For any residents who have been frustrated that Tenterfield Shire Council has not included the public forums in the live stream, all of that has changed.
Councillors considered the Tenterfield Shire Council Code of Meeting Practice 2024 to include live streaming of public forums last week. The public forums occur, when the occur, just before the ordinary meeting begins and allow members of the public, who have been preapproved by council, to talk about various pertinent issues.
When the recommendation was made in chambers, Cr Peter Petty, as is his habit, was the first to move the motion, to the laughter of Mayor Bronwyn Petrie. Cr Petty had a particular question in mind but had to wait until staff explained the technicalities of the amendment to the meeting code.
“My question is to do with the how you chair the meeting, Madame Mayor,” called out Cr Peter Petty, thanking the mayor for her “wonderful skills” He pointed to the current guideline which reads: if the mayor and the deputy mayor (if any) are absent, a councillor elected to the chair the meeting by the councillors present presides at a meeting of the council.
“In you absence, when you left the other day, you and Cr Sauer, was Cr Bonner just anointed or did we vote for him to stand in that position?
“We anointed him. I do apologise Councillor”, the mayor responded.
“I was surprised, I thought you couldn’t have…I’m a bit of a technocrat, you know, and I wanted to make a point of that,” Cr Petty replied. Which meeting he was referring to is unclear.
“We anointed Cr Bonner last year as well…we thought we’d give him another run at it”, Mayor Petrie said with a chuckle.
There followed comments and laughter that couldn’t be deciphered between councillors.
“My apologies, Cr Petty in the future there will be a vote”, the mayor said.
“In the spirit of how it should have been, Madame Mayor”, Cr Petty concluded.
“Absolutely, we try to do things correctly. And may I commend our councillors on their general behaviour in council meetings. We’ve looked at some others in the state and it’s quite a shocking and appalling… and not only is it shocking behaviour but the lack of immediate action, but slow action, on a number of complaints that have gone on” and the mayor illustrated by another local government which took two years to make a determination on a councillor complaint.
“So thank you every one”.
Councillors voted unanimously to live stream public forums in the future.
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