Even more local body elections advice

13 comments on “Even more local body elections advice ”

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1. James 1

   26 September 2016 at 6:12 pm

   I loved the GIF in the post – that actually made me laugh out loud. Very good.
2. Bill 2

   26 September 2016 at 6:21 pm

   Curious on other’s take with regards Chris Trotter’s piece on Gen Zero and Mike Lee and, further, the criteria being used by both the Spin Off and Gen Zero to determine which candidates are okay and which aren’t.

   http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.co.nz/2016/09/from-good-guys-to-fall-guys-spinoff-and.html
   • Pasupial 2.1

     26 September 2016 at 6:45 pm

     Trotter’s critique seems to be fair enough regarding the Spinoff. There’s not much evidence of fault on Generation Zero’s front though (apart from letting the Spinoff rag use their research for their own purposes).

     Generation Zero give Rob Thomas an A minus, and both Mike Lee and Bill Ralston a B minus (with Lee fractionally ahead, maybe just alphabetically) in the Waitemata & Gulf ward. The Spinoff translate that into an endorsement for Ralston, which makes me regret that I didn’t have any respect for them to lose.

     The category weighting is; 50% Transport, 20% Housing, 15% Environment (/climate change), & 15% Competence. Lee was mainly marked down on the Housing and Competence categories.

     http://aucklandelections.nz/
   • Stephanie Rodgers 2.2

     26 September 2016 at 7:26 pm

     I think the Spinoff explained their reasoning regarding Lee pretty clearly:

     This endorsement is more anti-Mike Lee than pro-Bill Ralston.

     …

     Lee has been a great ally for public transport over the years, and a supporter of the City Rail Link. But his performance at the Unitary Plan hearings could euphemistically be described as utterly appalling. He voted against upzoning the central city; deleting unneeded heritage protections; the removal of density controls. He voted “no” nearly double the number of times of any other councillor, and in the most crucial areas of the Plan.

     Trotter’s argument seems to be “Mike Lee has done great things in the past so how dare you not love everything he does.” That’s not particularly compelling to me.

     Martyn Bradbury is currently on the warpath against the Spinoff (“cash for copy”, “blue-green millennial” etc) so I take anything published on The Daily Blog about it with a gigantic grain of salt.
     • Bill 2.2.1

       26 September 2016 at 7:51 pm

       Wasn’t really thinking in terms of Ralston.

       In between me submitting the comment above and your response, I had a look at Dunedin mayor endorsements to see what was what. Way it read to me was that very subjective criteria was being used and although they (Gen Zero) outlined or sketched out some of the reasoning behind marking someone up or down, there was no access to what candidates actually said.

       eg – not mentioning infrastructure and climate change in relation to S. Dunedin would see a candidate marked down. But since S.Dunedin is history and no amount of infrastructure improvement will save it, then (arguably) Gen Zero are endorsing people with unrealistic proposals even though they state they only want realistic proposals.

       Giving pointers is good. But there’s a ‘gatekeeper’ feel to some of it.
       • adam 2.2.1.1

         27 September 2016 at 12:43 am

         I’ve gone right off Gen Zero, the Trotter piece was the final nail for me. Just utter waffle the last few times I’ve read them. Tired centrist crap. Too much in love with the unitary plan, which is a deeply flawed. No matter how much they try to spin it.
         • Bill 2.2.1.1.1

           27 September 2016 at 9:57 am

           When I read their CC stuff a while back…yeah, they’re peddling a line that things can essentially carry on as normal in the face of CC. So they went into that CC box marked ‘depressing waste of time’ alongside Greenpeace and others.

           But this leverage they’re seeking to take advantage of now and how they’re doing it, alongside the fact that they’re locked into a ‘pretend and extend’ mind set with, it appears, a large resource base and a degree of pre-existing influence riding off the back of many people mistakenly viewing them as ‘neutral’ and merely ‘concerned’, I dunno…I’m thinking they might be a little bit dangerous.

           They could divert a lot of energies all of the way up the garden path.
     • Pat 2.2.2

       26 September 2016 at 7:57 pm

       “This endorsement is more anti-Mike Lee than pro-Bill Ralston.”

       a curious statement given the only thing placing Ralston anywhere near Lees score is a bizarre 12/15 competence rating…..go figure
3. Pasupial 3

   26 September 2016 at 6:32 pm

   Stephanie
   Thanks for taking the time to collate this.

   The Generation Zero site now has ratings for all mayoral candidates in Dunedin. And have apparently; “built a political compass to help guide your decisions of all 43(!) council candidate nominations” (which I take to mean that it’s up to the reader to do it themself).

   It is not without flaws, eg; under competence Hawkins has the obscure phrase; “Personable one-on-one social skills is the sole publically expressed downfall of Aaron”, which doesn’t seem to have any specific meaning (they still gave him an A for that category though). Worse, they seemed to willing to believe anything the Whiley Coyote said. And didn’t point out which two candidates are standing for Mayor only (Timmings & Bayne) who thus will be down the bottom of my rankings given their lack of commitment to the place if they can’t be bossman.

   Also, Generation Zero has Palmerston North city council ratings too, but I don’t know anything about them. About a week ago NRT had a piece on their opinion of that election which may be valuable for anyone thereabouts:

   http://norightturn.blogspot.co.nz/2016/09/who-to-vote-for-in-palmerston-north.html
   • Stephanie Rodgers 3.1

     26 September 2016 at 7:27 pm

     Cheers Pasupial, I’ll update the list accordingly.
   • Pasupial 3.2

     27 September 2016 at 9:50 am

     There was a story in today’s ODT about the Gen Zero ranking of mayoral candidates. Not too surprisingly; the current mayor who got an A-plus (equal with the GP candidate) was happy, while; a candidate who was tied for last (on D) was upset. For context; Stedman is an excop realtor who was the sole candidate who didn’t even bother turning up to last night’s Unions Otago Mayoral Candidates Forum:

     The rankings were based on five areas that included climate leadership, transportation and “political competence”… Candidates scored well if they agreed with Generation Zero’s values.

     Spokesman Finn Campbell said it was put together because there were few good ways to get information about candidates, and the number of young people voting was “really low”…

     Mr Campbell said other regions had sent questions to candidates, but in Dunedin there were only three people who could commit to the project, and they had “gone non-stop for a week to gather information”.

     The group had put together scorecards from information from mayoral forums, social media profiles and print media stories, including candidate profiles.

     https://www.odt.co.nz/news/dunedin/dcc/environmental-ratings-controversial
4. Keith 4

   26 September 2016 at 8:34 pm

   I’ve voted but…

   Since National created Auckland Council and gave us without choice, Council Controlled Organisations, that really is the Auckland Council that essentially do what they like with our money without democratic oversight and are not answerable to elected representatives……what is the point?

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