I am a combination of energy and enthusiasm. In COVID pandemic, I have worked more than 50 hours weekly. My desire for community work has led me to conduct laughter yoga sessions, community tree planting , teaching Yoga and youth chess club ; all this on purely voluntary basis.
I have been working closely with the community of Nawton and Dinsdale. These communities (and many other communities in West ward) are not getting their fair share. For example, there are no council maintained toilets in the shopping area. I also see lot of cars parked on the road. They are a danger to everybody. Council needs to find solution like parking bay. In fill housing has gone rampant, making our suburbs ghettos of cement and concrete. City council needs to make regulations whereby every house needs one garage to accommodate a car or mobile scooter, the car should be able to reverse on the section and a tree with a potential to grow at least 2 meters ( ideally a native tree but even a mandarin tree will do) should exist on the section. A patch of lawn , 20 square meters , may be considered instead of a tree.
Law and order have gone out of hand. City council needs to talk to the police to fulfil community needs.
As a councillor, I want to work in all the above areas.
1) Lack of facilities for the west ward.
2) Car parks for cars parked on the road
3)Rampant in fill housing
4) Deteriorating law and order situation.
No.
We, as a nation, have problems of alternate flooding and drought. We will therefore need to work on deepening , widening river beds to prevent flooding. We also need water storage to pull us through the drought.
Let us first define problems, find the projects that will tackle those problems . We may need international consultants for the latest technology and novel concepts. Once those projects are well defined, we can decide who can do a particular piece of work.
For example, acquiring land for sewerage treatment plant can be done better by the local council whereas tendering for a dozen treatment plants for various cities can be done by the central government.
I am happy to have Māori to have a separate ward. However, each Maori councillor should be assigned a responsibility to tackle an issue predominantly found in the Maori community.
Central government and local government should work together on various issues. I have mentioned above that water problem should be solved by first defining the problem, deciding the goals and finalising projects. Sharing authority for a particular portion of a project is the last step.
Similarly, law and order situation should be tackled. Mayor, with councillors sit on one side of the table and police on the other.
Each councillor outlines where the police presence is needed at what time and an arrangement is made .
City council also needs to have its say on the housing development. Central government can’t dictate and take decisions without council’s approval.
None.
People don’t think councillors will be solving their issues. Very often, people don’t know the candidate and voting for an unknown person sounds risky.
The national politics and elections feature very often on the TV . Prime time news gives it maximum coverage. City council elections do not get enough publicity. That makes people neglect local elections.
People don’t think councillors will be solving their issues. Very often, people don’t know the candidate and voting for an unknown person sounds risky.
The national politics and elections feature very often on the TV . Prime time news gives it maximum coverage. City council elections do not get enough publicity. That makes people neglect local elections.
That is the ideal situation. Councillor knows the problems of the people. Councillor is also more approachable if he/she lives in Hamilton.
Only in a rare scenario where councillor’s partner has a job out of Hamilton, a councillor not living in Hamilton is acceptable.
There should be no limit on the consecutive terms of any councillor. Councillor does not earn much more than an average hard working, qualified person. Good councillors are difficult to find. Hence if the councillor has the mandate of people, he/she continues the work.