John Davis OAM retires from council

Hear John Davis OAM's retirement speech in 2017. From the Central Western Daily archives.

Transcript

00:00 My total life has been for challenges, whether it be rugby league, whether it be business,

00:06 whether it be council.

00:08 And I've certainly been very, very proud to be in the local government area for the last

00:14 30 years.

00:15 For the last 30 years, 17 years of Laney, the last 10 years being the Mayor, and proud

00:22 to be that in the Rural Council.

00:24 And then coming back to Orange and being on council here for about 13 or 14 years.

00:30 Every year being Mayor except for one where I was putting the sin bin, funny enough, we

00:35 had a six-hole draw and I lost the draw.

00:39 And I sat on the benches for 12 months.

00:42 And I didn't do a Tony Abbott.

00:43 I never spat the dummy out.

00:45 I sat there and a year just went past and I got the job back again.

00:50 And I was very proud to represent Orange and the community.

00:55 I've always believed that 80% of the people are the silent majority.

01:00 And I've lived by that and I believe that that is still the case right now.

01:07 The silent majority is an enormous amount of the community and they do respect the councillors

01:14 and what the council does.

01:16 We are not perfect.

01:18 We're certainly not perfect.

01:19 I've been involved in the 13 years with 12 councillors on the council, including myself,

01:27 part of the team.

01:29 At times you've got to have people from all different ways of life with different ideas.

01:37 That's not to say that you should enjoy people that are disruptive or working against the

01:44 system.

01:45 And I've found over the last 13 years and the majority of time, the Orange City Council

01:51 has been fantastic.

01:52 And I think it's delivered great things for the community.

01:56 And I've been very proud to lead that team.

01:59 And we've been super successful in regards to big borrowing or stealing money off federal

02:04 and state governments for the community, trying to get better value for the community members.

02:10 And I would hope that that would continue.

02:13 In regards to the Orange City, in regards to projects, I mean, it's been an enormous

02:21 amount.

02:22 I mean, there's been in 13 years, I'd suggest tens and tens, you know, might be 100 projects.

02:29 But that's part and parcel being on council.

02:33 And I've always joked that, you know, we could build major projects.

02:39 But as mayor, you know, the biggest problem I had was I couldn't stop problems with barking

02:45 dogs, for example.

02:47 But the major problems you could sort of fix.

02:50 [BLANK_AUDIO]