Community & Business

4 July, 2023

Service review set to guide future budgets

A REVIEW on services provided by Tablelands Regional Council has been made public but has been sanitised to keep some key information confidential.

A REVIEW on services provided by Tablelands Regional Council has been made public but has been sanitised to keep some key information confidential.

The review, undertaken by consultants, will inform council’s decisions about what services are maintained, what services may be reduced over time or abandoned, and its annual operational budget.

Cr David Clifton fought for the document to be released to the public because it provides the community with information about the challenges faced by council in delivering services and the effect that has on its long-term financial sustainability.

While the review has been edited to remove any sensitive information, it does conclude that council needs to boost its budget for road maintenance and renewals to keep pace with ensuring roads are maintained in good condition.

“Insufficient budget allocation to road maintenance and renewals with a significant backlog in asset renewals and planned maintenance has resulted in a less than desirable road condition,” the review states.

“Council is driving road upgrades to a higher design standard than what is required in accordance with the Transport Strategy, reducing the ability to invest in asset renewals, resulting in deterioration of existing assets and increased reactive maintenance costs, increased customer complaints and dissatisfaction.”

The review also revealed there was a lack of infrastructure strategy and no asset management plan in the sewerage business and strongly recommended council undertake full cost pricing for the water and sewerage and waste services.

“Both the water and wastewater businesses are also challenged to deal with the accelerated land development in bringing forward capital projects to provide service to new areas whilst solving legacy issues,” the review states.

The document also warns that council’s long-term financial plan is not meeting the required standards for the sustainability of its assets which supported feedback from council’s service managers related to the organisation’s “deficiencies in asset management investment”.

It also showed that there is a gap of $5.65 million per year between depreciation charges and investment in asset renewal.

A plan to implement the recommendations of the review has also been endorsed by council which includes numerous actions to be undertaken such as a review of council’s revenue policy

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