Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Joining us live in the studio is the Mayor of Palmerston,
Athena Pasco Bell. Good morning to you, Good morning, good
to have you in the studio now, Athena, I understand
council meet last night for your regular meeting. Is that
the last council meeting before we go to the council elections.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
No, we will have just one next month because there
are some things under the Act that we have to address,
such as the monthly financial report. So we will have
a meeting next month, but it'll be the second meeting
that we have mid August.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Yeah, right, okay, So one more I know that in
the minutes there was well that certainly looked as though
you were looking at the community by laws and that
they're being reviewed. What's being proposed or what are the
changes potentially being looked.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
At in our list of review.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
So we just finished the animal management ones and they
are implemented in twenty twenty four. The next one on
the list was our procedures for meetings. But you know,
even though they're old, they function and they're working pretty well.
So we've decided just to reprioritize and bring forward the
pub place by laws for review. And that will be
quite extensive because it covers a whole range of issues
(01:05):
and we will need to go out to community consultation
and a whole lot of thoughts and ideas that we've
been considering.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
I know two of the ones that get raised with
us quite a bit, and I don't know whether they're
actually by laws. You know that the council can change
in any ways. Obviously public drinking and also rubbish around
the place. You know, people leaving rubbish and crap around
the place.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Well, we will remove rubbish once we're notified that it's there,
so that's not an issue. You know, we do have
something about camping in our public place by laws, but
then you know the technicalities around whether people are camping
and whether or not we're moving on homeless people or
just itinerants who are in for other reasons. We also
(01:47):
found that our by laws in relation to long grass
within people's properties take too long for us to get
on top of and get the owner to do something. Right.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Is that commercial or residential homes?
Speaker 2 (02:00):
It can be both, but you know, we have a
lot of problems in residential areas where they don't mow
their grass. The other complaint we get a lot about
public places. Is the grass on verges as well, people
not maintaining their verges and the grass gets really high.
So there could be a whole range of things. I mean,
some of the really outdated stuff is that we need
(02:20):
a council decision about the operational hours for some of
our council facilities. But I really think that should be
up to the discretion of the CEO.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Instead of so like operational hours for the pool for example,
or something like that.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
Yeah, I think the library is a specific one, but
you know, it really should be with the consideration of
what the operational requirements are.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
You know, do you reckon the.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Community should like in some ways be consulted with some
of those things.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Absolutely, you know, we need to if we're going to
make some changes, we need to understand from the community
what it is they want to see happen and what
they're prepared to have and what they're not prepared to have,
so that we can actually get some robust by laws
that will probably have to last for the next twenty years.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
Well, and so that will those changes actually come into
effect before the council election or is it something that
you'll sort of your review and it'll take some time
to get through.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
The by law reviews can take two to three years,
so that's a very extensive process because we also have
to deal with Parliamentary Council who draft our bylaws yep.
But before we can ask them to do anything, we
need to do all the community consultation and because public
place is such a broad range of things, Yeah, we
need to do a lot of consultation and have a
good think about it with the community.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Yeah, to decide what.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
It sounds like. Some of them might need to be
a bit more contemporary though as well. Right, like if
there's people camping in the city, for example, and you know,
I know it can be argued that they could be
homeless people in the city, but you go, at what
point does the council or others need to sort of
intervene and go this is not appropriate because you're seeing
in a raft of other issues ensue because of people
(03:56):
living in different areas where they shouldn't be.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
So it needs to be discussion about those people. And
quite often there are homeless people who don't cause any
trouble at all, and we don't want to be displacing
them just because it says we need to displace them.
But the ones that are there drinking, leaving rubbish behind
and causing other problems like fighting and stuff like that,
you know, we do need to be dealing with them
(04:19):
a bit more. But the other thing is the City
of Palmerston has no services for homeless people, so it's
very limited about what we can do.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
And you know where we can refer people to yep.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
So it's that's a specific issue. But looking more broadly
at the public place by laws is going to be you.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Know, extensive by the sounds of it. Heyyathina, I've got
a question here that says, good morning, Katie. Can you
please ask the me if she can do something about
the internet in Bellamack. We've got Opticom, which is a
fiber cable from South Australia. We're having outages all the time.
