Forum –
Thank you for your publication; it is vital now more than ever that we have the dreaded COVID on our doorstep.
The information you supply and the strong voice you give the community is appreciated; the silent majority (sometimes gets) railroaded into doing things that they are opposed to.
One of these is the Council vote asking our opinion regarding how many councillors we should have.
But the more vital question is whether Gosford should de-merge from Wyong.
I know it will not be on the compulsory ballot paper but perhaps we should write it in?
(The referendum) will cost the Council/ratepayers $1.7M and we are told it is cheap at that price?
And it’s run by a company in Queensland?
Don’t we have printers on the Coast that could do the work and be grateful for it?
Another issue is the sale of assets.
The Council building in Gosford is being sold?
This is after all the millions spent refurbishing and updating the computer systems so the two (former) councils could talk to each other.
Say just for argument’s sake there are 100 employees (travelling from Gosford to Wyong).
That puts 100 cars on the road plus the travelling time – good day 40 minutes bad day one hour; that’s two hours per day (10 hours per week) plus fuel and wear and tear on the vehicles (at a cost of around) $60 per week plus pollution in this carbon reducing climate change world.
Will the employees be compensated in travel costs?
Doubtful.
Do they have room for 100+ (extra) cars at Wyong?
Probably not – so they now require a big car park how; much will that cost?
At $220,000 per car space (Federal Government costing) l don’t think the Central Coast ratepayers can afford it.
That is beside all the money required to bring the new council buildings up to code.
Do the employees want to move?
Probably not.
At each Council restructure, voluntary redundancy expertise is lost.
Why not enlarge Erina Council depot?
It’s all well and good putting on a new CEO at $517,000pa but if he is just listening to State Government requirements and ignoring the ratepayers’ needs can we afford him?
Email, Jul 27
Michael Blake, Davistown