Perth Voice Interactive

THE bungled geothermal project at Vincent’s Beatty Park looks likely to cost ratepayers nearly $600,000.

A detailed report, commissioned in 2015 by new CEO Len Kosova, says the system, installed in 2012, was meant to warm the pools and complex powerfully and cheaply by tapping into the raw molten power of the earth.

Instead, poor project management by the council led to constant breakdowns, and system inadequacies means it only partway heats the pools and doesn’t warm any air except in the boiler room.

The council’s had to keep the old back-up gas heater going, resulting in bills as high as $265,000, more than three times the budget. Because of a balls up in design the gas boiler can’t just “top off” the tepid geothermal heater: only one or the other can be on at the same time, so the gas-powered boiler ran all winter.

Back when the system was installed proper calculations weren’t done as to how big the heat exchanges and valves should be. Instead, a tradie eyeballed it and significantly underestimated what was required.

According to a council report the “system had started to experience inexplicable breakdowns, which led to significant down-times”. It crashed four or five times a year.

Last year the council lost $100,000 in federal grants for another new system that would’ve let it build an air heating system on top of the geothermal plant because it couldn’t fix the breakdown bugs in time. The council will now spend nearly $200,000 on replacement and backup boilers.

At the time directors still had no clue who was responsible, beyond saying “various contractors” had worked on the project and they’d “failed to identify culpability”.

An independent review commissioned by the council has now found proper “thermal load measurements” (ie, how much heat was needed) were never carried out nor verified by the engineer who built the thing.

“Thermal calculations were based on information provided to the city by a pool blanket supplier,” the report findings state, and those guestimations were based on the pools before their change in a major upgrade.

Other problems stemmed from having seven different engineering disciplines involved in the project, but no lead contractor to coordinate them, leaving city staff trying to do the job, without any technical know-how.

To top it all off, the manufacturers were never brought in to review all the calculations and assumptions before the system was built (a service they’ll happily provide), meaning they can’t now be held responsible for the systems’ shortcomings.

Mayor John Carey is furious about the layer cake of mistakes.

“This, in my mind, is another embarrassing episode for the city which our new CEO is now resolving,” he says.

He says it’s “extraordinary” that calculations were left to a pool blanket supplier and holds the council’s former management team responsible for failing to engage a lead contractor.

“When we’re managing major projects we need to have clear lines of accountability and responsibility.”

He says CEO Len Kosova has “been here coming up to two years, and we are still uncovering and unpicking errors of the past”.

“The Beatty Park issue is just one symptom of a range of challenges we’ve faced, which has been the budget deficit [when a mistake saw the council heading to an $8 million deficit], a complete lack of a management contract with Leederville Gardens, and a lack of a contract regarding Bendigo Bank and the sponsorship of TVs at Beatty Park”.

The latter referred to a botched deal with the former administration, in a “bizarre and inappropriate” handshake deal with the local Bendigo Bank branch.

Bendigo was supposed to pay the council $22,000 to put up TVs in Beatty Park, with the bank’s logo intermittently appearing on them, and in return the council would switch some of its banking business over to Bendigo. Turned out it was massively impractical to move part of the council’s accounts to Bendigo so the bank never paid up, but the tellies had already been bought, leaving the council out of pocket.

Mr Carey says the litany of problems vindicates the transparency agenda he’s been trying to spread to other local governments, saying he’s not afraid to air Vincent’s dirty laundry.

by DAVID BELL

VINCENT city council has turned down the volume on a West Perth party house.

New rules will require a management plan to deal with party goers, proper signs showing contact details for complaints, 7am to 10pm check-in — instead of staggering in at 2.30am with a boombox on the shoulder — and a staffed reception for the apartment complex.

Neighbours of the Harwood Place property, listed as short-term rental accommodation, fronted the council to describe scenes like those in the party-movie Project X: the noise has been so loud some have moved out. Often, no-one even picks up the phone when they try to complain.

The home is owned by Boldform Pty Ltd.

In 2008 Vincent council approved the 12-apartment complex as ordinary residential apartments, but it has been run as serviced apartments, without approval. Boldform applied to have the current use approved retrospectively.

“I do find it bizarre that a new development is built and it suddenly turns into serviced apartments,” Mayor John Carey mused.

“Anyone in the industry would know you need approval to run a serviced apartment.”

The owner wanted leniency but Mr Carey says that’s ‘a bit of a cheat, quite frankly, to turn around and say we haven’t had approval but we don’t like these conditions being imposed on us’.

“We’ve heard from residents that there’s a deep distrust and there’s a difficulty in getting the management company of these serviced apartments to actually respond, so no wonder the community is saying ‘if it’s going to continue, we want to see these conditions’.”

Deputy mayor Ros Harley, who’s long pursued a tough stance on operations without approval, voted against the motion, but the majority let it slide with tough conditions.

by DAVID BELL

STIRLING council will spend $200,000 introducing e-voting to its chamber. Staff have previously manually counted “ayes” and “nays” at council meetings. Once installed the system will allow councillors to press a button so their vote is automatically inserted into the minutes. As all e-voting systems come with microphones, the existing 11-year-old equipment will be redundant. Staff say they’d “exceeded their effective useful operating life and are due for replacement either way”. They’d budgeted $125,000 to upgrade the chamber’s audio visual equipment, so an extra $75,000 has to be found for the 2016/17 budget.

