Registering interest

Mr Flannery (Graffiti Trip A Bad Sign, News, 9 January) claims to have ‘seen’ Casey Council’s ‘Travel Register’.
This is untrue!
Mr Flannery has never accessed or viewed the travel register so I’m not sure where he got his information and figures from.
Nevertheless, I have been on council since 1993 (Casey’s longest continuing-serving councillor), first with the Shire/City of Cranbourne and now with the City of Casey.
Casey councillors have access to up to $5000 annually for conference and education (professional development) use.
If since 1993 I have accessed $32,000 as Mr Flannery claims, it’s a small percentage of what I had been entitled to claim but didn’t, and I believe every dollar claimed on my behalf has been very well spent and invested to improve things in the City of Casey.
With regard to my travel to study graffiti programs, Mr Flannery, if he’s been around long enough, will recall that prior to my study tours to investigate anti-graffiti methods and programs, Casey Council had no realistic graffiti program – council was at the time spending hundreds of thousands annually to remove graffiti from council property.
The policy adopted by council after my study now includes the rapid removal of graffiti from both council and privately owned properties as well as an education program delivered in Casey schools – it has definitely helped clean-up this city!
Whilst graffiti still occasionally appears in Casey, I think most people would agree that it is not visible for very long as the Graffiti Reporting Hotline has really worked to ensure that reported case of graffiti are removed as soon as practicable.
To report graffiti anywhere in the City of Casey, call the hotline on 1800 VANDAL (1800 826 325).
Wayne Smith, JP,
River Gum Ward councillor,
City of Casey.