Seems that Fullers weren’t finished yet and proceeded to connect the Quickcat with the upper passanger gantry at Matiatia.

In a world of constant change it is comforting to have reminders of the way things used to be. This is how i felt about the iconic Waiheke bach hanging on to the hillside at the eastern end of Onetangi Beach. It seemed improbable in so may ways. To see it yesterday morning strewn down the hillside like a carelessly discarded bag of rubbish sent a chill through me like losing an old friend.

There are plenty of pictures on the web of the aftermath, lets just remember it like this.

What lessons have we learnt? Well maybe we have learnt that Nobilangelo wasn’t so bad, or perhaps that we shouldn’t have posted so many candidates and allow the toastmasters through?

Maybe we might have learnt that leopards dont change their spots and we should have seen this from Faye Storer, as she has never let go of Denise beating her in the last election.

And maybe we have learnt nothing, and like the  TPI affair, after a couple of months we all crawl back to our grass huts, enjoy summer and get on with our lives.

The one thing that worries me is that, in spite of the unfair process electing the chair and deputy chair, we don’t actually know that this board is going to do a bad job. Even if the board had met correctly the outcome would be the same.

My hope is that Denise perseveres with, that the fourth estate monitors and the island never forgets this board.

Don’t let the bastards grind you down.

To quote Jo Holmes “Much of this will be in today’s Marketplace and the whole of Gulf (Green) News will be full of it tomorrow”

It is apparent that the Waiheke Marketplace” has aligned itself with Jo Holmes and cannot be impartial. To combat your vile tribe entering my house I will be installing one of these on my letterbox.

Dear Waiheke,

I want to thank the 2239 voters who elected me to the Waiheke Local Board. I really do appreciate your confidence in me. Sadly my colleagues on the board – Faye Storer, Jim Hannan, Don McKenzie and Jo Holmes – don’t share your confidence.

The first decision for the new Local Board on the 6th November will be to decide who will be the chair and deputy chair for the next three years. I had called an informal meeting with the local board members to start to discuss this and possible portolio roles on Thursday.
I was really keen that we should meet because as a group we hardly know each other. I thought it would be an opportunity for us to talk about our passions and what we hoped to achieve as a board for our community and begin to develop criteria on how we could make good decisions – including for the chair and other roles on the board.

But at the start of the meeting Faye handed me a sheet of paper listing all the roles which they had already divied up between the five of us including allocating the role of chair to Faye and deputy chair to Jo. The discussions that produced this sheet of paper were kept secret from me.

I was gob-smacked at the level of pre-determination here. None of these people actually know me. But these four people had already decided things about me without me – and I had no opportunity to inform them or defend myself.

It’s the way the decision was made, rather than the result, that concerns me most.

I had hoped that as a board we would be able to make good decisions together. Good decision-making requires all participants to take an active role. It requires participants to keep an open mind. It requires people to sit down together and look at all the available information, explore options, maybe robustly debate some of the points and in the end come to a decision. Additionally, for elected representatives, the Local Government Act applies. This requires board members to take into account the views of the community when making a decision. Unfortunately I was locked out of the decision-making by the other four elected board members and clearly your 2239 votes are irrelevent to this decision as well.

It saddens me that at a time of incredible opportunity with the new council and local board structure our brand new elected board members are kicking things off without the slightest nod to a transparent decision-making process. What does this say about their intention to act democratically?

On Thursday Faye told me that I am a ‘minority’ on the board. I had hoped that oppositional politics was behind us – as these were the people who made campaign promises that they would be happy to work as a team.

I’m greatly disappointed about the way things are starting off. I remain grateful to our community for the support you have shown me as your elected representative. I am especially appreciative of all of you who have argued and engaged with me and shared your thoughts and ideas because you keep me accountable. I trust you will continue to do so and will do the same for the other board members too.

Again, thank you for your vote.

Denise Roche

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