ONE of the Voice’s street art favourites, Mel McVee, led 100 kids and many other volunteers to paint Kings Square on the weekend. It was a project by Artsource and brushes were handed out to anyone who was willing to splash a bit of paint around.  The weekend’s all-in paint project launches about $2million of public art that’ll be rolled out across the Perth city link development area, paid by the per cent for public art scheme which set aside one per cent of the total cost for art.

TWO homes on Lonsdale Street, Yokine, were damaged last Saturday after a woman allegedly tried to escape police. Police allege they tried to stop the woman’s Ford Falcon in Balga, but she drove off, crashing into a Volkswagen, propelling it into the front wall of a house. The woman then allegedly crashed into a neighbouring house, damaging a wall, letterbox, roller door and fence. The woman was arrested at the scene and was conveyed to hospital.

THE president of the Maylands Autumn Centre says she doesn’t know how some members will pay for important health tests if prices rise, as predicted.

From July 1, providers of radiology and pathology services say they will no longer be able to bulk bill services because the Turnbull government is freezing their incentive payments.

The measure saves the government $650 million but providers say they won’t absorb the hit, and will instead pass on the cost to patients.

Sue Hayes says that’s a worry, as many of the centre’s oldest and most vulnerable clients are already clearly struggling to cope.

“You’d think they haven’t eaten for a week, the way they come here and wolf it down,” she told the Voice.

“We have some food at morning tea and they gorge themselves on food because I don’t think they are able to afford to eat at home.

“They eat and eat and eat, and if there’s anything left over they ask ‘can we take that home’ and you just go ‘yes’.

Ms Hayes and her partner are both pensioners and still trying to pay their mortgage. She says they budget strictly but after the steep rise in utility prices there’s not much left for food.

“Why don’t we cut their pay rises a little,” Ms Hayes says of federal politicians who voted for the bulk-billing changes.

She’s also furious with the Barnett government’s decision to raise car registration $99 a year.

“It’s getting harder and harder, and your pension goes up $7 and you think ‘that’s not even going to pay for one cup of coffee’ because that’s a fortnight, not a week.

Ms Hayes says an almost universal complaint from seniors is the federal government spends billions on foreign aid while they are hungry at home.

Health advocates warn the prospect of additional costs could deter people from taking life-saving tests, leading to long-term problems and higher costs as patients are admitted to hospital.

Janet Wood, whose mother needs regularly blood tests is outraged.

“My mother is on a pension and is understandably worried about these new changes,” she says. “Moreover, there has been no advertising about this proposed change to pathology, nothing in the newspapers or on television”.

The pathology sector says it will lead to job cuts if the number of tests falls.

Health minister Sussan Ley argues the bulk bill incentives for pathology have not been effective. She says since the Rudd Labor government introduced the incentive in 2009, the rate has only gone up one per cent, which would have been the same without the incentive.

by OTTOLINE SPEARMAN and STEVE GRANT

THE vast majority of Bayswater residents love the place, but they’d love to see more trees.

They’re the chief findings of an independent community perceptions study that interviewed 689 people to gain a snapshot of life in the Garden City.

A healthy 87 per cent rate Baysy a good or excellent place to live but just 64 per cent rate the council positively.

Just 39 per cent believe elected members have a “good understanding of community needs”, up from 25 per cent four years ago.

“I would like to see more street trees to provide shade and a place for birds,” said one local, amongst the 14 per cent who said more trees would improve life in the city. Two per cent wanted a ”lot less trees”.

Locals are happy with their rubbish and recycling, and facilities like Bayswater Waves, the Rise and libraries are well regarded.

The independent report recommends five priorities for the council: plant more trees, address community division over high-density developments, revitalise the town centre, improve safety and security, and modernise playgrounds and parks.

Cr Chris Cornish has been pushing the pro-tree agenda for yonks, having won support from councillors for his plan to increase canopy coverage from 13 per cent to 20 per cent by 2025.

“It is heartening to receive confirmation that all the work I have been doing in this area has been aligned with what the community wants.”

by DAVID BELL

The next instalment of the organisation’s annual Walk and Talk event deliberately coincides with Law Week and will take a look at the fascinating story of Alfred Hawes Stone.

One of the first solicitors to arrive at the fledgling Swan River Colony, Stone was also an avid photographer.

Born in Tunbridge Wells, England, Stone was appointed Justice of the Peace for the District of Canning two months after his arrival in the colony, and a year later became clerk to the Magistrates’ Court.

Crown solicitor

In 1831, he began practising as the colony’s first crown solicitor.

In his spare time Stone was an expert at wet plate photography, and his work provides an important record of the development of Perth in the 1860s and ‘70s.

His photographs capture his family and friends, as well as several buildings in and around Perth.

The talk, by Dr Pamela Statham-Drew, will be on May 18 at 1pm at the Old Court Law Museum on Barrack Street. Dr Statham-Drew lectured in economic history at UWA, specialising in the development of the Swan River Colony.

by OTTOLINE SPEARMAN

THE Ruah homeless drop-in centre is running desperately low on clothes.

The West Perth centre gets about 500 people a week coming through the doors and is running very low on essential items and with winter around the corner they need all sizes of mens’ and womens’ clothing.

Key on the wanted list are razors, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner and backpacks (and if you have any leftover hotel toiletry packs those are ideal). Pretty much every kind of clothing and shoes are needed.

Items can be dropped off at the Ruah Centre at 33 Shenton Street, Northbridge between 8.30pm to 3pm Monday to Friday, or at the head office at 67 Plaistowe Mews, West Perth.