Says it all
Screen shot from the Alpine Council's staff organisation page - at least they're telling the truth.
I seriously doubt that any council could get more out of touch with its ratepayers than what they are here in Alpine. The ever-expanding bureaucracy, the sick joke that is its tourism promotion arm that is funded by a punitive and wasteful 50% rates surcharge on commercial properties, the failure to embark on any serious upgrade of Bright’s CBD (despite the Bright Future project being adopted as policy nearly 10 years ago) while spending nearly $2 million to purchase and upgrade the Bright Indoor Pool are just a few of the Alpine council’s key failures. So who is to blame for the farce our council has become, the administration or the councillors? Or both? And, more importantly, how do we fix it?
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Promoting 'Beautiful Bright'.
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Can we have an occupy Bright protest. I’m sure our local law enforcement boys won’t care
Surprised it never happened outside Woollies.
That’s not a bad idea John – we could set up a tent city on the median strip perhaps?
Baldrick, their mums wouldn’t have let them sleep out.
I’m back! With acute bronchitis courtesy of Queensland. Next holiday will be in Bright which is looking as lovely as ever.
Good. I’d give up on Queensland as a tourist destination if I were you, Rox. Let’s face it, things have changed and now instead of ‘Beautiful one day, perfect the next’ it’s ‘Wet one day, flooded the next’. Queensland is the first victim of climate change … and who cares?
Good time of the year to visit Rox, this and autumn. Our summer is as well, a tad warmer than Tassie. Mind you, our winters are generally mild and lovely. Other than the seasons I suggested, I wouldnt’ bother coming any other time.
So spring, autumn, summer & winter are the only seasons when it’s worth visiting Bright? I’ll second that.
Nah Ray, then we’d need a permit to go on the median strip and I couldn’t be stuffed drawing a safe work area map up for them just to not even look at. How bout everyone just stop paying their rates? Oops no can’t do that because they charge you interest. Even more than a bank!
Actually, John, if a large portion of the 600+ property owners who are slugged with the 50% surcharge known as the Commercial & Industrial Special Rate refused to pay it, then the Alpine council would have no choice but to rescind it.
And that is what should happen because, as we know, the money they raise from the special rate does not provide any special benefits to those who pay it – and that is a breach of the Local Govt Act.
You might not be aware of this but 5 or 6 years ago I was one of three business owners who took the matter to VCAT on those very grounds in an attempt to have the special rate declared void & invalid. We lost the case because the then CEO and his tourism manager produced some very dodgy statistics that made out they were actually boosting tourist numbers. In my opinion the information was not only misleading but also fabricated.
Anyway, as I’ve said before, it requires the business operators to get angry about it and act in a unified way in order to have the rate thrown out – as it should be. And therein lies the problem – most operators are too timid to speak up.