CAMBRIDGE NEWS | 1
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 17, 2022
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NOVEMBER 17, 2022
Storm clouds above By Mary Anne Gill
The honeymoon is well and truly over for the newly elected Waipā council with confirmation the “perfect storm” chief executive Garry Dyet predicted during the election campaign has landed with a thud. The warning of a need to tighten belts – branded “fake news” by a mayoral candidate in the election campaign – has been sounded loud and clear at the Waipā District Council meeting this week. Dyet told The News, and alerted candidates in September, a perfect storm of inflation, supply issues, job vacancies and growth pains was looming. In a paper called Top Risks and Risk Appetite tabled at this week’s meeting, Organisational Excellence manager Georgina Knapp said the council was in “a really volatile environment at the moment”. The volatility around the labour market and supply chain issues was expected to change and the council would need to keep a close eye on it. Inadequate staffing capacity and capability to deliver on council’s objectives was rated as an ‘extreme’ risk. Very high risks were listed as financial sustainability, failure to deliver the programme of capital works, community engagement, climate change impacts, key stakeholders’ relationships and failure to give effect to Te Tiriti (Treaty of Waitangi) and build successful iwi/mana whenua partnerships. High risks were listed as failure to manage responses to and the impacts of local government reforms and managing health and safety and wellbeing. Protecting information management assets rounded out the risks with a medium ranking. Newly elected councillor Mike Montgomerie said the risk appetite of the council struck him as high.
“I don’t want to cause trouble on my first day,” he said and went on to say the risks were potentially setting the organisation up to fail. The corporate world would not accept that level of risk, he said and gave the example of the council saying health and safety was high risk when the only “acceptable
appetite” was for low. “You don’t want to artificially massage the risk.” Clare St Pierre said a council business had more constraints on it than corporates did while Lou Brown said times were uncertain. “We’re facing a lot of legislation changes which can impact on our operation.
Continued on page 9
Hello, hello, hello: Budding coppers the Beadle siblings Charlie, 3 and Mischa, 5, with Youth Aid officer Constable Danica Hibdige at the police engagement day in Cambridge. See more on page 5. Photo: Mary Anne Gill
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“We are a public body. We do have a line in the sand.” In her report, Knapp said the council was willing to take well defined risks at a moderate to high level where it would result in the achievement of strategic objectives and provide opportunities.
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