We just want NBN like any other suburb. Have asked
Luke it falls under him too, Does it.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Tell a communications there's entirely the Commwealth government.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
Yeah, it's any sort of issues about it for Bella mate.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
I've seen the posts up on Facebook and you know
there are some issues there. I'm not exactly sure what
the issue is, but telecommunications is very specifically in the
Australian Constitution, so it falls under the Australian government. I
can write letters of support, so if you want to
send me an email, I can raise it with Luke.
Now I've left the studio, but yeah, definitely need.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Something to follow up on. Now I've got another one
here that says the Palmerston bus interchange out the front
of the main road is a disgrace with people camping
and littering everywhere. Can the council help?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
We can lobby anti government to do something because it's
their land.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
It's so wild to me when I know it's not
your land, but it just seems so wild to me,
Like this is where people get the shits with, you know, bureaucracy,
right like where they go, well, come on, can someone
just sort it out?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
But if you know, if it gets to that stage,
we push the government like we're pushing with Clinton how
at the moment for the Liquor Commission to do a
public inquiry and gray about alcohol. It's not our realm
of responsibility when it's not our land, but we can
definitely attempt to influence. It's just really tricky because it's
(06:22):
the same as you know, sending a council ranger onto
your property to go and clean up your yard without
your permission. You know you wouldn't accept that some.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
People, I get what you're saying. I suppose for the
general punter, we just think to ourselves, oh goodness, may
let's sort it out.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
And there has been some good news though, because you
know they're looking at closing down Casarina Interchange, which we've
heard and I have been informed that Palmerston will you
know they're looking at that after so we'll learn some
outcomes from the shutdown of the Casarina INTERCHANGEEP hopefully get
all the good lessons learned and apply that into Palmestan
when they look at that space.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Hey a quick one on those gray shops around that
area you did just touch on this. Is there any
update at this point in time. No.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
I caught up with Clinton Howe last week and there
hasn't been an update from the Liquor Commission about where
they'll hide a public inquiry yet, but hopefully they do.
When they do, I really want to encourage the public
to come out and have a say about it, so
that they can hear it from not just me and
Clinton you know, not from council, from everyone who's affected
(07:24):
by what's going on there, because sometimes I think they
just don't believe us. And you know, you can ask
them to come in and have a look, walk around
with us, come and see the issues.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
But I don't know, maybe they're a bit chicken.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yeah, I don't know. Well, get them out there and
get everybody out there to have a look. And if
they do hold a public meeting, I think that'd be
a really good thing, or a public hearing so that
people can have their voices heard, particularly the people that
live nearby that are seeing real issues as a result.
A bit to go on, but we're fast running out
of time. I've got to get to the national news.
But I do want to ask you. We are just
(07:58):
I think are we five weeks out from the council elections.
So you're obviously running again for the Palmerston mayor. I
know that we've certainly heard others putting their hand up,
you know, for different areas. What's the process now from
council's perspective, at what point do you sort of cease operating?
I guess is as normal in terms of all the
counselors and you know, you don't really go into caretaker mode,
(08:22):
do you, Council, you.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Do, but it's the caretake of modes really around making
significant decisions. So you know, we wouldn't be able to
drop a million dollars on a project in that caretaker period,
which commences on the thirty first of August. Once the
declarations or sorry, once nominations close.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
We still have our civic responsibilities, so we still have
obligations and commitments that we need to meet and that
doesn't change.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
We just can't make significant decisions.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
When will we know who everybody is that's putting their
hand up? I understand that on was it on Friday
last week that you had to that when the nominations opened?
Speaker 2 (09:02):
A nominations close on the thirty first of August, which
is a Thursday, the first sorry, thirty first of July,
the first of August, which is the Fridays, there will
be the declaration of nominations and that's when we find
out who's nominated.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
All right, well, it'll be interesting. It always is. Athena
Pasco Bell, we've run out of time. Thank you as
always for joining us in the studio.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Thank you, thank you,
Joining us live in the studio is the Mayor of Palmerston,
Athena Pasco Bell. Good morning to you, Good morning, good
to have you in the studio now, Athena, I understand
council meet last night for your regular meeting. Is that
the last council meeting before we go to the council elections.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
No, we will have just one next month because there
are some things under the Act that we have to address,
such as the monthly financial report. So we will have
a meeting next month, but it'll be the second meeting
that we have mid August.
