Letters, Letters, and more Letters

The correspondence TheShire receives is overwhelming but I did not comprehend to what extent until I asked Kevin Clarke: Director Sustainable Organization to provide me with some statistics.

Although this does not negate the need of TheShire to respond to our correspondence it does indicate the magnitude of the problem and, yes, some things might slip through the cracks. It also points out the need for us to take some responsibility and to be diligent in following up on any correspondence that is not answered in the time line specificed by TheShire: twelve working days from receipt.

Let me give you some interesting stats for the month just past Month (October 2009):

• Received 13,049 items of hard copy mail (11,430 via Australia Post, 1,320 via DX and 299 faxes).
• All of these are processed via our AusInfo system and it is those that we are best able to monitor and track for responsiveness.
• We received 86,765 emails into the organisation.
• The vast majority of these are sent direct to an email address (a person) in the Shire, not to the custserv@mornpen.vic .gov.au (which are in turn treated as hard copy and forwarded to AusInfo).
• Obviously not all of these emails need a response but I acknowledge that it is these emails that we need to rely on the 'responsiveness' of staff because we cannot (at this stage) track every one for the 12 day response.
• And obviously some of these are SPAM or similar (actually 1 in 7 is assessed as junk email/ unsolicited etc etc).
• Interestingly, of the 86,765 emails received , 1 in 230 was affected by a virus, all of which were trapped and successfully quarantined by our virus protection software.

Local Governance Act 1989 (LGA1989)

This is a document that anyone who is seriously interested in making change in the local government must have at their disposal. It is the bible of local government.

This document outlines the legal do’s and do not’s of local government and is an important tool. It certainly helps any cause if you can point to a section of LGA1989, especially if you are going to take a matter to the Ombudsman.

The cost is relatively nominal (around $35) and, amazingly, it is an easy read and easy to understand. To obtain a copy you can go to the website www.ocpc.vic.gov.au or call 03.9278.1144 or 1300.366.356

If you need clarification of an issue in LGA1989 you can call the information line at 03.9651.7026. You will reach a triage gatekeeper who will then have an appropriate officer return your call. My call on a recent matter was returned within two hours although I can’t promise this in all cases.