FORMER Bayswater councillor Mike Sabatino has dropped his case against the WA electoral commission on the eve of its hearing because he, “shouldn’t have to pay for democracy”.
Mr Sabatino had wanted “transparency and justice” after scrutineers had claimed there was chaos during the counting of votes at the October local government election.
He says votes for his ward may have been miscounted, and while he’s still sticking to his guns, he told the Voice (after the paper’s deadline last week) that he couldn’t go through with the December 11 hearing. “I shouldn’t have to pay for democracy and transparency,” he says. “It was going to cost a lot to go up against the commission and the state.”
SHAKESPEARE STREET residents up Mount Hawthorn way have decorated their verge trees with Christmas baubles and signs saying, “all I want for Christmas is a bike boulevard!”
The WA transport department’s considering whether to install pilot bike boulevards in streets like Shakespeare, and Lake in Bayswater, which set aside a large strip for bikes and sees cars having to cede way to cyclists.
The idea is to slow down residential streets and encourage more folk onto bikes.
•The Shakespeare Street kids already have their bikes, now they want somewhere safe to ride them for Christmas.
With half of all car trips less than 5km, Transport’s hoping more people will get onto a bike instead of hopping into the car for short jaunts.
Thirty houses on Shakespeare Street are behind the boulevard plan and have joined the “Bikes on Shakespeare Action Group” to decorate their trees.
Resident Melissa Ledger says a boulevard “will encourage everyone including mums, dads, children and the elderly to make short trips on bikes or on foot rather than in cars” and they’re not just for long-distance cyclists on high-end road bikes. Transport is still consulting, and Vincent city council has no objection as long as residents are happy and it’s not asked to pay for anything. If any other locals are keen on joining, get in touch with Ms Ledger at bikesonshakespeare@iinet.net.au. Transport has online surveys about it at http://www.transport.wa.gov.au
HAMPERS costing Bayswater ratepayers $200 a pop will no longer bring Christmas morning joy to the partners and spouses of council leaders.
The city’s councillors this week voted to stop $3200 being spent each year on festive gifts for their partners, and the partners of the city’s five most senior staff. It ends a tradition of more than 17 years to show “appreciation of those spouses and partners during the year”.
WA local government minister Tony Simpson didn’t mince words in demanding that the practice end.
His letter to the council advising the largesse must stop arrived just hours before the council was due to debate the issue.
“We’ve been told that the practice does not comply and we shouldn’t continue with the Christmas hampers,” Mayor Barry McKenna told his council. “That’s the minister’s recommendation.”
He noted the council had sought advice from the WA local government department in 2011 and was told “Christmas hampers were allowed to be given”.
“But the department has now, today (Tuesday, December 15), changed its mind,” he says. “A lot has happened in the last 24 hours.”
The minister stepped in after news of the hampers made headlines on the day of the meeting. Because of the conflict of interest, councillors had to write to the minister for permission to vote on the motion to dump the allowance, moved by Cr Catherine Ehrhardt.
Buried in the council’s budget papers under “functions and events”, the hamper allowance was dumped unanimously.
Among the spouses now missing out on ratepayer-funded wine and chocolate is Mt Lawley Liberal MP and WA speaker Michael Sutherland, who is married to Cr Michelle Sutherland.
IT’S no illusion: the next time Perth magician Sylvia Marinai takes the stage at Fringe World it’ll be the first festival she performs as a woman.
Assigned as male at birth and living most of her life that way, Ms Marinai started transitioning a little over a year ago. Before then she performed as “Jean-Luc, the Cool Conjurer” for 10 years.
The former army serviceman, professional water-skier and actor has long felt female, but kept it hidden.
“I always did borrow my mum’s or girlfriends’ things since I was five-years-old, always trying to slip the shoes or clothes on, and I understood it wasn’t ‘correct’, it wasn’t accepted by society, so I had to live as I was,” she says.
As a child in France she recalls a strip of Paris where transgender prostitutes would ply their trade and it contributed to her keeping her thoughts to herself: “for me I was having that association — transexual means prostitute”.
• Sylvia Marinai as Zatanna, with assistant Egypt.
She was sent for military service in Tahiti where transgender people are more accepted.
“Being transgender is quite normal,” she says, and in some Polynesian cultures, “the third-born child … is raised as a woman even if born as a man”.
