Council candidates respond to street maintenance issues
Two council candidates have different approaches to path maintenance.
Council candidates Gordon Chesterman and Jason Howarth say they both plan on dealing with street maintenance in Hamilton East after hearing issues raised by student Laura Davidson.
Davidson told the Waikato Independent her Hillcrest area around Knighton Road had overgrowth on pathways, graffiti and vandalism, high numbers of cats spreading litter, roots uplifting pathways, smokers leaving butts everywhere, and missing street signs.
When informed of these problems, current councillor Gordon Chesterman said, “I have not had a single phone call from a ratepayer about cats, nor have I had a single phone call about smoking in Hamilton East. I mean council cannot be expected to be a policeman of people’s dirty habits.”
Chesterman went on to explain that when people called with an issue he always took action to help, but when people did not inform the council they could not fix an issue they did not know about.
“If the residents are not the guardians of the community, and ring council staff when they see something that requires fixing, then often there’s no way we would ever know. I don’t go out prowling in my car looking for things to tell staff to fix, that would be impossible. But I respect the residents who will phone up.”
Chesterman said some of the issues raised, such as cats and litter, were the responsibility of the SPCA or landlords. But he went on to explain that the issues with footpaths would be dealt with by a programme already set up by the council, and that Davidson was more than welcome to inquire about this.
“Footpath maintenance is done on a regular basis all over the city, and it’s a planned programme every X number of years, and I think that if she’s got a particular complaint about a particular footpath I invite her to give me a call and I will certainly ensure that she gets an answer about when that might be fixed.”
When pressed about the same issues, new candidate Jason Howarth suggested getting community groups involved.
“We’ve got plenty of community groups… who are more than willing to be engaged with the council and work on some of these projects. Some of these jobs are too small to have someone dedicated by the council to look after, but by the same token I think there should be a financial reward if we do get a community group there… whether they want to give it to each person individually in a share or whether it goes to a community organisation as a group. I think the council needs to stand up and be accountable for it, but also look at making sure it’s an ongoing concern.”
After hearing ideas from current councillor Chesterman and from the new candidate Jason
Howarth, Davidson said Howarth’s new ideas of getting the community involved would probably be more productive.
“Gordon Chesterman didn’t seem to have much of a solution besides what the council is already doing, which hasn’t achieved a lot in my view. Jason Howarth’s idea of bringing in community groups will probably bring about action sooner than the plans that the council currently have in place. I’d say Howarth will get my vote.”
