Kāpiti council CE finally apologises for Kool-Aid comment
After initially doubling down and attempting to defend his Kool-Aid comment, which was caught on a hot mic during a council meeting, Kāpiti Coast District Council Chief Executive Darren Edwards has now backed down and issued an apology.
In a media statement issued today, Edwards states:
“I want to express my sincerest apologies for the comments I made during the recent Kāpiti Coast District Council meeting held on Thursday 30 January. I recognise that my actions fell well short of the standards that I set for the organisation, myself, and members of the public attending Council meetings.
I am sorry that the comments I made in the Council Chamber have caused offense to Ms Padamsey as this was never intended.
I respect the role Coastal Ratepayers United play in our community and their continued contribution to local democracy. I remain committed to working together for the benefit of our community.
It’s important to me that anyone who takes the time to speak with our elected members feels comfortable sharing their views and representing their position.”
It’s obviously good that an apology has finally been issued. Hopefully the Council now reflects on how they’ve handled this. It is concerning that an apology wasn’t the first thing that happened when they became aware of the comment following media enquiries, including from Local Aotearoa. Instead they took the route of trying to double down and presumably hoped it would only be a brief social media storm.
Instead, they’ve received negative media coverage and ended up sparking even more outrage from the community about their initial reaction defending the remark.
If anything, it seems that it was only after at least one complaint was lodged - by me - that an apology has been forthcoming. Looking at the wording of the apology it may well be that other complaints were received as well.
There’s a lesson in here for both the local government sector and communications practitioners more widely. When you know someone has stuffed up, a prompt apology is always the better option. Instead of dragging things on into a third day and sowing even more distrust in the community, this whole sorry saga could have been done and dusted in less than 24 hours.