The community web site Streetcorner has asked Randwick City Councillors to respond to a series of questions arising from online criticism by a resident concerning the recently exhibited building program.
The report that Councillors voted on at the extraordinary meeting to adopt the building program and levy is available at Council.
Greens Councillor Murray Matson has made the following responses to Streetcorner.
QUESTION Do you believe that Randwick residents could fully understand what was being proposed from the Survey Pack sent to homes? Anecdotal feedback from the community suggests that few people understood it would result in a permanent increase in rates i.e. beyond 7 years.
ANSWER Prior to last Christmas it was the intent of Council to apply for a special rate levy limited to seven years duration. This had to be abandoned after the state government issued new guidelines forcing us to a reduced but permanent levy. Council has since made rigorous efforts to explain to the community that the levy was now to be permanent. It would be disappointing if there still remained a misperception by some in the community that it was still to be a limited levy.
QUESTION Do you believe the Survey Form and the analysis by Randwick City Council was conducted in accordance with robust research standards? If so, what research standards were applied by Council?
ANSWER Yes. “Council used SPSS, an industry standard statistical analysis package to analyse and report on the survey data. External contractors entered the data from the printed survey responses into the statistical software. The online and printed surveys were analysed together by the statistical software. Council will further validate the survey process by undertaking an internal audit.” (P10 General Manager's Report No. GM7/10).
QUESTION Do you believe a representative sample of Randwick residents was obtained in the Survey form submissions? (i.e. matches the age, gender and demographic profile of the area)
ANSWER Demographic profiles were matched. “A number of demographic questions were asked to determine that the respondent demographics closely reflected the community. … the following Figure 2 shows the close correlation between the population of residents in each suburb according to ABS 2006 census data14 and the percentage of respondents from each suburb.” (P10 General Manager's Report No. GM7/10).
QUESTION Do you believe the Survey questionnaire, results and report of results should be audited by an independent and credible quantitative research company who can report on the validity of the results?
ANSWER There will only be a need for that if creditable evidence is put forward that Council has failed to comply in some significant way with the new guidelines issued by the State Government after Christmas. The general manager’s report on the outcomes of the survey gave me no reason to believe that such evidence exists. Nor I am convinced that Dr Barron has since put forward any compelling reason other than he resents the decision that Council has made on the outcome of the survey.
QUESTION When is a decision expected by the NSW Government on whether Randwick City Council can apply the Building Levy to ratepayers?
ANSWER Council has to approve a budget for the next financial year i.e. 2010-2011. Therefore Council needs to have an answer some time before June 30 2010. If we don’t get permission then we can’t charge the levy and commence the building program. If that happens then there are going to be some very disappointed people in the Council area who will want to know what the State Government is playing at. Randwick went to great lengths and money to adhere to the Government’s new guidelines on applying for rate variations above our historically frozen level. Many other Council’s are watching closely how the Government responds to Randwick’s bid. Failure to get a reasonable outcome from the government after all we have done is going to make those Councils ask themselves what it is that they have to do. Councils simply won’t be able to fund anything they can’t fit into their present frozen rate levels.
QUESTION Who is the approving authority for the Building Levy at the State Government level? Can residents make submissions to this body?
ANSWER I guess that’s a question for the Minister. My area of responsibility ends at the local government level.
QUESTION Our feedback is that a number of locals are feeling very concerned about the approach taken by Randwick Council and are looking to Councillors to prove the validity of the “Survey” and to answer claims of bias in the way the information was presented and the survey questions were constructed.
ANSWER I have tried to reply to anyone who has contacted me on the matter and that includes Baron. In the case of one other individual I ceased replying following multiple and repetitive emails from him.
It was also apparent to me that in many cases the critics with the shrillest voices had not actually read the General Manager’s report, which was available on line. They were asking me questions that I knew were already answered in the report. They were actually spending a lot of their own time and energy producing detailed analyses of what they thought Council had said, done or claimed rather than what Council was actually trying to do. I am convinced that Dr Baron himself had not read it until I pointed it out to him about a week ago when I became frustrated and I challenged him on it. I note that his Streetcorner story now contains evidence that he has finally read it.
Baron has placed a lot credence in a botched amendment put Councillors Stevenson and Bowen on the 23rd of February this year.
“…that Council also indicate the full financial projections as set out in example table 2 in the General Manager’s report for a period of seven (7) years and ensure they appear in Council’s consultation documents and on our website.”
Their reference to seven years made the amendment pointless. All the Councillors had been updated at the meeting and told that the levy now had to be a permanent arrangement as a result of the Government’s new guidelines. There was thus no longer any significance that I could see to a figure of seven years. It was the recommendation of the GM’s that we show the effect of the levy as it would be in each of the 3 years that it increased – after that the increases cease and the effect plateaus out.
We could have just as easily chosen 10 or 50 years rather than 7, but there would have been no more useful information portrayed than in the 3 we did resolve to use.
I strongly suspect that Baron has again not read what Stevenson and Bowen actually tried to move.