Paul Rankin is running for mayor in the upcoming Shellharbour City Council election. Photo: Supplied.
Former Shellharbour City Council deputy mayor Paul Rankin has put his hand up as an independent mayoral candidate in Ward D for September’s council elections.
Paul was on the council that formed following the 2008 sacking of the council, serving one and half terms, with four of the six years as deputy mayor.
With a background in sales and operations management, the Flinders resident now wants to bring back some of the policies that were important during his previous tenure.
He said among the key issues were addressing the increase of executive management roles from three to five, enhancing youth services in the area and ensuring the operations of Shellharbour City Stadium weren’t leased to a third party.
“If that gets tended out, then we’ll lose staff there and it’ll be more expensive for people to use the stadium,” he said.
“We need to stop the sale or leasing of council assets like the basketball stadium.
“I think it’s important it remains in community hands and viable for the community to use it.”
He said he had also been advised council took away a rebate or discount for sports clubs affected by wet weather, which he wanted to address.
“I want to get that rebate back to the sports clubs, because the canteen is where they get most of their money from,” he said.
“If they lose, say, four weekends due to wet weather, that’s a lot of money the canteen loses.
“By doing that [rebate], it keeps the cost down for kids.”
He said he was particularly passionate about creating opportunities for young people in the area, not just in sport.
“I want to get the youth services back again, because that’s important,” he said.
When he was last on council, he said it ran an event called Amp It Up.
“We took school-aged kids that were in their own bands, we put a concert on at Albion Park’s Centenary Hall for them, so they could get up on stage and actually perform a proper gig with the lighting and the sound,” he said.
“I want to get back to encouraging that.”
He said he also recalled a free fun day at Reddall Reserve with waterslides, library on the lawn and a barbecue, and was instrumental in helping get a mountain bike park in Tongarra passed through council.
“It’s just a matter of working hard for the community,” he said.
“There’s no slogans or anything like that. All I can do is promise I will work my best for the community, and if that means pulling the CEO into line, then so be it.
“I think council at the moment management-wise is very top heavy. That’s a lot of money going into senior management that doesn’t go back into the community.
“I just think we need to be more responsible with our money, particularly on cost overruns.”
Being on dialysis administered from home, he also wanted to address the issue of additional red bin pickups for people with particular medical conditions.
“I do what’s called peritoneal dialysis, so essentially, you hook up to a machine and it pumps fluid into your body cavity, and that takes out all the toxins and excess fluid,” he said.
“But there’s a lot of waste that goes on because there’s a lot of plastic tubes and bags that have to be thrown out.
“If you’re a person in my position, or with any other similar disease, Shellharbour charges you $700 extra per year for an extra [red bin] pickup if you do it weekly.
“That’s another thing on my agenda is to look at that, and go right, if we’ve got people that have issues where they use the bin and have to get it done weekly, and they can’t afford to pay that extra $700, then I want to address that.”
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