Cr Mehrtens is right in claiming (Coast News, October 31), that it is crazy to base council strategic planning on wards.
They are just artificial bureaucratic creations, constructed to put about the same number of voters in each (and to do it in a way that gave Wyong more wards than Gosford, which is why Wyong ward begins in Manns Rd and goes all the way to Wyee).
Strategic planning should be based on real communities, which council staff have been attempting with their “planning districts”.
When the new council formed, we were told that “wards are only used under election circumstances and, once the councillors have been elected, they represent the interests of the entire Central Coast LGA, and do not base decisions on the interest of the ward they are elected in”.
Pull the other one. Councillors are just politicians and their decision to switch to ward-based planning reflects their anxiety to claim credit for anything that happens in their ward in the hope that this will help their reelection.
Email, 4 Nov 2019 HK Colebatch, Pretty Beach