But back in France she began to feel “alone” again, and the competitive water-skiing gig made a transition unlikely since it required a fairly beefy upper body.
Her first time in plain view as a woman was in a transgender beauty pageant back in 2004.
“It was very scary because all the other women were Asian, they had very fine faces, small, petite, and they all looked so feminine and they were much younger than I was! I felt a bit weird but they made me feel welcome and they were kind to me, and I was the first caucasian to participate in that pageant.”
It wasn’t a magic show but she’s been experimenting with her female stage persona “Zatanna” for a little while now, with test shows in Japan and China, and started transitioning in her personal life over the past 18 months.
“As soon as I had the costume on, I thought, I’m pretty sure it can work, people in Perth are quite open… I don’t know if I was performing as trans in France it would be the same thing.”
Before coming out Ms Marinai says, “I felt very nervous, I couldn’t sleep”, but when she did tell people it was a huge relief.
“I feel much better, since I took that decision to come out to my friends and family. Ninety-nine per cent of them were really open and nice, and I couldn’t say it was easy for everyone but they were more than welcoming of me as Sylvia.”
Ms Marinai says other Perth magicians “were very welcoming”.
“They said you’re part of the family and you stay part of the family. I went to the funeral of two magicians last week… and they ask me to come as myself, Sylvia, as female… that proves a few things.”
Plus, she says magicians have bigger secrets to worry about: how tricks are done. “They’re friends, but they’re competition as well. We’re still hiding things from each other. Some secrets we like to keep.”
There are a few practical considerations for a working magician who’s transitioning: Zatanna has dropped some of the more “masculine” tricks from her repertoire, and for clients who’d already booked her in advance as Jean-Luc she offers to perform as her old persona if they prefer. She’s also kept her female assistants, a classic standby in magic shows for a good reason: when it comes to fitting into a magic box “you need to be small, and very flexible”. “I try to fit inside myself, I’m not flexible enough. I need to take some yoga and pilates lessons”.
Zatanna has two shows at Fringe in February, her all-girl big illusion show and her Theatre of the Mind show with mentalism. Dates and tickets at http://www.fringeworld.com.au
BAYSWATER councillors have dubbed a move to record and publicly list all their contact with developers as a “burden” on themselves and builders.
The plan — similar the policy Vincent council adopted in June — was dumped six votes to four. If supported, it would have required all councillors to list all interactions with developers “to introduce a level of accountability and transparency”.
Details for public display would include the developer’s name, date and time of contact, a list of other related parties and the nature of the issue discussed.
Councillors Chris Cornish and Michelle Sutherland spoke against it, labelling it red tape.
“I don’t like the vagueness of ‘developer’,” Cr Cornish said.
“Developers could be mums and dads who want to build something in their backyard, and wouldn’t want the burden of more stuff.”
Mayor Barry McKenna says in his 25 years on council, he’d never felt a need for such a register.
“I don’t want councillors bogged down in red tape. If it’s not broke, why are we trying to fix it?”
Cr Dan Bull, who led the charge for the register, says it would stop undue influence, and perceptions of influence, on decisions, and says being transparent is never a bad thing.
Punish pure greed
I SEE all the “news” about clothing and other allowances… some recompense is fair enough, some is pure greed, and the response should be as harsh.
When a mayor or elected official is performing a function on behalf of the community they should in my opinion be offered reimbursement or an allowance on behalf of the community.
Malcolm McCusker as Governor showed the way here, donating his entire pay to charity, others could be mindful of such behaviour! They do not have to claim!
Those that transgress should be exposed, the current guidance is poor and the method of operation not good enough. Why? no one cares especially those who have their nose in the trough.
The minister for local government is the man who sets the standard and is responsible for prosecution of it. He is the man. Brett Moir Park Rd, Mount Lawley
On rainy days?
AS a pedestrian and public transport user I am not opposed to the Scarborough Beach Road bike lane.
For one thing, it encourages bike riders to ride on the road and not on the footpath. However, what does concern me is if more roads are converted to a single lane and a cycle lane then what is going to happen on days when people don’t cycle, such as on rainy days?
Are cyclists committed to using public transport on these days, or will they jump in a car and clog up the road with traffic, which will then slow down public transport? Carolyn Mitchell Shakespeare St, Mt Hawthorn
A bleak but liveable Plan B
NOW that the UN Security Council has voted unanimously to wipe out IS, ISIS, ISIL, Daesh, or whatever it is calling itself today, we have to ask ourselves, “what’s the next step?”
