be educated on the reclaimed water program, why was it paid in the last year's budget. To date this book has not been printed, as far as I know .
That is a lot of money in any ones laugage.
3:14 PM, January 26, 2006
Did the Council really pay CH2M Hill $30,800 for "community education and information strategy workshop"?
6:44 PM, January 26, 2006
These amounts - all paid to CH2M Hill - seem to be for the same work:
$14,600 - preliminary scoping and costing estimates
$16,500 - scoping and estimates of advanced water reclaimation plant
$16,000 - estimates and visitor centre and additional salt management.
"Scoping and estimates" seems to cover a mysterious range of things to bill for.
6:46 PM, January 26, 2006
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