Now the Day of Local Government Elections Are Over..... What Can Be Done For Next One To Alert Our Community

Time and time again, what I heard was, 'I didn't know about the election but saw the signs in front of the Polling Booth,' or ' no one told me about it', or 'a neighbour told myself about it', or 'We just voted, why do we have to vote again?' and it goes on.

So, is the community right in saying this and what can we do to advise relevant Stake Holders being the voters, the simple fact that 'There is a compulsory election'. 

Well, the first point of view is Council's do not run their own elections. That could be a positive factor in many aspect or it could be a negative as well. The thing  the community might get from this is, 'Oh it is run by the NSW Liberal Government or it is run by the NSW Labor Party (if Government of the Day).

I personally think that is not the main issue. The issues we have been facing  are that we  have 3 tiers of government and this year we have had 2 tiers of government elections in one single year. Local Government elections is held every 4 years and same with NSW State Government but our  Federal Government Elections is every 3 years and hasn't caught up with Local and State Governments where elections are every 4 years for an election to be held. 

So, we really need to change our election time periods to holding elections, so that all tiers of our  government elections are the same.  We need the Federal Government to change their government term to 4 years.

Then, we could have each tier of government election in each different year, consecutively one after the other and a rest for the 4th year.  For example  next Local Government Elections 2016,  next  New South Wales State Elections 2017, and the next Federal Election in 2018 leaving the next year 2019.... a rest year!

Furthermore, we need more alertness given to communicating to the community on dates of Mayoral Elections and Blacktown City Council General Election on the Annual Calendars (that are distributed to all communities). A notification sent with council rates of when the election is due that year. We need the NSW  Electoral Commission to place signs on NSW Government buildings, in our local area, confirming when the election is on in 2020. They could even post the results to community members of the current election, telling them who their elected members of Council are in their ward. Maybe adds on Television and radio will assist as well. We need to inform the community.

Also a letter could be sent from each local elected Councillor, advising the community, of their representation of being an elected Councillor in their Ward.

This is just a shortlist of what can be done, yet we know in the weeks running prior to the election, local newspapers are flooded with articles for candidates, elections subjects and issues etc. On the wider TV media, I heard about it 24 hours before Election day. They are interest in Federal and State elections and only interested in results of the Local Council elections (after the event). This image of  presenting elections to the  community needs to be changed for the better.