A ‘citizens’ jury’ could help tackle one of the trickiest problems to face the next cohort of Greater Bendigo City councillors.
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Councillors will consider a report at this Wednesday’s meeting which proposes establishing a jury to provide independent community input into Greater Bendigo’s priorities for the next four years.
The report’s author, city planning and development director Prue Mansfield, said the idea was to build confidence that council was listening to residents.
“The goal is for more people to have more confidence in more decisions of council into the future, because ‘people who look like me and are not part of the establishment’ have made these recommendations,’” Ms Mansfield writes in the report.
Under the model, to be run independently by the newDemocracy foundation, a randomly-selected jury of 26 people would come together for six days over a 10-week period to address a major question which the next group of councillors will face.
The current crop of councillors would work with newDemocracy to pose the question – the report uses two possible examples, one on council rates and the other on spending priorities.
Ms Mansfield said the model would be very useful in helping the new council develop its plan for 2017-2021. She said, if council agrees with the recommendation, the jury should be established as soon as possible in order for their report to be ready for the incoming council after the October 22 election.
The man who spearheaded a long-running, but ultimately unsuccessful campaign to prevent council from demolishing the Kangaroo Flat Leisure Centre said while he cautiously welcomed the idea, it would not address systemic flaws in council’s decision making.
Don McKinnon said proposals put to council were largely coming from the city’s executive branch – not councillors – and were already drafted by the time they were made public, reducing consultation to a symbolic process.
At the moment, by the time [council plans] are voted on and made public, all the drafting is already done,"
- Former Marong councillor Don McKinnon
“It sounds reasonable in principle but in practice it will still depend on who they want to listen to,” the former Marong councillor said.
“We had 80 per cent of residents supporting us and it didn’t stop them.”
Report to council at bottom of page.
