An extended appreciation goes to Marilyn Bowden who has been driving the school buses for 30 or more years and has become a vital part of the community.

From making sure each child that boards her bus and gets to and from school safely to learning each passenger’s name with every new year, and furthermore, remembering them as they grow and mature within our community.

Thirty-three years and still going strong.

Marilyn’s hard work and dedication has not gone unnoticed.

Thank you, and well done.

Mr Taylor was a councillor and mayor for 12 years at the City of Nedlands and holds a business master degree.

In his article, Mr Taylor used the analogy of local government, as “a company with a board (elected councillors), chair (president), and executive (CEO and other), responsible to shareholders (the community – ratepayers)”.

He writes “in corporations, the boards usually comprise highly regarded, qualified and experienced individuals.

“This provides assurance to shareholders, that the board will provide guidance to the executive on the running of the company.”

However, he notes, “the board must have more extensive and fundamental experience than those they are overseeing”, otherwise the executive has the ability to misguide and misdirect the board and potentially not act in the best interest of the shareholders but their own.

Mr Taylor asserts, “one of the central weaknesses in local governments, is that the individuals who become presidents and councillors, sometimes do not have the business skill sets or business experience to oversee the financial and other capacity of the councils to which they are elected”.

It is unfortunate the many councillors (particularly newly elected) are being mentored, advised and manipulated by the executives they should be overseeing.

Mr Taylor also notes “it appears these highly rewarded executives relish unlimited income by increasing rates and levies instead of driving efficiencies, pushing down costs, perks and salaries”.

In his observations, many local government executives are “myopically focused on increasing their budgets and staff as this invariably affects their remuneration”.

He states, “Councils are powerless to stop it and ratepayers do not know what is transpiring as there is no disclosure”.

We are very fortunate in our council to have people of varying skills and backgrounds who want to make a difference and are prepared to take the difficult, tedious and consuming time to service the community.

The Toodyay community has been made aware of a lack of increasing services despite huge rate increases over the past few years.

The Toodyay Council is very aware of this phenomenon and has the power to act in the interests of the ratepayers.

The council also has some very skilled, business-minded councillors who have shown researched alternatives that would definitely work but it appears they are blocked in their endeavours.

Toodyay needs a system where management is rewarded for delivering cost-efficient quality services rather than delivering huge increased costs.

It would be helpful if the community felt councillors were working together, rather than having the perception that council is manipulated by the executive.

Our three-year-old daughter was exploring as kids do and easily opened the cover to the stormwater drain and was peering inside.

Thankfully I was close to her.

Many of the blocks have two drains which are not secure and no internal grate is fitted.

The deep drains are easily accessible and large enough for a small child to fall into.

I wrote to and visited the shire and have been assured this issue is being followed up urgently with the developer to repair.

In the meantime, I want to make sure all residents are aware of the situation so those with small children can cover the grates temporarily.

I’m hopeful this issue will be resolved quickly.

As at August 26, it seems that the drains to the front of the blocks have been secured by the shire.

Many thanks to the shire employees who have organised this.
The rear drains are still unsecured for now.

While all our interactions have been positive, I’d particularly like to thank Heather for the amazing and super caring home service she gave recently when we had to have our 19-year-old cat euthanised.

Thank you.

It is great to have this kind of quality and caring service here in Toods.

The driest year I remember was 1969 when we had a semi-drought.

The early crops survived but we had very little grass.

The winter started early, then the rain stopped for a long time.

The ground got too cold with white frosts and the grass could not grow until September.

Some farmers were going out in the Julimar State Forest and cutting the tops out of the blackboy trees to feed their stock.

The rushes were quite bitter but the centre of the top is very sweet – you can eat it yourself if you are lost in the bush.

I had 30 cows and over 1000 sheep and fed my stock on Bamboo shoots and canes and was lucky to have lots of Jam and Wattle trees on my farm.

The sheep love the seeds and leaves from the Jam and Wattle trees and the cows kept in full milk, with lots of cream in it, from the bamboo which they loved eating.

The day might come when we might have a drought again so farmers should plant some Bamboos, Wattle, Jam and some Tagasaste trees.

Clover is also good as it seeds on top of the ground and just under the surface of the soil and sheep will dig it up.