Hamilton got an early love letter from a group of 6 councillors just before Valentine’s Day. The end is in sight for the speed bumps and insane in-lane bus stops!
It was the culmination of a lot of work by elected representatives Geoff Taylor, Ewan Wilson, Mark Donovan, Emma Pike, Kesh Naidoo-Rauf, and ‘far-right extremist’ Andrew Bydder. We listened to the public, went out talking to affected businesses, and spoke to hundreds of grey-haired ‘rioters’ at a certain public meeting. We copped flak from media, social activists, and within council. Together, we argued strongly against each project. We lost every time 6 votes to 8.
While it could be claimed that this is the democratic process, none of the councillors had campaigned on a mandate of such damaging change to our roads. The fact is, this was only one version of democracy, and another was started.
Thanks to members of the public who stood up for their city. Many people formed groups such as City Watch, joined the Hamilton Residents and Ratepayers Association, wrote letters and emails, phoned councillors, handed out pamphlets, and protested on the streets. Thanks also to business leaders such as Tom Andrews and Robin Ratcliffe, who made their experienced views known. The pressure worked.
The 6 councillors put together a Notice of Revocation to overturn the original decision in a meeting called by Geoff Taylor on 13 February. Ewan Wilson drafted the notice. This is within the official rules of the council’s democracy. We did this to give an opportunity to the remaining councillors to reconsider their position in light of the people’s response – and to expose those ideologically fighting cars. Mayor Southgate and Deputy Mayor O’Leary quickly seized on the chance to switch from defending the projects to giving us the numbers to stop them at the next council meeting on 20 February. To be fair, Southgate has been sitting on the fence saying she didn’t support all of the projects. It may be a late shift, but it is appreciated.
There is more to come as we have sparked a review of current projects. This includes cutting out in-lane bus stops where construction hasn’t commenced. We will need your on-going support.
In my opinion, there has long been a reluctance by Council members to say no to all the recommendations made to them by staff employees. No doubt there are many projects that need to be approved. However as a community we need to live within our collective means. Many of our members are on fixed incomes and are placed under undue stress when any item of our personal budgets is significantly increased at a rate greater than the CPI increase. I know that other items have also increased over the years, but I would suggest that the increases in HCC rate invoices in the last 8 years in particular have increased at a much greater level than CPI.
It is…
Fantastic many thanks for the work you are doing. The council has got to stop spending money on unnecessary projects