Jeff Donaldson, who was director of environmental monitoring and operations at the council for years, was made redundant several months ago.
At a meeting organised by council candidate for the Dunstan ward, Michael Laws, in Wanaka yesterday afternoon, Mr Donaldson said he had become ‘‘dissatisfied with trying to get things to happen’’ while working for the council.
He cited his inability to get a pest management plan updated, which left the Otago council as the only one in the country that had not reviewed its pest management.
He also expressed concern at his "inability to do anything" about lagarosiphon, didymo and lake snow in Otago’s lakes and rivers.
Mr Donaldson said he had found himself "surplus to requirements" a month after moving to Wanaka to be nearer his grandchildren and to fill the position of manager biosecurity and biodiversity.
The work he expected to do did not appear in the council’s annual plan.
Mr Bodeker pointed out yesterday the annual plan was set by the council rather than staff.
"We have discussions with communities, the councillors discuss those, and then we put them in the annual plan.
"So as staff members, we are just implementing what the council wants to do, and that’s what happened during Jeff Donaldson’s time, as it does now."
Mr Donaldson also told the meeting, attended by about 20 members of the public, the Otago council covered the second-biggest area of any in the country, behind Canterbury, but at 132 it had the smallest staff.
The Canterbury regional council, he said, had 550 staff.
Mr Bodeker said he believed Canterbury had even more than 550 staff but that was largely due to the different approaches of the two councils.
Canterbury’s consent-based system required more monitoring than Otago’s effects-based system.
"Where farming is a permitted activity [in Otago], in Canterbury it’s a consented activity. So just that alone makes the staff numbers different."
Mr Donaldson is now national programme manager for freshwater biosecurity for the Ministry of Primary Industries and a member of the newly formed Lake Wanaka Trust.
