Time for a change of leadership
I repeatedly get asked as a member of the Invercargill Ratepayers Advocacy Group, what I think about Tim Shadbolt standing for mayor in next year’s election.
I have been unable to reply. It is a bit like the devil you know, as opposed to the one you don’t.
I personally believe it is time for a change of leadership in our council. Tim has done well in the past but being the longest-serving mayor and having ‘‘put Invercargill on the map’’ doesn’t cut it anymore.
But who is a better candidate?
And if there is more than one other candidate, will they split the vote for those wanting change ?
From where I sit, I cannot go past Scott O’Donnell (HW Richardson Group director) for mayor.
He has shown his passion for the CBD (both the project and a link with the new Kmart complex) and his commercial vision for the city. The group’s two vehicle museums are inspirational.
His view that Holdco holds huge equity that should be released for city development and his criticism of purchasing of a Nelson forest and questions over the electricity company line activities, are refreshing.
But unfortunately, the mayor, while being the ‘‘chair of the board’’, is still just one vote of 13. So, until we replace 4-5 of the current ‘‘old boys brigade’’ with people with new ideas, more civic duty and less personal gain, then it will be business as usual after next year’s election.
Nobby Clark, Invercargill Ratepayers Advocacy Group
Scott O’Donnell replied:
My focus (with the help of a good team) is getting the CBD sorted for the good of Southland.
Mayor Tim’s support in doing that would be greatly appreciated.
Maternity and abortion
In 1975 I gave birth to my son at Lumsden maternity unit.
Back then the sound of a crying newborn was regularly heard at this unit.
The local Lumsden doctor was a busy man, not only caring for local medical needs, but also bringing lots of babies into this world at the maternity unit.
At the same time, Southland Hospital was in the process of planning and then building a 20-bed modern maternity unit.
Now in 2018, this maternity unit, like the Lumsden unit, is closed and no longer required as the demand for its beds for births has markedly declined.
What Invercargill births do occur can now easily be accommodated within the main hospital.
A short distance from the closed Invercargill maternity unit is an abortion clinic which every year claims about 500 Southland unborn lives. This deliberate killing on demand at taxpayer expense is all in order to accommodate self serving adults’ rights to choose to kill the life growing within its mother.
The killed Southland unborn, if they were given the chance, would have grown into adulthood to have become our nurses, teachers, farm hands etc.
Today, Southland communities are instead demanding that more immigrants be allowed to come into New Zealand to fulfil our growing employment needs. Pauline McIntosh