On February 28th 2022, Knox Council votes on the 2021-2025 Domestic Animal Management Plan containing the 24-hr-cat-curfew.
Knox Council plans to hold February’s cat-vote meeting online - preventing public presence and response. This meeting closure is actually due to one unvaccinated councillor - a proponent of the 24-hour-cat-curfew. We are told this councillor's unvaccinated status is also being used to push through the cat curfew. (internal info confirmed from Council). This unvaccinated councillor, claiming care about biodiversity, voted to destroy a wildlife corridor, is killing native birds and animals, and has continually denied any community consultation. *
Thank you Michelle for your observation: The Government once said that the unvaccinated would be shut out of society. But in regards to meetings, Knox Council are shutting out the community to placate one unvaccinated Councillor who could easily attend the meeting via Zoom, so that the vaccinated community could attend.
January Meeting, Press 7. Public Question Time to go to exact place: http://webcast.knox.vic.gov.au/archive/video22-0131.php Director Matt Kelleher: ‘Council is in the final stages of its 2021-2025 DAMP and I note, that as part of the community consultation process, Council has received a large number of submissions regarding concerns and opposition to the 24-hour-cat-curfew….Council plans to present this feedback … at its February Council Meeting. Whether or not a councillor owns a cat, does not exclude them from having the power to make a decision.’ The Mayor kept nodding throughout this reply. ‘Covid 19 temporary measures, of Local Government Act 2020, allows for council meetings to be held by electronic means. Any requirement that council meetings be open to the public is satisfied by live-streaming the meeting, or placing a recording of the meeting on the council website.’
Knox Council did not consult, or advertise, 24-hour-cat-curfew, before voting for it on June 28th 2021, and have also kept their meetings closed to the public. Two landlord councillors hid their personal interest of making a local law that overrides tenants’ rights for cats, removing cat-owners’ equality.
The covid election removed most opposing cat-owner councillors. Some Knox councillors are acting for their personal interests, regardless of diversity, and hawking false ‘experts’, with no statistics, and denying community consultation.
By hiding identities of complainants, a neighbour can make a cat complaint, engaging Knox Council to hound a cat-owner from their home and community with unaffordable fines, by forcing untenable living arrangements, and by removing cat-owners’ equal rights. Knox Council is dictating the deaths of cats, and cat-lovers being able to live in Knox.
Preventing meetings being open to the public throughout this whole process, while making this law that hurts families, de-values cat-owner properties, removes renters’ rights, and removes all benefit from registration payments for cat-owners - making it a fee only for punitive enforcement. While targeting a minority unfairly for victimisation, hate-speech, and community division, by removing equal rights for cat-owners.
Council has claimed to the Victorian Ombudsman that the ‘pilot’ would lead to ’24 hours’ and that consultation was ‘widely advertised’. Unfortunately the Ombudsman, not showing impartiality, believes Council and false figures. We will ask for review. Please can AdvoCats professional statisticians who can help contact morgan-shae@ihug.com.au or andysdixon@hotmail.com
Watch for February’s Agenda (it is stated to be online five days before, but Council put January’s up only one business-day before the meeting.) https://www.knox.vic.gov.au/our-council/councillors-and-meetings/council-meetings/agenda-and-minutes/current-agendas-and-minutes February 28th is the finalisation of the 24-hour-cat-curfew, the final chance councillors have to care about the whole community, or to follow selfish interests and misinformation to hurt us.
Life matters, Cat Lives Matter! Respect for Felines. Caging Cats, and owners, Is Cruel.
Please stand against dishonest actions, and a council intent on using the pandemic to harm the most vulnerable in the Knox community, for more money, while their developments are rapidly killing our wildlife.
The Victorian Ombudsman has not addressed or answered most of our main concerns in the Lists of Defects they requested. I am requesting permission to share this assessment with you for input. The Ombudsman re-quoted Knox’s untruths. Also wording has been altered in a question I made, not in the case, to change its meaning, to discredit. Without government integrity agencies acting impartially, Knox Council believes it is untouchable, beyond any trustworthy watchdog.
Reminders from previous Updates
Councillors Personal Interest: https://www.knox.vic.gov.au/sites/default/files/2021-10/Personal%20Interest%20Return%20-%20Public%20Summary%20-%20Returns%20to%2030%20Sep%202021.pdf
Two Councillors are Landlords. In March 2020 renters finally won the right to keep their pets. Landlords have to pay a fee and go to court, VCAT*, to refuse a pet. They cannot reasonably refuse a Pet Request - unless there is a municipality Local Law. This 24-hour-curfew removes cats from having the same rights as dogs, for tenants in Knox.
Councillors denied any community consultation on 24-hours, outspokenly voting for it in June; and again in August 2021 to prevent a survey, costing less than ‘$10 each’ per registered cat-owner.
Less than 20% of Knox registered cats are deemed ‘nuisance’, and cat complaints are 1/3 of the dog complaints in Knox. The over 80percent of homeless, impounded cats cannot pay, and the poorest owners and renters will bear the highest fines. Why make a law without evidence of efficacy for Council statements?
Some Councillors state bio-diversity is their aim, yet vote to give Developers permits to destroy habitat and neighbourhood character. Native animals and bird habitat are being decimated by overdevelopments. Power-brokers blame the voiceless, make incorrect statements, and pass laws for personal profit. Like wolves at the door, using a pandemic to prey.
Tenants Victoria, Pets: https://tenantsvic.org.au/advice/during-your-tenancy/pets-and-your-tenancy/
Victorian Premier Dan Andrews on why the Residential Tenancies Act was changed to recognise cats as family members:
https://twitter.com/danielandrewsmp/status/927416865751568384
2020: https://m.facebook.com/DanielAndrewsMP/posts/2910057212392129?locale2=de_DE
27 Dec 2021 article on Pets in rentals https://www.realestate.com.au/news/pets-in-rentals-victoria-how-reform-has-fared-almost-two-years-on/
*VCAT is the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal
* I am just being careful not to name the unvaccinated councillor publicly. morgan-shae@ihug.com.au
We need everyone to know what is happening here. Keep in touch on Knox AdvoCats on Facebook. Love your fur family!