Council’s general manager Adrian Butler answering a question from a councillor.
After heated debate and two motions defeated, with two councillors absent, Federation Council will further consider its position towards adopting plans for a Special Rate Variation (SRV) at its next monthly meeting, on November 26.
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Councillors voted 4:3 against two motions, the first put by deputy mayor Rowena Black, which was as per the chief financial officer, Jo Shannon’s recommendation, as per the unanimous recommendation of the nine councillors of the previous Federation Council before the September elections.
Seconded by immediate past mayor Pat Bourke, the motion included the following:
•Note the resolution from the outgoing council recommending progress of an application to the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART) for a 69.94% permanent Special Rate Variation over two years commencing 1 July 2025.
•Endorse the progress of work required for an application to the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal for a 69.94% permanent Special Rate Variation over two years commencing 1 July 2025.
Cr Derek Schoen moves his motion: also pictured is Cr Rowena Black.
•Endorse the updated 10-year Long Term Financial Plan to be placed on council's website and public exhibition seeking community feedback for a period of 28 days.
•Adopt the recommended changes to the Delivery Program 2022-2026 for the updated Delivery Program 2022-2026 to be placed on council's website and public exhibition seeking community feedback for a period of 28 days.
•Require the final documents to be presented to council at the December 2024 ordinary meeting with a report detailing community feedback received and any proposed changes to the drafts for consideration by council and adoption of a final set of plans.
Before the motion was debated, Cr Derek Schoen indicated his intention of a foreshadowed motion. It was seconded by Cr David Bott and included as hereunder:
•Endorse the progress of work required for an application to IPART to make the temporary SRV permanent being 45.91%.
•No future SRV be progressed or applied for until the workplace culture and productivity reforms are achieved and asset rationalisation and disposal are identified;
- the engineering department’s operations be reviewed to deliver significant productivity increases.
- indoor staff be reorganised to deliver productivity increases
- the planning department structure and operations be reviewed by a taskforce of GM or deputy GM, Director Planning Place and Sustainability and three councillors
- non-essential assets are reviewed and progress a plan for disposal, lease or transfer to community stewardship.
Absentees were Crs Susan Wearne and Andrew Kennedy, who were approved for a leave of absence at council’s extraordinary meeting of October 15, in which new councillor Cheryl Cook was elected mayor and Cr Black as deputy.
Council’s deputy general manager and chief financial officer Jo Shannon explained the journey of council arriving at today’s situation.
Had the two absentees been present, the first motion may well have been a 5:4 vote in favour of the general manager’s recommendation. But they weren’t.
Before councillor debate, Ms Shannon said the former council’s recommendation to councillors was the result of substantial work by her council team, detailed reports from IPART, NSW Treasury, council’s audit committee and the three professors headed by Professor Joseph Drew from the University of Newcastle.
Cr Pat Bourke expressing his disgust at a statement made in the chamber with Cr David Bott in the background.
Ms Shannon advised of the need for a 110-120% increase in rates during council’s 10-year long plan but said that size of rate increase would not be satisfactory to ratepayers and neither would the reduction to current levels of services required be suitable, thus meaning a middle ground would be more acceptable.
“That’s why I have gone for 80 per cent increase in the long-term plan ased on community feedback ,” she said.
“We are focused on productivity improvements and improving asset management practices.”
She and General Manager Adrian Butler advised that council receives 500 to 700 requests a year from the shire’s residents to fix or improve road-related issues alone. “It’s a matter of getting the balance right,” Mr Butler said.
Speaking to her motion, Cr Black said she believed council needed to continue to progress the SRVs, and there would still be plenty of opportunities for further councillor discussion and actions, especially as cost efficiencies were referred to in the 77 recommendations by Professor Drew and that staff have since made efficiency gains.
“There has been a huge amount of work put into this application and process, a huge number of hours by staff and delaying it will have to re do all the work again,” she said.
“I can understand Cr Schoen’s motion but the two actions in these motions can and must work in parallel, not separately, otherwise it puts us further behind in becoming financially sustainable.”
Cr Bourke said council has listened to the community, paid for the best possible and much sought after specialists headed by Professor Drew who have also met with ratepayers, and acted accordingly with this council resolution.
“Eighty per cent of ratepayers said they were happy paying the SRVs – eighty per cent – so long as they are getting services and having roads fixed,” he said.
Cr Schoen said that IPART was clearly not happy with the way NSW councils have handled their finances, that Federation Council has not experienced effective restructuring of its departments or staff and that it has been said it may have been the situation before merger of Urana and Corowa Shires in 2016, adding: “So be it, but this council does not have a good record at cutting costs and has overspent on capital projects.”
Mr Butler disputed the allegation of expenditure on big projects, citing the Corowa Aquatic Centre coming in under budget and the shire’s biggest ever project, the Corowa Saleyards project, being just one to two per cent over budget.
But Cr Schoen emphasised the need for council “not to put the cart before the horse” in undertaking the measures outlined in his motion.
“I’m not against SRVs – I believe we need them to service desired levels of service but we’re experiencing repeated lack of funds. If we get the structure changed in the right way we can operate better and have permanent ongoing savings, instead of having to inflict big rate rises on our ratepayers for years to come,” he said.
“I want to hang my hat on having the best or second best planning department out of all the councils. Builders are going elsewhere. I want builders to come to Corowa. I want to get rid of systematic problems.”
Cr David Bott supported Cr Schoen and supported the 19% and 17% rate increases but to justify any further increases after more investigation, to “put a caveat on further SRVs to get to 69 per cent, for council to undertake reviews and demonstrate financial responsibility”.
“I think the community expects us to be financially responsible,” Cr Bott added.
Crs Bourke and Black slammed Cr Schoen’s reference to, and implication of, ‘’workplace culture’, with Cr Bourke saying he was disgusted at the use of words and asked: “Who’s going to determine it?”
Cr Richard Nixon commented: “Surely we can determine something is better than what we’ve got now.”
Cr Bourke described the defeat of Cr Black’s motion: “A lot of damage has been done today for Federation” and Cr Black said she felt “gutted”.
Cr Schoen said his motion ensuring council is doing everything possible to improve its overall situation, is in line with feelings in the community which has voted for change - in a council which now has six new councillors.
“Otherwise we’ll be back here year after year seeking big rate increases,” he said.
Cr David Harrison admitted he was struggling, as a new councillor, to come to terms with the whole subject. Whilst he could see both sides of the cases put in the two motions, he had to be confident before casting his vote.
Mayor Cook praised Cr Harrison’s “candid honesty”.
He voted against both motions, expressing particular concern with the second motion’s conditions and covering operational matters.
Mayor Cook said it was interesting to note that 89 councils in NSW have sought SRVs which means “not all the councils can be bad managing money and that there’s a message there – a lack of funding from up above” (the state and federal governments).
