City council secrecy under close scrutiny
An abundance of issues that Hamilton City Council managers deem should be discussed behind closed doors is perturbing the city’s elected officials, who say it’s ‘‘a bad look’’.
But chief executive Richard Briggs reckons the surfeit of secrecy is merely coincidental and is in no way a deliberate attempt to hide things from Hamiltonians.
Thirteen matters were listed in the ‘‘public excluded’’ section of the agenda for Thursday’s council meeting – an increase on the usual handful.
While some of these covered usual topics such as confirmation of public-excluded minutes and briefing notes from previous meetings, there were also some more substantial items such as proposals and agreements relating to the Rototuna Village Pool; the Hamilton Christian School; and the purchase of land in the Peacocke neighbourhood for a sports park.
Another topic was titled ‘‘Wairere Drive Speed Limit Reduction’’. The reason so many matters needed to be in ‘‘PX’’ was raised by councillor Ewan Wilson, and also queried by Cr Dave Macpherson.
‘‘I think it’s starting to be a bad look for council when there’s numbers in there,’’ said Macpherson, who was intrigued by the Wairere Drive matter.
‘‘I understand that there are some residual legal issues there, but a question of speed limits on our public roads surely is one that ought to appear in public only.’’
Briggs replied: ‘‘The base premise around speed limits is a normal course of business for council that should be in public. This one has more of a conversation around legal aspects of a decision and consequences thereof that leads it into the commercial realm.’’
While he had no issue with the more general discussions and the final decision of the council being made public, ‘‘the upfront conversation has a very legal nature to it. That’s the reason that it’s sitting where it’s sitting in PX.’’
Macpherson asked whether, in such situations when secretive matters were only a minor part of the matter being discussed, only the sensitive aspect could be kept from the public.
‘‘For the most part this is a collection of items that have happened to come up today, rather than an active decision to retain a certain percentage of the . . . meeting in PX,’’ Briggs replied.
‘‘Whilst I’m rigorous in ensuring things are remaining open I can stand to be more rigorous, and [you should] hold me to account when I slip up occasionally.’’
In most of the council’s meetings the majority of matters on the agenda were in the open section, he said.
‘‘For the most part, today’s [public-excluded] items are just coincidentally showing up. But your point is made.’’
Mayor Paula Southgate said she was confident the public could be privy to the vast majority of council decisionmaking.
‘‘In terms of process, we rely on legal staff and we rely on governance to make some nuanced decisions around that. We do report into open as soon as we can. But you are right Dave, there is a possibility on a small number of public-excluded [items] where the substantive topic of conversation can occur separate from the legal or commercial conversation.
‘‘Not in all instances though. Sometimes they are quite interwoven. So we have to have some confidence staff are directing us correctly on that.’’
People wanting to know more about council affairs were able to attend meetings and workshops, watch meeting footage online, and read the publicly available minutes of meetings on the council website, she said.
‘‘And, of course, we do go out to groups and stakeholders who are affected by a certain issue. I do have a high level of confidence in staff. Occasionally we might all get things wrong in life, and that happens.’’