Noosa Council was regularly portrayed as a paragon of transparency because it rarely closed meetings to the public, but since the election, council staff several times recommended closing meetings to the public when an appeal was on the agenda. In this post Ingrid asks if closed meetings are being normalised with a shift away from transparency?
“If a tree falls in a forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?” And if a Council meeting falls on a Friday and nobody hears it, does it make a sound? With only four views on the latest Council meeting, Ingrid believes the missing piece in the council transparency jigsaw puzzle is just letting people know when and where to find it.
Ingrid recounts how her letter to the editor at Noosa News were distorted and published on the newspaper’s website under a misleading and dishonest headline, going from ‘Incumbency is the big advantage in election campaigns’ to ‘You pay peanuts ($70,000 worth) and you get elected mayor’. Is this click bait needed to keep regional newspapers alive?
Rod Ritchie believes gender equality is important, but bad behavior is not confined to any gender and that any paradigm of “divide and conquer”, from either gender, is not what the electorate expects of their councilors, especially in these fraught times.
Are rules meant to be broken, ask Judy Barrass in response to Ingrid Jackson’s Article about the Noosa Plan. Judy believes families, societies and governments cannot operate without structure and agreed rules about what is acceptable and what is not, and a land use plan gives a structure to land use and confidence that there is and will be some order in how things happen. It's the big debate that needs to happen, and we welcome all views.
Karen Cook-Langdon (Kaz) entered the 2020 Noosa council elections as an 'underdog' with a fairly low public profile. Kaz didn't quite make it over the line, but our political landscape has shifted in these elections and for Kaz there is no going backwards.
“Do you swear to protect the Noosa Plan, the whole Noosa Plan, and nothing but the Noosa Plan?”
“I do.”
In the run-up to the March Noosa Council elections some advocacy groups put candidates on the spot about their commitment to...
Can "Tactical Urbanism" help us see a different future in terms of the way we get around in Noosa? Other cities across the globe are giving it a go - and it seems sensible that we do too...
After the slow and painful countdown courtesy of the Electoral Commission amidst the outbreak of a global pandemic, Noosa elected Clare Stewart as its first female mayor and welcomed two other females to the historically male dominated chamber table.
Vote 1 for female representation at this year's Council elections. It's a simple strategy to balance the scales of injustice and forge a new future for Noosa.
Betty's 2040 was a long time coming. She found it hard to keep up with real life developments and swayed from apocalyptic visions to describing a hopeful and utopian one.
The voice of the hinterland and the young, we thank Nathanael for both his sensible answers to our questions and his ongoing service to our community.
Yanni van Zijl is best known for her stunning thought-provoking art creations often involving discarded plastic packaging. Here are Yanni's answers to our questions.
From koalas to humans - Meghan Halverson will keep up the crusade for a better world. Here are Meghan's answers to our five questions:
Answering our 5 candidate questions first with military efficiency: David 'Fletch' Fletcher from Future Noosa made all the right noises. We'd like to see this man in action!
Amelia Lorentson's smart and well considered answers to our 5 Questions to Candidates. Carved clean out of a crystal clear wave.
Crawling out of our festive hibernation we bravely face up to the year 2020. Council elections are looming large and campaigns have fired up. Open Noosa had some recurring topics we, the editors obviously feel passionate about. Alas we prepared some questions to candidates.
Council’s letting proposals are tearing community apart according to Ralph Rogers, prominent Noosa businessman and investor in local enterprise. In Roger's view, a council acting in the best interests of the shire would defer a vote on this draconian proposal, which will be subject to one legal challenge after another.
Short term letting – and Noosa Council’s attempts to design a policy to control it – are hot topics in Noosa right now. And the Future Noosa group, which has three councillor candidates standing for March’s election, is concerned about the policy’s impact on residents. Councillor Candidate Andrew Squires warns not to throw the baby out with the bathwater – the baby being the best interests of residents.
With the 2020 elections nearing, Businessman Andrew Squires, hospital administrator Karen Finzel and ex army aviator David 'Fletch"Fletcher have launched their campaign as independents for next March’s local government election, cooperating under the name Future Noosa.
Keith Jackson ploughs through 16 months of Noosa Council voting statistics to analyse 44 split votes. In 26 of them Cr Ingrid Jackson found herself voting alone as a minority of one against her fellow councillors. Keith looks at why, the issues involved and the implications of such polarisation for open governance.
