STATE MP Roma Britnell says Warrnambool City councillors have to explain to the community why they've sacked the council's chief executive officer.
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The council voted on Monday night to dump Peter Schneider, who has been in the role for 18 months.
South West Coast MP Roma Britnell said the employment of the chief executive officer was a decision made by councillors and "so it will be up to councillors to explain why they have taken this course of action and what the cost of this decision will be to ratepayers".
Warrnambool Ratepayers Association vice president Ben Blain described the sacking as a cloak and dagger scenario.
He said the association called on the council to release the minutes of Monday night's meeting.
"Because the public do have a right to know, it's our money," he said.
"The council has to open up."
Mr Blain said the council continued to preach about transparency but had resolved to not release the cost of terminating the CEO's employment.
"Why do we have to keep that a secret? The council has been vocal on its budget issues in its current term," he said.
"We've applied to have our rate cap broken. Now we're expecting ratepayers to foot the bill for what we believe is a total political move."
Mr Blain said the decision to sack the CEO and the secrecy behind it showed how out of touch the council was with community expectations.
"To get rid of a CEO three months out from an election that they have appointed and to think that's alright is totally against what we believe," he said.
He said the city was suffering with businesses hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic and the council leadership was now in disarray.
"Everyone is struggling and now the leadership of the council is falling apart and the current councillors seem to think that's alright, it's not," he said.
"No reasoning, no costing - they're big red flags.
"A lot of these issues have been coming up for 10 years and to expect the CEO to fix it in a year, it would have been a mammoth job for anyone."
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