Prior to moving here, I had very little knowledge of the history and subsequent journey being undertaken by the Dunn and Lewis families. Not only does this building honour two young lives lost in the Bali bombing of 2002, it is testimony to a group of young boys who, refusing to have a monument to their mates made out of stone, chose instead to create a space where community members and groups, particularly young people, can come and find hope.

Gayle Dunn, with a tireless team, community and council support, government grants and years of hard work turned this vision into reality. In conversation with Gayle and her daughter Karlee they listed the charities, service groups, educational and rehabilitation programs the Dunn Lewis Centre support and are supported by. The list went for several minutes.

Stage 2 - the Conference Centre, is ready to be completed and Gayle is hoping (with council's extra support), it will be open and operational for our fast approaching busy season.

It is hard to know where to begin to thank Gayle, her family and our new community for creating this healing, evolving and wonderful place. I guess the best thing we can all do is to continue our support of this brilliant venture honouring Danny Lewis and Craig Dunn.

Amanda Findley is the popularly elected mayor for all Shoalhaven residents, including teenagers. Following the 2018 Climate Change Rally, the mayor opened the council meeting, congratulating the students on their efforts. Cr Mitchell Pakes stood up and berated her: "How dare you encourage students to miss school? There are only two reasons why students should not be at school. One is illness and the other is death."

I was so disgusted, I walked out.

The last council meeting was shifted to Friday, September, 20, because two Shoalhaven Independent Group members were unavailable for the regular Tuesday meeting. This was the annual meeting where council committee members were to be chosen. Generally, there is not an extraordinary meeting called when councillors are unable to attend.

This coincided with the Students' Climate Change Rally, organised by three local 16-year old students.

They asked the mayor if she would read their statement at the council meeting. The mayor obliged, opening the meeting with this request. Cr Andrew Guile rudely talked over the mayor for the entire few minutes of the reading.

At last year's committee election meeting, Cr Mitchell Pakes took it on himself to propose three committees be abolished. These included the Sustainable Futures, the Flood Plain Risk Management (FPRM) and the Early Childhood committees. Apart from presenting his own list of members to be elected to committees, Cr Pakes announced that he would nominate the mayor to one committee, as the rules determined this was compulsory.

At a subsequent meeting, there was a rescission motion regarding the FPRM, after it was brought to the attention of the council that such a committee was legally required.

At this year's meeting, Cr Pakes had a pre-ordained list of councillors, once again, for all the committees, almost totally excluding members of Country Labor and The Greens, including the mayor.

Among these excluded members we have two nurses, and I hope if their services are needed by some of these other 'born-to-rule' councillors, they will be conveniently unavailable.