Culture of spending

In reply to Cr G. Ablett, the current mayor of the City of Casey and his somewhat questionable reasoning for the Casey Cultural Precinct Project.
I am amazed, nay mortified, at the suggestion by the incumbent mayor that the contraction of an unrequited monolith will not incur any increase in the already unrealistic and far too expensive Casey Council rates.
Are we to assume that funds will be diverted from other Casey budgets to pay for the contraction and rates will be increased to ’make up’ the deficit budgets?
In addition, are the suffering and overcharged ratepayers of the City of Casey to assume that no part of the rates levied will be used to repay the principal and interest of the loan Cr. Ablett mentioned, and what exact external funding will be received?
Perhaps that will too (like the loan) be supplied by a philanthropic organisation that requires no repayment from the Casey Rates levy (sic).
Why do we need yet more council offices? If current council office space is not sufficient then perhaps the Casey Council could reduce the number of staff currently employed in the non-core departments that currently waste ratepayer funds, and so manage with what is currently available and a sizeable amount of money could be saved by disposing of at least one unwarranted council employee who draws a salary package well in excess of $300,000 per annum.
As for regional theatres, civic centres and art galleries; surely it would be better if Casey Council diverted rates supplied funding resources to that of ensuring core services are correctly addressed and not rejoicing in the construction of modern-day gin palaces and councillors’ amenities.
M. Bennett,
Berwick.