By Cam Lucadou-Wells
About 50 voters took the chance to sift through and measure up some of the smorgasbord of 84 Casey council election candidates at a Meet the Candidates forum in Doveton.
Unfortunately, not even a third of the contenders in Edrington, Four Oaks and River Gum wards showed up to the 22 September event.
Casey Residents and Ratepayers Association, which organised the forum, stated it was one way indicating those who are genuine candidates rather than those who may be “dummies”.
“It had proven that a lot of candidates had not wanted to take advantage of an opportunity to meet the citizens of Casey that they wanted to represent,” Jim Duthie of CRRA said.
“It could be concluded that these were the ‘dummies’ or arrogant people who were above talking with residents.”
Dummy candidates – an election strategy that has blighted council elections – are those people standing with no intention to represent ratepayers but just to garner and pass on votes to a contender.
Candidate Brian Oates, who had served on the council for three previous terms, said it was a sure-fire way to identify a candidate who was not serious about being elected.
He said he was standing again to “change the culture” on the council.
“They seem to be isolating themselves from the community.
“If you ask a question, you tend to get an aggressive response.”
The CRRA was not a dispassionate host, handing out leaflets to “put the current councillors last” and endorsing candidates such as Mr Oates, former Greens councillor Lynette Keleher and Rex Flannery.
It plans to publish its preference list online in October.
As always, the popular theme among fresh-faced candidates was to keep down rates. Several thought rates could be pegged lower than the 2.5 per cent rate cap, at the rate of inflation.
Strategies to achieve this were a little thin, though several candidates took aim at the $125 million Bunjil Place project.
Edrington Ward candidate Timothy Jackson, a Slater and Gordon lawyer, described it “the fancy new council offices with a few new things”.
He said he would rather the project’s money was diverted into initiatives such as new quarters for Narre Warren SES or young offenders’ programs.
Cr Rafal Kaplon said he believed rates could be capped at 2.5 per cent increases but “I don’t know how realistic it is to go beneath that”.
“We have 120 people moving in the City of Casey every week, and new roads, child-care facilities and community facilities need to be built.”
He said the council had made $1 million in efficiency savings, including axing two directors as part of a restructure.
Novel ideas included free access for overweight people during quiet times at council-owned gyms, suggested by Russell Larkins, making Casey a solar city by Lynette Keleher, and loosening the ResCode to allow more affordable dwellings built in backyards suggested by Bill Plemmer.
The ‘Melbourne Cup’ field of 21 Four Oaks Ward candidates could be narrowed down to seven who turned up on the night – Rod Bagon, Richard Barrow, Cr Rafal Kaplon, Bill Klemmer, Andrew Lawler, Brian Oates and Chris Sargeant.
There were three who sent apologies – Afroz Ahmed, who was at work in regional Victoria, former mayor Shar Balmes at another appointment and Cr Rosalie Crestani who was at a citizenship ceremony.
That left a long list of 11 candidates who were unaccounted for.
Out of River Gum Ward’s field of 15, just four candidates Lynette Keleher, Malik Mahmood, Nagaraj Nayak and Cr Wayne Smith showed for the forum.
Five, Robert Faligan, John Gulzari, Pravin Ramdany, Cr Damein Rosario and Ian Spencer, were apologies and six were unexplained absentees.
Edrington Ward candidates Riley Baird, Anthony Dissanayake, Timothy Jackson and Russell Larkins attended, and there were six unaccounted absentees.
