Mayor says community wants parks and roads over homelessness action

A Tasmanian mayor says ratepayers want the council to focus on playgrounds and roads over addressing homelessness. DETAILS>>

Glenorchy mayor Bec Thomas says ratepayers want to see their money going to roads and playgrounds instead of addressing homelessness, a responsibility she says lies with other levels of government.

The comments came as the council debated a motion on homelessness by Alderman Kelly Sims which included investigating the use of council owned facilities to be used as crisis accommodation.

The motion was deferred at last month’s meeting and council officers prepared a report which indicated there would be challenges in pursuing the option.

None of the recommendations suggested pursing the option further.

On Monday, Ms Sims said her motion had been watered down.

“It’s really quite patronising to the community, especially to the homeless,” Ms Sims said.

“There’s absolutely no benefit to endorsing or voting for this, it will change nothing.”

Kelly Sims runs a housing Facebook page and is concerned about some of the trends she is seeing. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

Ms Thomas was concerned Ms Sims would offend council staff.

“Comments suggesting the motion has been watered down are unhelpful, disrespectful and devalue the extremely hard work and commitment of council staff across a range of teams at council in aiming to address the housing and homelessness crisis,” Ms Thomas said.

She said action was already being taken by the council including talks with stakeholders and the state government on the idea of using council owned facilities as emergency accommodation.

“The strong feedback from the services present was that any shelter provided would need to be supervised which would require resourcing,” Ms Thomas said.

“It’s not within council’s role or budget to provide such a service.”

Ms Thomas said the idea was not off the table.

“We are and remain committed to continuing these conversations, should a provider like City Mission have the resources to provide such a service in Glenorchy,” Ms Thomas said.

Bec Thomas has been elected as the new Glenorchy City Council Mayor. Picture: Nikki Davis-Jones

Ms Thomas said the community wanted council to focus on other services.

“In all the recent engagement we’ve been doing with our community I haven’t heard that ratepayers want to spend their valuable ratepayer dollars on addressing homelessness,” Ms Thomas said.

“Let me be clear, it’s not that they don’t care or that they don’t want the issue addressed, but the recognise that this is what they pay taxes to other levels of government for.

“We acknowledge our community is telling us they want us to focus our efforts and spend their money on what matters most to them: recreation and public open spaces including playgrounds, urban services like mowing and weed management, quality roads and footpaths and environmental management.

The mayor said there was “no quick fix” to addressing housing and homelessness.

“There’s no silver bullet, I know this can be frustrating and really hard to accept when there’s people out in the cold but we’ve just got to be pragmatic about this,” Ms Thomas said.

Ald Sue Hickey asked if Ms Thomas if she thought her answer was patronising, to which she replied “no I don’t”.

Council split over crisis accommodation plan - July 25

A Glenorchy Alderman says her motion to investigate the possibility of using council owned halls and facilities as crisis accommodation has been watered down by council officers after the discussion was put off last month.

The motion by Kelly Sims was deferred at last month’s meeting because it was submitted to council six days before the meeting instead of seven.

Glenorchy City Council Alderman Kelly Sims was sent a poo emoji by another Alderman with the complaint being dismissed. Picture Nikki Davis-Jones

Part of the motion was for council officers to come back to council after two months with a report on the viability of using the council owned resources.

In response council officers said there were complex considerations in the possibility of providing crisis accommodation.

“A limited number of buildings were identified as possibilities as council rarely leaves a facility vacant without finding a tenant,” council officer said.

“As such there would be a significant lead time waiting out leases to expire before most

facilities could be made available.

The officer indicated the use of halls would not be suitable.

“Even our lower-utilisation halls would require significant upgrades to ablution facilities and

would be difficult to heat efficiently,” the council officer said.

“The majority of halls are highly utilised with regular hire groups in place.”

Tents at Hobart Showgrounds Picture: Linda Higginson

The officer said the possibility of using change rooms would also require negotiations.

“Change rooms and other rooms at sport and recreation facilities may have some appeal for this purpose as these include toilet and shower facilities,” the council officer said.

“However, these are all tenanted and would require negotiation of specific agreements with the relevant tenants.”

They also said a planning permit would be needed because there were no exemptions to allow a premises to be used as emergency accommodation.

The council officer said providing oversight and an site management of such a facility was not something the council was capable of providing and said a partnership with a provider would be needed.

None of the recommendations by council officers in response to the original motion suggested negotiations with tenants, service providers, upgrading halls or seeking a permit.

“They’re basically giving us the reasons why they can’t do it, it appears to be excuses,” Ms Sims said

“We have access to the spaces, the planning scheme and the processes able to make that happen.”

Ms Sims said her motion had been watered down.

“The motion was really about reassessing opportunities and we’ve missed the chance to do that genuinely and meaningfully,” Ms Sims said.

“It’s exactly what the community is sick of. The community want to see us working hard on the real issues.

“When important motions arrive and are dismissed, watered down, reviewed and completely changed by the time it gets to the vote, it’s really concerning.”

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Originally published as Mayor says community wants parks and roads over homelessness action