'Quarter of targets behind schedule' should raise alarm
Nearly one-quarter of the targets in the Council's Operational Plan are behind schedule, but the Administrator is satisfied that the work is "on track" in the progress and delivery of budgeted capital works.
When I was managing a work program, 75 percent performance was not considered a matter for self-congratulation.
In fact, that would have been a matter for alarm and for a full review of scheduling to identify what was going wrong.
Obviously, standards at Central Coast Council are much more relaxed.
This perhaps goes some way to explaining how the Administrator can casually hand out a five-year renewal of contract to the CEO who is responsible for this quality of performance and who is quoted as saying: "The Q2 Report is very good, and we are getting on with delivering projects and services in a very timely ... manner".
Is this level of self-delusion commonplace amongst Council servants?
Amongst other issues, it is particularly notable that 814 development applications are behind schedule, and the best that the Council can say about this is that the number is lower than the 903 applications that were outstanding in June 2023.
This means that, in six months, the Council has reduced the backlog by about 100, so we can confidently look forward to being back on track in only about four years' time - a sterling record.
The pathetic excuse that many applications are incomplete and cause the staff extra work is mind-boggling in its naivete.
Would the Council have us believe that no other Council ever receives incomplete applications that cause staff extra work?
I'd suggest that it is standard for Councils to receive incomplete applications, yet no other Council has the abysmal record that Central Coast can show in this area of service, presumably because they have staff members who cope with inadequacies in applications, instead of just complaining about them.
Certainly, it doesn't appear that Council is wasting manpower on its response to the Minister's proposal to increase residential densities in selected parts of the LGA.
It has simply objected to Gosford, Tuggerah and Wyong being included in the reform (not Woy Woy, apparently) and wants any zoning changes mapped, "so it doesn't create ambiguity".
Did the Council carry out any consultation with community groups or provide any analytical information in formulating this submission?
If it did, I'm not aware of it.
As for the comment that the concept "needs to be driven by evidence-based actions", this exhibits a degree of chutzpah that verges on the breathtaking from a Council whose Development Control Plan does not have one single evidence-based standard in the entire document.
If the Council could defend any element of its DCP on the basis of evidence, developers wouldn't have a leg to stand on in their appeals against Council decisions, so it can hardly defend it against any changes made by the Minister.The Council notes that the reforms "are happening faster than Council can amend local infrastructure contribution plans".
What does this say about the competence of the Council to deal with standard work processes?
Maybe if the Council attended to important business, instead of frittering away its resources on such nonsenses as waterfront redevelopment plans, the community would have more confidence that its rates were serving a useful purpose.
SOURCE:
Email, 11 Mar 2024
Bruce Hyland, Woy Woy