THE role of a local council was once quite simple — looking after roads, rates and rubbish.
Nowadays, it takes in additional strategic planning, environmental issues and an expanded service-delivery platform.
But accompanying this is more layers of red tape – and inevitable delays in getting things done.
In recent months, Sunraysia Daily has reported on concerns from local developers that Mildura Rural City Council was failing to address the need for more housing as the population booms.
This week, council chief executive Sarah Philpott, sat down with the Daily to respond to the criticism, as well as concerns around the three-bin system and the embarrassing state of Langtree Mall.
Ms Philpott, whose total remuneration is $330,000, has been in the council’s top role since August last year.
She lists her role in steering the council’s 455 full-time staff through the COVID-19 lockdowns as her biggest achievement so far.
“I’ve felt really proud about the work we’ve done this year,” Ms Philpott said.
“We sprang straight into providing community relief, support services, we’ve worked with other agencies (and) we’ve lobbied so hard for the community in terms of the border issues.”
Asked whether the council was ill-prepared for the rapid growth in the region, Ms Philpott said: “There are places opening up, and we just keep working our way through it.
“That’s why we take a big-picture view of it. If you jump around doing small spot rezonings, you don’t take that bigger strategic picture.”
She said the council had in place a housing strategy and a planning scheme review, which were adopted in April last year.
“(The planning scheme review) looks at the next four-year program of activity around strategic land-use planning,” Ms Philpott said.
“It has got a mammoth list of different reviews that need to be gone through.
“And so, because what we’re doing here is shaping a city for the longer term, we get ready for what we see as the key growth areas and then do the strategy work that enables zoning to be changed, as an example.”
Among the reviews under way is one into Irymple, which developers say “desperately needs” more land opened up for residential development.
The company leading the Irymple structure plan is Melbourne-based Mesh Planning.
When asked why a local planner was not engaged to lead the Irymple review, Ms Philpott pointed to a “process” that the council followed in awarding contracts.
“Our procurement policy already has a loading in it around local benefit, for instance.
“The thing here will be, who applied? What were the cost factors? What was the local benefit? They are the things we assess on each occasion.
“I don’t know whether anyone local applied. I’m not saying they did or didn’t, or their merits.
“With each of these kinds of procurements, we go out with a scope of work and then make an assessment. And it is assessed against our procurement obligations.”
The Daily asked about the three-bin system, citing its recent survey that showed the majority of 2500 respondents wanted general waste to again be collected weekly.
In her defence of the new system, which came into effect in early July, Ms Philpott said: “Council, along the way, went through a comprehensive process of talking to the community.
“We did a trial of 800 people to see how it worked and 85 per cent of those were really supportive.
“I understand this is a really big change for people.
“If people, individually, have got any concerns, then talk to us. We can provide support around that.”
She said the new bin system was already diverting huge amounts of general waste from landfill.
“In the months of July to November, there was 73 per cent diversion rate from the yellow and green bins,” she said.
“So we’ve diverted 7144 tonnes from landfill over that time. It is really significant.”
In relation to concerns around the mall, Ms Philpott said it was a “complex” issue and “I don’t think there’s one fix”.
“Council’s position is, we’ve adopted a CBD plan that looks at how to connect the mall through Feast Street to the riverfront,” she said.
“That work is thinking about what does the whole city look like, and how does the whole city develop.
“We do hear from people about concerns about the mall, which is understandable. It’s got a number of layers (including) the changing face of retail.
“Our focus in the shorter term is really about how we do some outdoor activation.”
Ms Philpott said her broader vision for the region fell into “two contexts”.
“One is in the community context and the other is for the organisation,” she said.
“When we talk about where the community wants to go to in the future, the way I see council’s role is to work in, alongside and with community in it.
“In terms of the vision, I think it’s embracing that we’re going into a new phase.
“We’re going to emerge from this COVID environment and people are going to want to be connected and live good, quality lives.
“Our job is to make that possible – and make this is a great place to live.”
