If your organisation is engaging with local election candidates and you have ‘intel’ that might benefit voters, send it along to BayBuzz. We’ll post it on our Election Central and you’ll be reaching 1000’s of HB citizens following the campaigns.
Here’s an example – a report from Friends of Hastings Libraries, who met with Hastings mayoral candidates.
FRIENDS OF HASTINGS LIBRARIES INC
The Friends had their AGM at 10am in the Hastings Library last Friday, and immediately following the meeting, the Society held an event to meet, hear from and question the Mayoral Candidates for Hastings District Council.
Invitations were sent to all 5 Candidates. Cr Damon Harvey replied with his apologies saying he was out of town on the day of the meeting (later providing comments as reported below. Candidates Darrin Wilson, Steve Gibson and Crs Wendy Schollum and Marcus Buddo attended,
It became obvious to us immediately that all the candidates were friendly with each other and each was aware of the campaigning the others were doing.
The Society had 2 questions they wanted the candidates to answer, but also there was initial time perhaps 10 minutes for the candidates to talk about themselves and then to ask 2-3 questions presented from the floor. The ‘floor’ consisted of about 25 people, most were members of the Society who had attended the AGM but there were a few others. It was not an advertised public meeting but no one was turned away.
The Candidates presented in alphabetical order and each answered the following 2 questions
1-How will you address the challenge of the outdated and earthquake prone Hastings War Memorial Library?
2-What would you do to ensure that the three libraries in the system (Hastings, Flaxmere and Havelock North) continue to provide vital services to the growing population the Hastings District?
Marcus Buddo mentioned the high Council debt, the high cost needed to fund water services in the next few years ($650 million) and the costs of Cyclone recovery and resilience – which are ongoing. That mentioned he said he saw the Libraries as core services and the annual cost was currently $5million for a facility which had 454,255 site visits and 704,412 virtual visits in the last financial year. So, in his eyes was good value.
In answer to a floor question, Mr Buddo said we had a system of local democracy because we had local needs and he thought it was a legitimate role for Council and its community to determine what is a core service – it is not a role for Central Government. As to a new or extensively refurbished library in Hastings, Mr Buddo said that there could be an opportunity in the future for a Private/Public partnership.
Steve Gibson referred to his working and political background in the Manuwatu and said he had learned much from his extensive door knocking in Hastings District. He questioned the efficiencies of Councils (not just Hastings) when it came to building management and maintenance. He said he was a believer in lower rates indexed to the CPI so as to protect pensioners and others on fixed incomes. He favoured shared services between councils. He said he had retired at 50 and wanted to give back to the Community. He said the community needed many more volunteers. He also said he knew of successful Community Trusts and was keen to investigate them for Hastings
Wendy Schollum indicated that as a Councillor she had taken a very close interest in the local libraries, especially Hastings, and had spoken to staff about what were quite serious inadequacies in the building – sub-standard toilets, too hot in the summer, leaking roof and of course the earthquake prone issues. That said, she agreed with other candidates that the Council could not currently afford to build a new library and stressed that the existing building was a War Memorial, which was a further challenge. She was not giving up on getting some private finance arranged to perhaps contribute to part of the library or some equipment.
Ms Schollum did respond to some of her fellow candidates’ comments that the Council had “wasted” money on the ‘Water Museum”, the Archive storage, and the Tauroa Rd fence She that the those projects were budgeted well before Gabrielle and in many cases the Hastings Council was only paying a minor proportion of the overall cost. To a floor questioner Ms Schollum said that the Council had investigated alternative forms of infrastructure financing but nothing seemed to be available at this stage.
Darrin Wilson mentioned that his schooling and upbringing had been entirely in Hastings, although his involvement in Motocross bikes had taken him all over the world. Like Steve Gibson Mr Wilson had been a successful businessman who had been able to retire at a young age and concentrate on putting something back into the community.
He harked back to earlier days when Councils did not fill buildings with highly paid Admin staff, or engage large numbers of contractors but instead employed gardeners and tradespeople.He did not have a building plan.
Damon Harvey, after tendering his apology did contact the Society and gave some verbal answers to our questions and some general thoughts. He said he supports the Council continuing to fund the 3 Hastings libraries for operations and building maintenance. He had had a look at the new Christchurch Library and was very impressed. He said that if such a State of the Art Library was to come to Hastings it is most unlikely it could funded by Council alone – as may have been the case in the past. This is because of the enormous pressures on the Council since Gabrielle. If elected Mayor Mr Harvey wanted to review all Council facilities just to see whether some could be better operated as Trusts with some private funding. He said that as a past Chair of Sport HB he had had some experience in this area.
