Originally Posted by
Lantern
Strebla, local councils now are VERY different to the way they were in the late eighties/early nineties. They are basically a bereaucracy gone mad these days. I'm serious -- I work directly with local councils (and have worked within them) on development permits, both as an internal consultant and on behalf of external applicants, and there are literally REAMS of paper/policies that no one individual was either responsible for drawing up or currently enforcing/implementing. Therefore, the changes in administration that someone mentioned above is not only a periodic change, the high turnover in staffing means that problems literally disappear into thin air and can EASILY pass through the hands of ten-fifteen individuals of which not one of them has the authority, expertise, background or experience to make a decision.
In a large case like the above, the problem is exacerbated because the complications multiply exponentially -- you essentially have under-skilled individuals having to make desicions on projects they don't really grasp using policies they didn't write and hardly understand, and without the authority to do so and without a clear understanding of who does, and it's a truism in local public service that the less skilled you are, the higher in ranks of management you rise. That's why more and more these days larger projects have to go over local council's heads (and thus the local residents) because they put projects in untenable positions like this one -- it is ridiculous that a project that has the backing of:
a. The Federal Government
b. The State Government
c. The local populace
d. ALL local public institutions (university etc)
is held up by essentially two or three bereaucrats, nearly putting an entire institution (the Dogs) out of business, and crippling the entire faculty of another (Vic Uni)!
The humble local council is meant to be a BASIC check and balance to other processes, but because of their own inefficiencies and delusions of grandeur they have somehow managed to turn themselves into the key to the running of the entire urban environment, and MILLIONS upon MILLIONS of dollars in our economy, in both lost time, wasted labour hours and actual dollars spent, not to mention emotional distress, are broken upon the altar of the Almighty Local Council. Heavens above. This really makes my blood boil.
This morning on AM 774 we had people calling up who work at councils complaining about the inefficiencies and the JOKE that most councils have become. Something has to be done. Someone -- State Government, the locals -- has to put them firmly in their small, small place.