MARTY Smyth joined King Island Council last November and is now the new deputy general manager. He found the role appealing due to the strong community links of the Council.
Marty has a background in emergency services, including aviation medicine. He told King Island Radio that he enjoys the community-oriented atmosphere of King Island and is focused on improving services and infrastructure for the community. Born in New Zealand, Marty spent eight years in the Royal New Zealand Air Force, as a medic and was later involved with aeromedical evacuations in the Pacific Basin and with disaster work in places like Solomon Islands, Tonga, Fiji and Vanuatu. He also taught aviation medicine.
In Victoria, Marty oversaw the 000 network and later worked in government in Queensland. He believes that his role on King Island is one of improvement, “Not that there’s anything wrong, but there’s a lot of things that we need to improve,” he said.
“There’s plenty of opportunity to look at different things and improve some of the things. Because of my background in emergency services, I can take an emergency services approach. I’ve been appointed as the municipal emergency management coordinator, so that’s a responsibility under the Tasmanian Emergency Management arrangements, so I can put that in place.
“We can do a risk assessment, for example, and look at what are the risks of our infrastructure on the island. If there was a bushfire, if there was a power outage, if there was a water outage, look at the utilities. If there was a major accident, how do we approach that? How do we manage that? We have limited resources. I’m impressed with what the small team at the council do. They get involved in a wide variety of things, and I guess, for me, that’s the challenge as well.
“Working in a bureaucracy, you’re just sort of writing reports and writing papers, and they go round and round in circles for months on end and people might make a couple of wording, tweaks, and that kind of thing, and, at the end of the day, does it make a difference to the community and the people that live in that community? Probably not. But down here, you’ve got the opportunity to look at things – for example waste management. How can we do that better? How can we fund it without putting rates up?”
“There are challenges in a small community, but it’s also where you can talk directly to people and understand their needs and this, and making a difference, appeals.” Marty has been in his role as deputy general manager of King Island for three months, his role involves emergency management, project management, and community services.