ODT Mon, 22 Jun 2015 (page 8)
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Let’s see if there is any possibility that mayor and councillors are bloody well creaming it for little or no ratepayer benefit. Oops. As they have always done.
See DCC consolidated debt; debt per capita (ratepayers); and the stifling intergenerational debt stacked up by the two spendthrift councils: Chin’s and Cull’s.
Worse. How will RT earn his keep as DCC chair of Finance while he is greasing wheels as temporary deputy commissioner at SDHB…. does not compute.
Send a commissioner to DCC.
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Posted by Elizabeth Kerr
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Tagged as Brainless wonders, Council debt CRISIS, Councillors, DCC, Dunedin, Dunedin City Council, Fatcats, GOD HELP US, Lack of accountability, Lack of transparency, Mayor, Pay levels, Paying off farm or home mortgage, Personal income, Remuneration Authority, Rip-offs, Rorts
What if? Dunedin... 
Some argue if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys. This is the argument for the entitled. Today I read an article on 10 symptoms of a dysfunctional organisation and one of the symptoms is the awarding of out of kilter pay rises and associated perks. I guess it demonstrates sense of entitlement and is a tool to buy loyalty and support. I realise this rise comes from the outside Remuneration Authority, but one can maybe put it down to dysfunctionality being contagious!
The peanuts quote doesn’t explain why you can still get monkeys irrespective of pay rates.
Link supplied by Peter:
Click to access PIResults-Dys-Orgn-113012.pdf
When you increase the quantity of peanuts you get fat monkeys.
Elizabeth – I share your frustrations at the annual “gravy train” increase. However this will continue from year to year unless the present Government led by PM Key is prepared to go further and alter the rules that the Remuneration Authority work under; to apply for Local Government as well. You will recall that he is embarrassed by recent MP salary increase determinations set by the RA and has promised to do something about it.
Lyndon, a good point. Maybe it will take Minister of Local Government Paula Bennett to slash and burn.
The remuneration authority receive the same increase they grant councillors! No doubt, just like the higher salaries commission.
What can definitely be determined is that failed outfits like the SDHB, Delta and the DCC pay more than successful businesses. Carole Heatly is paid $10,000 per week, $250 an hour to lose $42 million; the boss of Delta “earns” $9000 per week, $225 an hour to invest in land deals which lose ratepayers millions; and now councillors, many unemployable, “earn” $1,000 per week to ensure debts of $650 million going to $850 million rapidly due to falling interest rates imposing losses on “swaps”.
I call on zero payments to councillors to ensure no naked self
-interested parties are elected, the job of running Delta to be advertised for a salary of less than $170,000 and the job of CEO of the SDHB to be advertised for less than $200k per annum.
We my not get the so called quality of applicants, but we will probably get a practical person eminently capable of running a better organisation.
We could Not do worse.
Where is the proof that highly competent people are not far more numerous that the salary structure posits? Not many on the lowest rung of a 10-rung ladder are capable of doing the job of those on Rung 5 – but some are, proof being that some work their way up to there and beyond by being promoted on ability. How many of the lowest ranked miss out because Rung 5 isn’t wide enough ie places are rationed by space not by competence, energy, imagination, ability to get on with customers and co-workers without bullying or grovelling. By the time you get to the top rung so many have missed out on promotion, never been able to demonstrate their abilities, that it’s largely a lottery.
Then the hiring process shows preference to those who are already highly paid, using that as “proof” that they’re not highly paid fat monkeys. Bollocking nonsense -string of assumptions – look at the results!
Word on the street is that Cr Wilson has seen the beginning of the end and is to run for the Regional Council next elections.
Hmmm.
Elizabeth – maybe some truth in this rumour if the recommendations of the Representation Review Panel are ultimately taken up by the Local Government Commission.
Lyndon, yes the review has feet. I never got the impression Cr Wilson was wedded to DCC. She’s one of Daaave’s chairs, of Infrastructure Services – the largest budget area for council services, but then she had the South Dunedin flood and the pesky unmaintained mudtanks. Woe is KW.
Flyer might be on to something. Wilson is to chair a meeting about safeguarding water resources in the Taieri catchment. A Regional Council responsibility.
An early start to get her name before the electors ?
Somebody at ORC must be looking out for her – or is Greater Dunedin ‘thinking’ about to take control of ORC too, for the greener good brought about by the Facebook and smartphone lobby.
Elizabeth – I was appalled at the Mayor’s reply to “criticism of Council over flooding” in today’s ODT. Is it possible to post this? You wonder at his current thinking and subsequent re-election possibilities with an attitude he has conveyed.
Lyndon, I have just got the tree ODT. I’m able to photograph with smartphone – presently dependent on low tech, away from scanner and editing suite. Will get that up shortly – I see it’s a response to Jeff Dickie of Woodhaugh, who kindly contributes to What if? from time to time.
He’s not handling the climate change, I mean heat. It’s time he got out of the kitchen and pedalled off into the distance.
See new post: Mayor Daaave lacks honest leadership in media replies
Tabled at the Council meeting held 29 June:
Report – Council – 29/06/2015 (PDF, 133.6 KB)
Elected Member Remuneration Rates for 2015/16
Given the astounding success of the DCC and DVML’s restructuring of debt that now unbelievably shows a stadium “profit”, perhaps Cull, Bidrose and the new Mr Davies could offer their unique financial advice to the troubled Greek government? Talk about creative thinking outside the square. The Greeks could borrow some more from someone else to pay off the IMF, transfer all national debt to another entity with another name, and pay the administrators of this restructuring a bonus out of the surplus! I see Cull quotes multi billionaire Warren Buffet in the latest DCC ratepayer funded propaganda flyer. I strongly suspect Warren will not be wanting these three as equity partners. I personally wouldn’t put them in charge of a hotdog stand in the Octagon. Still, at least you could keep an eye on them there and keep them away from “Other Peoples’ Money”! It just keeps getting sillier and sillier, although most of us stopped laughing a long time ago.
silly: adjective
sillier: comparative adjective
having or showing a lack of common sense or judgement, absurd and foolish
synonyms: foolish, stupid, unintelligent, idiotic, brainless, mindless, witless, imbecilic