Over the past four weeks I have attended two workshops run by Local Government New Zealand (LGNZ). These workshops are designed to assist councillors in getting to grips with the responsibilities of asking the right questions and making the right decisions.
The first workshop focused on asset management and left me with a far clearer idea about how we manage Council's assets, not to mention some insights into how engineers think!
The community's assets are what makes our community tick and how well we manage, maintain and plan for these assets plays a vital role in community development. Many of our assets have a lifespan of 50 years or more, so attention to the growth and development of our region is an important factor when allocating funding as we need to make sure the asset will cope with future demands.
Essentially asset management for most of us is about levels of service. The Council asks the community: "Are you getting the services you need for a reasonable cost?" Sometimes this means we need to look at different ways of doing things, not just building something bigger. And this is where asking the right questions can make all the difference.
The second workshop was on effective decision making. I received a clear reminder that it more about the ability to influence the collective decision-making around the council table than it is about an individual's views and issues. A key test is the willingness to make the right decisions which are not necessarily the most popular ones while taking the community with you. The Local Government Act 2002 provides the legal framework that guides this process.
As elected officials we are not at the council chambers every day and we are not staff with designated roles and responsibilities. Decision making at our level is about governance not management (certainly not micromanagement); there's no point in having a dog and doing all the barking yourself.
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