“No questions asked”: Acting Mayor – ‘Tent city’ inquiry critical

ACTING Mayor Andrew Sullivan’s defence of his role in the ‘tent city’ fiasco confirms the urgent need for an independent inquiry into why the City of Fremantle allowed the 24-hour homeless camp to stay open without approval for nearly a month.
StreetWise has revealed Freo Street Kitchen organisers stored tents and other provisions for the homeless and conducted “de-escalation” training in the same office Mr Sullivan has shared since early December 2020 with activist Jesse Noakes at 11 Pakenham Street (www.streetwisemedia.com.au/acting-mayors-office-staging-post-for-tent-city).
Though City staff and elected members knew the organisers were operating out of Cr Sullivan’s office, they appear to have done little except to give FSK access to water, power and portaloos despite public calls to close the unauthorised camp, which the State Government did on January 23.
Fremantle Liberal candidate Miquela Riley says the City’s role in tent city should be independently investigated, the call echoed on social media groups demanding to know how tent city was allowed to escalate into a war of words between the City and State Government (www.streetwisemedia.com.au/calls-grow-for-tent-city-inquiry).
Standing in for Greens WA candidate Brad Pettit who went on leave January 29, Mr Sullivan claims he was trying to be the “eyes on the street” in the lead-up to the Boxing Day lunch as staff were on leave.
“I rented a hot desk to Jesse Noakes early in December,” he says, adding he rarely saw Mr Noakes who used his office about five hours a week. “He is always on the move and wanted a place in Freo to work from when here. I didn’t question him about what work he was doing but knew he was mostly involved in support activities for the homeless.
“I also now know he was involved in the Freo Street Kitchen but was not the primary organiser.  Frankly, I was just happy to help him out with a hot desk, no questions asked.”
Mr Sullivan’s response to the StreetWise report does not explain how he “sub-lets” to Mr Noakes when he has no lease. He also fails to produce the notes he says he sent staff and elected members explaining, “what I knew”.
“I only rented him a single desk, and he did ask if he could have the occasional meeting to which I said yes to. I wasn’t in the office when any of the meetings occurred. The next time I saw him was after the street kitchen had been set up. The fact that I saw some tents … in a large pile of goodies that the volunteers had stashed out the back of the building was just a passing curiosity for me.”
Cr Sullivan added he saw Mr Noakes a couple of times on December 22 and 23, the latter date the same day FSK held its “de-escalation” training session at Cr Sullivan’s Packenham Street address.
Cr Vujcic has responded today to Cr Sullivan’s post, describing the tent city saga as a catastrophic failure of compliance and leadership. You can read her full statement on her Facebook page.
(In other news, Dr Pettitt is doing fine, the unshaven mayor-on-leave telling viewers on his BradforSouthMetro page on Saturday: “It’s been a pretty unusual week or two. And I wanted to just really check in with everyone there to see how everyone is doing … I’ll catch you soon.” Dr Pettitt makes no mention of tent city nor the much-vaunted Greens WA housing policy in his five minute, 22 second video).
Cr Vujcic says Dr Pettitt had sent her motion calling for an investigation to the next finance committee meeting on February 10: “This is a committee where I do not have a vote nor can speak to the motion without the permission of the chair.” Beaconsfield Cr Hannah Fitzhardinge is the chair.

Comment

Cr Sullivan’s narrative posted by Freo’s ‘One-eyed’ View is unconvincing and designed to distract from serious issues of risk management, approvals, liability and community health and safety. It confirms not only what appears to be a lack of action on his part, but the complicity of all elected members except Cr Vujcic for having allowed organisers to overstay their Boxing Day welcome. Cr Sullivan has not published his response on either his personal or council Facebook pages.
In his defensive post, Cr Sullivan takes a pot shot at South Ward Councillor Marija Vujcic, the only elected member to call on the CEO to investigate tent city on January 1. He accuses Cr Vujcic of sending him a provocative email, “that seemingly challenged my integrity”, but does not produce the actual email in which Cr Vujcic questioned Cr Sullivan’s version of events: “This does not make sense. No one knows. But you did Andrew! How does this work without city approvals? I want an investigation ASAP.”
Having declared a proximity interest which he now believes does not apply because tent city no longer exists, Cr Sullivan says he questioned whether the camp, “was in the best interests of those living there, and whether it was safe. I was speculating whether some of the people behind the scenes might have a political interest in having the camp in that location”.
This contradicts WA Premier Mark McGowan and Aboriginal Affairs Minister Ben Wyatt who said tent city was a political stunt and “some councillors” had an interest in the camp staying open (www.streetwisemedia.com.au/silly-politicking).
Interestingly, and one to watch in coming days, Cr Sullivan shifts the attention to City administration staff he says had the camp under control: “I was anticipating the CEO might want to brief me as Deputy Mayor while Brad was away or brief the elected members.”
He says the CEO contacted elected members advising approval had not been granted for either the support activities or tent city and that the community safety team and police were monitoring the situation. Knowing there were no approvals, the acting mayor and elected members except Cr Vujcic appeared to do little to close the camp. In fact, they supported it with City resources and heart-tugging tales about the plight of the homeless.
To claim Cr Sullivan had no prior knowledge of Mr Noakes’ intentions at Pioneer Park is a stretch. As an elected member, where was the governance and proper process? Verbal requests and verbal approvals for the Boxing Day ‘stunt’, reportedly given to Mr Noakes by Dr Pettitt and City Ward Councillor and member of Dr Pettitt’s election campaign team Rachel Pemberton, are not standard operating procedure. Not when the costs are so high and the health and safety of the community, including the homeless, is at risk.
This much Cr Sullivan admits: “I still don’t really know whether the camp happened organically or whether it was orchestrated, although the latter is far more believable with the benefit of hindsight.”
Cr Sullivan’s narrative reads like a Christmas fairytale in which the councillor is busy running around shopping and rushing to get to Rottnest or down south and, at the same time, keeping at arms length from Mr Noakes and tent city organisers.
The user-friendly councillor is watchful, caring and more concerned activists would commandeer his toilet paper. Compassion over red tape, he insists. Why ruin a Christmas lunch for the homeless. After all we’re not Scrooges.
Not a single councillor nor the CEO have stepped up and explained their role in the debacle they could have helped avoid despite having known of FSK’s intentions at least a week before Christmas when Mr Noakes approached Dr Pettitt and Cr Pemberton.
The issue boils down to whether the CEO advised Dr Pettitt to call a council meeting once they realised the camp organisers were not going anywhere. Did Dr Pettitt ask for that advice and why did he not call a meeting? Council did not meet until January 27, two days before Dr Pettitt jumped ship. By then police had received up to 80 calls for help including the alleged sexual assaults of two teenagers, aged 13 and 14, by two men in their early 40s, on December 31. One of the men will appear in Fremantle Magistrate’s Court on February 9.
Whether you are an elected member or a politician, if there is a crisis you get in there and show leadership and adherence to the proper processes designed to protect the City and the community. Imagine the chaos had the Government announced a COVID lockdown.
Cr Sullivan has simply polarised the issue. And until an independent inquiry is held, Fremantle can look forward to more of the same.