Lord Mayor Basil Zempilas has defended the City of Perth council's move to rebrand as the "City of Light" following scathing comments about the decision by a Labor MP in state parliament.
The council, which covers 20 square kilometres of central Perth, launched a rebranding campaign last year dubbing Perth the City of Light, and recently sent out a survey about the campaign to residents and ratepayers.
Perth was first dubbed City of Light in 1962 when residents were encouraged to leave their lights on overnight so the city would be visible when the American astronaut John Glenn was orbiting the earth on the Friendship 7 flight.
Labor MLA Margaret Quirk, who represents the electorate of Landsdale in Perth's north-eastern suburbs but is also a Perth city ratepayer, recently attacked the move in parliament.
"The Lord Mayor seems to be absolutely fixed on the name City of Light," Ms Quirk said.
"I have a number of problems with this. The first is that many people who might be minded to travel to Perth will not remember that in 1962, when astronauts flew over Perth, John Glenn said, 'Oh, look; we can see Perth'.
"The other reason I think that City of Light is inappropriate is that Paris already has it. Why would we have a brand name that has been taken for many, many years by Paris?
"The other reason I think City of Light is inappropriate is that we do not have daylight saving here. Just when people are in a position to enjoy the light, it is bloody dark!"
'Historic, organic' gift of name
But Lord Mayor Basil Zempilas said despite its age, the City of Light moniker was still highly relevant.
"It's a very fitting title for our city, which was given to us 60 years ago," Mr Zempilas told Nadia Mitsopoulos on ABC Radio Perth.
"We didn't go to an advertising agency and pay for it, we didn't ask a marketing team to come up with it.
"We got that name organically, because of a great Perth event."
Listeners to ABC Perth Radio had mixed views on the branding.
Rose: "We are not the City of Light! That was a comment by a single person re a specific event the 1960s. Have we not changed since then?"
Judy: "City of light’ works for me. Every time our visitors get off a plane in Perth they comment on ‘the light’. The origin is also a plus."
Terry: "Perth, the City of Light in an era of extreme catastrophic climate change. The last thing we should brag about is our contribution to light pollution, greenhouse gases, and increased heat in the city."
Michelle: "City of Light does not hit the mark for us at all! As if that's our point of difference!"
'Feedback encouraging': Lord Mayor
Mr Zempilas said light could be in reference to many things in Perth.
"We have more natural daylight than any other capital city in the world," he said.
"[Light] means connection, it means our energy, our commitment to one another and the accessibility throughout our city.
"I think it represents our bright voices, our great entertainment industry.
"And I've got to say that since we reclaimed the name a little over 12 months ago now, the feedback has been very, very encouraging."
A former City of Perth staff member, who did not wish to be named but whose identity has been verified by the ABC, was also scathing of the branding.
"The Lord Mayor campaigned on 'reclaiming' Perth as the City of Light, hard," he said.
"Community consultation didn't show it as even remotely popular or relevant — it always polled last, and it was only ever included because the Lord Mayor wanted it in there.
"Despite the community polling it dead last, despite 50 other cities already, and legitimately, calling themselves the City of Light, and despite the fact that no one ever called us that (except in one newspaper article and then never again) the City of Perth rebranded to it for God knows how much."
Mr Zempilas said the name had emerged from a forum of community members and city councillors.
"The brand name came out of a survey that we did with a cross section of 50 ratepayers and identities from around the city of Perth," he said.
"That forum strongly endorsed the name City of Light.
"There was a view amongst the 50 people which included our councillors, stakeholders and other people from the city that the name was relevant and effective."
Mr Zempilas and the WA Government are also at odds over the proposed spending of almost $200 million sitting in a Perth CBD parking levy fund.
An auditor general report last month found the government had no clear plan to spend the money collected from a levy on all non-residential parking bays in the CBD.
Transport Minister Rita Saffioti wants to expand the scope of what the money could be spent on while Mr Zempilas has campaigned strongly on keeping it firmly focused on CBD transport projects, as legislated.
