Have you read Council’s Annual Report?

One of the five principles of local government is transparency. On occasion, council has been blamed for the lack of transparency however in my opinion it may not be the lack of information readily available but the inability to find the information which may be the issue. This particular problem was highlighted to me a couple of months ago when a journalist asked me if I thought I earned my $250,000 salary…..now before you do as I did and almost fall off your chair, please know that I don’t earn that amount or anywhere near it (stay reading and I’ll tell you exactly how much I do earn).

The interesting thing to me was in public office, nothing is private, and our income is certainly readily available to everyone. Each year an independent tribunal sets local government elected officials remuneration, the report can be found here: (http://www.dilgp.qld.gov.au/resources/ report/local-government/remuneration-discipline-tribunalreport-2016.pdf). I, as the North Burnett Mayor earn $101,631 per annum. The Deputy Mayor earns $58,633. And your Councillors’ earn $50,815.

As a side note: compared to our fellow colleagues in the WBBROC region we are the lowest paid and in fact we are in the lowest paid band in Queensland. (Bundaberg and Fraser Coast Mayors, $148,536 / Councillors $85,994; South Burnett and Gympie Mayors $125,084 / Councillors $66,450).

This is just one example of information which is available. Everything we do, every decision we make is public information, even the confidential items are public once the commercially sensitive information (names, addresses, amounts etc) are removed.

For a good overview of the previous 12 months I recommend you read our Annual Report which has all the juicy bits in one spot (this will be released in November). To keep abreast of the decisions we are making, our council meeting agendas are on our website and if you ever need to know anything specific, just ask, I’m more than happy to make sure you get your questions answered.