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My first 12 months as Mayor have been both an honour and a humbling experience.
As Councillors, we are elected by the people to make tough decisions, and not necessarily the popular ones. The Special Rates Variation, or the SRV, has been one of those difficult conversations. For the 2000 residents that responded online and the 400 who took the time to give feedback on our phone survey, thank you for your time and your comments are very welcome. Many of your ideas around cost saving and management are things our staff have already been actively investigating and doing over the past few years.
A lot of the feedback has been the assumption that Council is in financial difficulty. That is not the case. Council has and will continue to put out a balanced budget that covers all responsibilities that Council may have. The intent of the SRV is to catch up on the backlog of capital works, predominantly roads. This backlog has been caused by a combination of factors outside Council’s control, chiefly the
exponential rise in repair and material costs, and the significant periods of wet weather and flooding since 2020. Council is responsible for more than 800km of sealed roads and 300km of unsealed roads, and that is where any SRV funding would be spent.
It is also important for our residents to be clear about which major projects that are underway are funded by Council, and which ones are being funded from other sources. Projects that involve through Federal and State funding include the new crossing at Gorricks Run, Thomas James Bridge reconstruction near Wisemans Ferry, the long overdue Pitt Town bypass, the development of Fernadell Park at Pitt Town, the roadworks at The Driftway and Londonderry Road for the Richmond Bridge duplication, the repair to the Cornwallis drainage network, the upgrades at Macquarie Park and Colbee Park, and the improvements to Windsor Mall and George Street. The recent installation of flood warning signs at Brennans Dam Road, Tennyson Road, Old East Kurrajong Road and Roberts Creek Road were built thanks to funding from Rotary and Bendigo Bank. We thank these partners for their support to our City.
Wishing everyone a great Christmas and please stay safe.