We can’t just raise the biggest army the world has ever seen and march over and smack ‘em in the eye. We will not be fighting an army. We will not be fighting another nation. We will not be fighting an ethnic group, a religion, a culture, or even a language. We will be fighting an idea, and ideas have a habit of surviving the most appalling oppression (think of democracy, or freedom of religion, for a start).
If we are to think of ourselves as civilised nations, we cannot just march over there and behead the lot of them. These people are, after all, creatures of whichever force is with them, and have a right to live as they see fit (provided it doesn’t interfere with us). In civilised nations, solutions as final as industrialised annihilation are seen as politically incorrect. We have to have a Plan B.
We can no longer just redraw the map, with absolute disregard for ethnicity or faith, as we used to do from Whitehall, and we are running out of places to send the vanquished. St Helena is too small; Australia has done its bit as the wastepaper bin of Empire; the Amazon rainforest is spoken for; Antarctica is too cold; Atlantis sank a long time ago; and Mars is too expensive. Perhaps Mr Putin will re-open the gulags…
Wait … a … minute! That’s it! Think of a place mostly occupied by people no-one cares about; people with little in common with John and Jenny from Joondalup.
A place that’s bleak, but liveable; a place stuck in the middle of nowhere in particular; a place of no use to anyone else. Isn’t it obvious? Canberra!
Instead of soaking up the world’s nuclear waste we take Daesh and fence them into the ACT! As the meerkat said, “simple!” Rick Duley Walcott St, North Perth The Ed says: This letter has been edited for good taste.
Get rid of the grid?
HOME energy options may save the grid from privatisation
If the state follows the federal suggestion to sell the power grid to the private sector will they be able to charge you for not being connected as the energy corps does now?
The annual supply charge from Synergy is $156.54: should this increase to a point that home energy storage is a viable option people will opt out of the grid system leaving those who can’t afford to, or don’t care to pay for, the grid and a system powered by coal and gas.
The seven cents feed-in credit paid to solar homes makes natural gas at 14 cents per unit and $98.55 supply charge per annum unviable to most solar homes.
Will grid-supplied electricity follow? Michael Whitworth Caribbean Drive, Safety Bay
Pollies deserve special treatment
POLITICIANS continuously break laws hoping not to get caught. When they do, they expect to be forgiven by just saying “sorry”, because they think they are above the law.
The most recent ”sorry” is from Bill Shorten for using his mobile phone while driving, as if he was not aware of the traffic laws.
Can an ordinary citizen get away by saying “sorry”?. Politicians are expected to set examples. They should be penalised double, or perhaps triple. Alex Mulla Smith St, Highgate The Ed says: Shorten handed himself into police and was fined $455 and lost four demerit points — the same penalty anyone else would have faced.
THE cosy rooms of new Maylands eatery Nash and Co are reminiscent of nana’s house, plastic flowers, books, teddies and deep old sofas–but the effect is rustic, hip, and relaxing.
Post-lunch, my companion felt so at home he stretched out on the old leather settee for a snooze.
And why not, given the blissfully peaceful quiet of a room to ourselves.
Having eaten the best part of an entire cronut I was tempted to do the same, but some of us must work.
The ambience of Nash and Co has seeped into the staff (or is it the other way around?) and everyone was warm and welcoming, and mighty efficient too.
The water delivered to our table had a fresh but unidentified taste, which I later discovered was from the orange, lemon, mint and cucumber in the dispenser.
Refreshed, we still went for a couple of zinger juices, orange and pineapple ($7.50) which sharpened the taste buds — but it’s a shame they were served in plastic, and not the bio-degradable sort. You can do better, guys!
My companion visits a mate in Bali several times a year so knows a thing or two about the cuisine, and ordered the nasi lemak ($16).
It’s also a traditional dish in Malaysia, where owner/chef Nash Wahab hails from, and the rice, chicken curry and sambal with anchovies hit the right note.
“They’ve not souped it up with salt,” he opined, adding it was mild and delicious.
My veggie stack ($14) was at first disconcerting as I’d expected it to be hot.
But the flavours of the rich, oily, roasted vegetables coupled with fresh raw spinach, tomatoes, and thinly sliced haloumi won me over.
The helpful staff popped in to see if we wanted coffee and dessert, which consists mostly of cronuts ($8.50), the love child of a donut and a croissant.
