Negative power

DAVID McKenzie covers several items in his short letter (Road to Safety, News, 1 May).
I agree that council and councillors sometimes need to be held accountable for their actions or perceived inaction and David is not lacking on his comments on that count.
I also believe that criticism can be forthright, but that it should also be fair.
I think that David is off the mark in all three instances of his letter.
Yes, the finally completed pedestrian crossing in Main Street, Narre Warren North, which seemed to be completed shortly after his last blast about this subject, certainly seemed to take an inordinate amount of time.
Perhaps David was not to know councillors Crestani and Kaplon together with other members of the community were also agitating for its completion.
The major delay was due to having to wait for the electricity authority to provide power for the project, to which end a meeting between Casey and the power supplier had already been arranged to push for provision.
When power was available, council were quick to complete their remaining part of the project, in time for the commencement of term two.
Surely this is an improvement to safety and traffic control.
As to supervision during school hours, whatever happened to parents teaching their children about road safety as well as supervising their own children if necessary until they are old enough to use such a crossing safely?
Community representatives had also met with the manager, parks and garden and staff, to expedite the replacement of ailing oaks in the honour avenue.
If the decision was up to me I would long ago have removed the dead trees and replaced them with new English oaks to perpetuate the living memorial. Community expectations are that the decision to remove such trees should not be taken lightly.
This is a two edged sword, resulting in the engagement of consultants to survey and report on the memorial tree avenues throughout the City of Casey.
A time consuming and expensive process, but supposedly impartial enough for councillors to decide on a course of action with less chance of radical and unreasoned opposition to what should be done to bring not just this honour avenue but all of those in the City of Casey up to a reasonable standard in the immediate future.
If rejuvenation does not come about soon you will not be the only one agitating for action.
Finally, it’s easy to take cheap potshots at councillors, in this case Cr Kaplon and Cr Crestani, both of whom had been pursuing the above problems behind the scenes.
Perhaps you could do a better job than our existing councillors but remember ratepayers are looking for solutions to problems, not continual negativity.
Clive Ellis,
Narre Warren North.