Newly-elected Katherine Mayor Joanna Holden pledges united council and strong decision making
Katherine's new mayor has pledged to rebuild trust and tackle the town's pressing challenges head-on as part of her ambitious vision to make the outback town more liveable. Read the details.
Katherine Mayor Joanna Holden has thanked voters for putting their faith in her at the recent Northern Territory Local Government Elections, as she lists off her short and long-term vision for Katherine.
“It feels humbling and exciting … I’m very keen to get my feet under the desk and start working with the new council,” she said.
Ms Holden said one of her first priorities was to “build a focused and cohesive team (council) that understand our roles and responsibilities”.
“If we have that right from the beginning, it creates better decision making into the future for Katherine,” she said.
“It sounds easy, but I know that because we’re all different people it might not be. However as long as we know what our overall goals and focuses are, we can work towards that.”
Division plagued the former council after councillor Amanda Kingdon was issued a no-trespass order over online comments made about then Attorney-General and Local Government Minister Chansey Paech.
Ms Holden said she would also look to “increase community engagement”, a promise she took to the election after community members voiced concerns about the apparent “disconnect” between council and the public.
“We need to be looking at how we can build that and ensure that we are listening to the community,” she said.
She said her third main focus was “trash talk”.
“There’s been a lot of feedback from the community about waste management such as dump hours; the roll out of new wheelie bins; the new dump, because our existing dump is at the end of life; and the recycling program,” she said.
“But obviously that takes the agreement of the entire council for us to start focusing on that as a priority.”
Asked what she wanted Katherine to look like in four years, at the end of her first term, Ms Holden said she wanted to see a “strong, engaging and vibrant community”.
“I would love to also see an increase in people wanting to come here and make Katherine their home; so that means addressing some of the barriers to people wanting to do that at the moment,” she said.
She said this could be achieved by tackling anti-social behaviour, which she acknowledged council was limited in what it could do, as well as cleaning up rubbish and gardens.
“I want a community where people are saying ‘That’s a place I want to go and live, work and raise a family’,” she said.
Ms Holden said she “genuinely thanked” the other candidates for running.
“It takes bravery to put your hand up and run for any election position and the work that goes into that,” she said.
But there was one other mention dear to her.
“I also want to thank my Mum,” she said.
“She is an incredible role model, and I couldn’t have got here without her.”
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Originally published as Newly-elected Katherine Mayor Joanna Holden pledges united council and strong decision making
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