Speaker 1 (00:27):
Yeah, right, okay, So one more I know that in
the minutes there was well that certainly looked as though
you were looking at the community by laws and that
they're being reviewed. What's being proposed or what are the
changes potentially being looked.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
At in our list of review.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
So we just finished the animal management ones and they
are implemented in twenty twenty four. The next one on
the list was our procedures for meetings. But you know,
even though they're old, they function and they're working pretty well.
So we've decided just to reprioritize and bring forward the
pub place by laws for review. And that will be
quite extensive because it covers a whole range of issues
(01:05):
and we will need to go out to community consultation
and a whole lot of thoughts and ideas that we've
been considering.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
I know two of the ones that get raised with
us quite a bit, and I don't know whether they're
actually by laws. You know that the council can change
in any ways. Obviously public drinking and also rubbish around
the place. You know, people leaving rubbish and crap around
the place.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Well, we will remove rubbish once we're notified that it's there,
so that's not an issue. You know, we do have
something about camping in our public place by laws, but
then you know the technicalities around whether people are camping
and whether or not we're moving on homeless people or
just itinerants who are in for other reasons. We also
(01:47):
found that our by laws in relation to long grass
within people's properties take too long for us to get
on top of and get the owner to do something. Right.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Is that commercial or residential homes?
Speaker 2 (02:00):
It can be both, but you know, we have a
lot of problems in residential areas where they don't mow
their grass. The other complaint we get a lot about
public places. Is the grass on verges as well, people
not maintaining their verges and the grass gets really high.
So there could be a whole range of things. I mean,
some of the really outdated stuff is that we need
(02:20):
a council decision about the operational hours for some of
our council facilities. But I really think that should be
up to the discretion of the CEO.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Instead of so like operational hours for the pool for example,
or something like that.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
Yeah, I think the library is a specific one, but
you know, it really should be with the consideration of
what the operational requirements are.
Speaker 3 (02:43):
You know, do you reckon the.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Community should like in some ways be consulted with some
of those things.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Absolutely, you know, we need to if we're going to
make some changes, we need to understand from the community
what it is they want to see happen and what
they're prepared to have and what they're not prepared to have,
so that we can actually get some robust by laws
that will probably have to last for the next twenty years.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
Well, and so that will those changes actually come into
effect before the council election or is it something that
you'll sort of your review and it'll take some time
to get through.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
The by law reviews can take two to three years,
so that's a very extensive process because we also have
to deal with Parliamentary Council who draft our bylaws yep.
But before we can ask them to do anything, we
need to do all the community consultation and because public
place is such a broad range of things, Yeah, we
need to do a lot of consultation and have a
good think about it with the community.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
Yeah, to decide what.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
It sounds like. Some of them might need to be
a bit more contemporary though as well. Right, like if
there's people camping in the city, for example, and you know,
I know it can be argued that they could be
homeless people in the city, but you go, at what
point does the council or others need to sort of
intervene and go this is not appropriate because you're seeing
in a raft of other issues ensue because of people
(03:56):
living in different areas where they shouldn't be.
Speaker 2 (03:59):
So it needs to be discussion about those people. And
quite often there are homeless people who don't cause any
trouble at all, and we don't want to be displacing
them just because it says we need to displace them.
But the ones that are there drinking, leaving rubbish behind
and causing other problems like fighting and stuff like that,
you know, we do need to be dealing with them
(04:19):
a bit more. But the other thing is the City
of Palmerston has no services for homeless people, so it's
very limited about what we can do.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
And you know where we can refer people to yep.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
So it's that's a specific issue. But looking more broadly
at the public place by laws is going to be you.
Speaker 1 (04:41):
Know, extensive by the sounds of it. Heyyathina, I've got
a question here that says, good morning, Katie. Can you
please ask the me if she can do something about
the internet in Bellamack. We've got Opticom, which is a
fiber cable from South Australia. We're having outages all the time.
