Living in Interesting Times
Thursday, 31 March 2005
A member of a council committee sends out a weekly e-mail newsletter which he uses as the basis for a radio show he does on Access Radio 999FM.
This is from the latest missive:
> Councillor Pope has challenged my comments regarding what she says or
> does. So I have decided to report at a regular basis so you the reader
> can decide on her performance. [1] On March 2nd she gave an apology
> for non-attendance at Council Meeting. [2] 14 March 2005 was at
> Extraordinary Council Meeting. [3] 7th March she gave an apology for
> non-attendance at Environmental Wellbeing Committee meeting. [4] 7th
> March at 7.30pm she gave an apology for non-attendance at a
> Infrastructure Wellbeing Committee meeting. There were three other
> meetings that Cr. Pope could have attended but did not.
> So now you the reader/listener can decide on her performance.
> All findings above can be found in council minutes. Over this period
> Cr. Pope along with Dennison and Naylor registered no interest in
> appointment to outside organisations.
You, dear reader, have probably already noticed that my apologies for meetings here in Palmerston North went in at the same time I was in Wellington at Hui Taumata and in Greymouth for the RMA Accreditation training.
Meetings I “could have attended but did not”? I don’t think so!
As to my registering “no interest in appointment to outside organisations”, well, I can only assume that he looked at only tonight’s Order Paper and jumped to conclusions. It’s a shame many of the people who receive that e-mail misinformation will probably not take the time themselves to look at what is going on at Council, or to check out this website to see what I am actually doing.
I don’t write everything in this blog (for which you will probably be thankful) as with the number of meetings and workshops we have not only is time a constraint but so is my desire not to bore you witless!
So, tonight we had a Council meeting. It started at 7.30pm and was adjourned at midnight to be recommenced later today, at 6.00pm following on from a 4.30pm workshop. It’s after 2am now and I am winding down before heading to bed. Then I will get up and go to work until 4pm, before launching myself back into Council business.
Did you know that the old Chinese saying, “May you live in interesting times” is actually a curse, not a proverb?
