CHANGING the frequency of City of Coffs Harbour Council meetings will be put out to public consultation.

The City’s practice has been to schedule Council meetings on the second and fourth Thursday of each month between February to December (adjusted to avoid conflict with public holidays).

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Last year, Council gave the community, via Have Your Say, an opportunity to comment on its detailed Draft Code of Meeting Practice.

One of the principles is that Council decides when meetings occur, but no schedule was documented.

When councillors received their briefing on 21 February for the following week’s meeting, some were surprised to find that the recommendation was to move to monthly meetings.

Mayor Nikki Williams told News Of The Area that she supported monthly meetings because they would give Council a good opportunity to deliver more to the community rather than be tied up with administration.

At the meeting, Councillors Tony Judge and Julie Sechi successfully moved a motion to keep meetings fortnightly until mid-year to enable community consultation on the proposed change.

The only dissenting vote was from Cr Paul Amos.

“In usual circumstances of a council this size, undoubtedly bi-monthly is the best option,” Cr Amos told NOTA.

“However, this term of council sees increased external advice to councillors and, as such, the need for frequent meetings diminishes.

“Meetings at the moment are in a very tense environment and as such staff are impacted.

“Currently, there is a level of indifference from the general population and maybe reduced meetings may amplify the interest as to what goes on at council, which would be a good thing.

“Public opportunity to speak would remain unaltered.

“The staff have recommended the move to monthly meetings and I think all have forgotten that it only takes one councillor to raise a notice of motion to return to fortnightly meetings for it to be repealed.”

Cr Judge said he was not opposed to longer times between meetings, but argued “we should not be imposing it without consultation”.

“Councils should be looking for more opportunities to engage with the community, not less,” he said.

By Andrew VIVIAN