We just want NBN like any other suburb. Have asked
Luke it falls under him too, Does it.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Tell a communications there's entirely the Commwealth government.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
Yeah, it's any sort of issues about it for Bella mate.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
I've seen the posts up on Facebook and you know
there are some issues there. I'm not exactly sure what
the issue is, but telecommunications is very specifically in the
Australian Constitution, so it falls under the Australian government. I
can write letters of support, so if you want to
send me an email, I can raise it with Luke.
Now I've left the studio, but yeah, definitely need.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
Something to follow up on. Now I've got another one
here that says the Palmerston bus interchange out the front
of the main road is a disgrace with people camping
and littering everywhere. Can the council help?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
We can lobby anti government to do something because it's
their land.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
It's so wild to me when I know it's not
your land, but it just seems so wild to me,
Like this is where people get the shits with, you know, bureaucracy,
right like where they go, well, come on, can someone
just sort it out?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
But if you know, if it gets to that stage,
we push the government like we're pushing with Clinton how
at the moment for the Liquor Commission to do a
public inquiry and gray about alcohol. It's not our realm
of responsibility when it's not our land, but we can
definitely attempt to influence. It's just really tricky because it's
(06:22):
the same as you know, sending a council ranger onto
your property to go and clean up your yard without
your permission. You know you wouldn't accept that some.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
People, I get what you're saying. I suppose for the
general punter, we just think to ourselves, oh goodness, may
let's sort it out.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
And there has been some good news though, because you
know they're looking at closing down Casarina Interchange, which we've
heard and I have been informed that Palmerston will you
know they're looking at that after so we'll learn some
outcomes from the shutdown of the Casarina INTERCHANGEEP hopefully get
all the good lessons learned and apply that into Palmestan
when they look at that space.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Hey a quick one on those gray shops around that
area you did just touch on this. Is there any
update at this point in time. No.
Speaker 2 (07:03):
I caught up with Clinton Howe last week and there
hasn't been an update from the Liquor Commission about where
they'll hide a public inquiry yet, but hopefully they do.
When they do, I really want to encourage the public
to come out and have a say about it, so
that they can hear it from not just me and
Clinton you know, not from council, from everyone who's affected
(07:24):
by what's going on there, because sometimes I think they
just don't believe us. And you know, you can ask
them to come in and have a look, walk around
with us, come and see the issues.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
But I don't know, maybe they're a bit chicken.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Yeah, I don't know. Well, get them out there and
get everybody out there to have a look. And if
they do hold a public meeting, I think that'd be
a really good thing, or a public hearing so that
people can have their voices heard, particularly the people that
live nearby that are seeing real issues as a result.
A bit to go on, but we're fast running out
of time. I've got to get to the national news.
But I do want to ask you. We are just
(07:58):
I think are we five weeks out from the council elections.
So you're obviously running again for the Palmerston mayor. I
know that we've certainly heard others putting their hand up,
you know, for different areas. What's the process now from
council's perspective, at what point do you sort of cease operating?
I guess is as normal in terms of all the
counselors and you know, you don't really go into caretaker mode,
(08:22):
do you, Council, you.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Do, but it's the caretake of modes really around making
significant decisions. So you know, we wouldn't be able to
drop a million dollars on a project in that caretaker period,
which commences on the thirty first of August. Once the
declarations or sorry, once nominations close.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
We still have our civic responsibilities, so we still have
obligations and commitments that we need to meet and that
doesn't change.
Speaker 3 (08:48):
We just can't make significant decisions.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
When will we know who everybody is that's putting their
hand up? I understand that on was it on Friday
last week that you had to that when the nominations opened?
Speaker 2 (09:02):
A nominations close on the thirty first of August, which
is a Thursday, the first sorry, thirty first of July,
the first of August, which is the Fridays, there will
be the declaration of nominations and that's when we find
out who's nominated.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
All right, well, it'll be interesting. It always is. Athena
Pasco Bell, we've run out of time. Thank you as
always for joining us in the studio.
Speaker 3 (09:25):
Thank you, thank you,
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