The choice was bewildering, so we decided on almond and salted caramel, swapping plates halfway through (because at heart, we’re sharers).
They arrived in picturesque splendour, with huge dobs of creme fraiche and slices of fruit.
Surprisingly, they weren’t as sugary as expected, but the richness stopped us in our tracks and we both left a morsel of the delicious pastries on our plate.
Thanks goodness for great coffee to unblock the arteries.
by JENNY D’ANGER
Nash and Co 200 Whatley Crescent, Maylands 0497 286 321 open 7 day 7am–5pm
HOMELESSNESS, Aboriginality and the blinding speed of technology are explored in James Taylor’s play Hobo.
“Change has been steady throughout history, but over the last 20–30 years technology has absolutely exploded,” the 26-year-old says.
“It’s made so many things possible, but I don’t think our brains can keep up with it.”
And if young brains such as Taylor’s struggle, he spares a thought for those who grew up before the advent of the internet age and mobile phones.
Toss in asylum seekers, ISIS and the state of the economy and the plot thickens, Taylor says: “A lot of people are dealing with difficult stuff.”
• Maitland Schnaars is Tank, in James Taylor’s Hobo at the Blue Room. Photo by Rob Fischer
But he’s not offering solutions through his play: “People might feel they find an answer…[But] I’m only 26. I don’t have answers myself.”
Hobo is a provocative look at what it’s like to be a man in an age of identity crisis.
Fred has lost everything, wife, kids, money — and the respect he once had as a long-running radio personality.
“They brought in a fresh-faced female producer to breathe life back into his show…but he resisted…pushed things too far and ended up on a sexual harassment charge,” Taylor says.
When the audience meets Fred (played by James Hagen) he’s living in an alley with homeless Aboriginal man Tank (played by Maitland Schnaars).
With nothing much to do and plenty to say, they share a camaraderie, strengthened by a love of music and witty banter.
Content in his self-imposed exile, Fred gets an unexpected visit from his estranged son Terry (Chris Bell), which shakes the foundations of his new reality. Bell’s actor’s bio says he’s been “frighteningly close to the edge countless times, and completely sober for two years”, and has lived on the streets.
He and Taylor both served in the navy: “[He’s] one of the biggest role models I have ever had in my life,” Taylor says.
Hobo is the WA Academy of Performing Arts Aboriginal Theatre graduate’s debut as a director and playwright.
It is made possible thanks to Playwriting Australia and Yirra Yaakin Theatre’s next step program, helping to further indigenous artists.
It’s part of the Blue Room’s Summer Nights program during the Perth Fringe Festival and is on January 22–25. Tix $25 at fringeworld.com.au
A LONG avenue of frangipanis forms a sweet-smelling bower as you wander down the herb-lined path to this Clarence Street, Mt Lawley abode.
The entry is guarded by a secure gate-house, a sculptural edifice with a cute peaked and corrugated-tin roof–topped by a soaring bird in flight.
The four-bedroom home was designed by renowned architect Peter Christou.
Look him up online and you’ll find a number of fine public buildings, and I recall viewing the stunning home he built for himself on Joel Terrace some years ago, well ahead of the pack in terms of design.
This four-bedroom home was built with retirees in mind, wanting a lock-and-leave with living spaces on the lower floor and the bedrooms and study on the second.
There are two alfresco areas, a private covered space at the front and a timber-decked courtyard at the rear, sheltered by attractive high limestone walls.
Set at the back of a subdivided block you step straight into the open-plan living area, where almost floor-to-ceiling glass either end ensures plenty of natural light, while framing the handsome rear alfresco area and its sculptural greenery.
Indoors, honey-gold timber floors are contrasted by crisp white, while a fire-engine red wall adds a wow factor.
A huge L-shaped window in the compact kitchen overlooks the front alfresco area, just the thing for checking the arrival of guests while keeping an eye on dinner.
There’s no shortage of bench space and storage, including a double pantry.
The bedrooms are on the second level, including the main with its generous ensuite, and a flower box at the window to colour your world.
The hustle and bustle of the Beaufort Street cafe strip is a short walk away, and the green ambience of Forrest Park is even closer in the opposite direction.
by JENNY D’ANGER
9A Clarence Street, Mt Lawley $949,000 Toby Baldwin 0418 914 926 HERE Property 9443 8011 viewing by appointment
Perth Voice Interactive 