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  • Government-to-government property transactions will be streamlined under proposed legislative reforms agreed to by the Commonwealth this week. The Federal Government has accepted all 16 recommendations of a review of the Land Acquisitions Act (1989) carried out by the federal Department of Finance in 2020-21. Among other things, the review recommended that Section 40 of the+

  • New and easily deployed technology able to extract value-added materials from problematic waste streams is about to be trialled on the NSW South Coast. Dubbed “micro-cycling science”, the novel technology was developed by the University of NSW’s Sustainable Materials Research and Technology (SMaRT) Centre with support from the Australian Research Council. The technology is deployed+

  • Three north-western NSW councils will take part in a research project to address their long-standing health workforce shortages. The Glen Innes Severn Council and the Gwydir and Narrabri Shire councils will work with a research team to establish, fund, and manage a health workforce recruiter and connector (HWRC) position in each of the three LGAs.+

  • The Federal Government is allowing childcare centres in any area declared a Covid-19 hotspot for more than seven days to waive gap fees. In line with new arrangements introduced on 19 July, council-run early childhood education and care services affected by recent stay-at-home orders can opt-in to waive gap fees to parents to try to+

  • Infrastructure resilience can be enhanced by looking not just at assets themselves but how they contribute to societal resilience overall. In two new advisory papers published this week, Infrastructure Australia (IA) recommends a whole-of-system, all-hazards approach to resilience planning focused on strengthening an infrastructure asset as well as the place, precinct, city, and region that+

  • This week, it was a pleasure to meet with our new Assistant Minister for Local Government, the Hon. Kevin Hogan MP, to congratulate him on his new role, and commit to working with him on all matters important to local governments. On your behalf, I raised: Local government financial sustainability questions arising from COVID lockdowns;+

  • The Commonwealth Local Government Forum has begun a “Month of Mentoring” to support female councillors and encourage women to stand for office.   “Mentoring is a proven peer-to-peer methodology that supports women leaders to navigate the political environment, increase their confidence, and build their political network,” acting CLGF Secretary-General Lucy Slack said last week. “While+

  • Plastic Oceans Australasia (POA) is inviting council staff to host plastic-free picnics next month to help heighten awareness of pollution from single-use plastics. The inaugural Picnics Unwrapped campaign encourages people, as individuals or teams, to host or participate in a waste-free picnic from 1- 30 September. POA hopes the campaign will raise awareness of the+

  • Feedback on the federal government’s Peri-Urban Mobile Program (PUMP) is being sought from community representatives and industry. Announced as part of the 2021–22 federal Budget, the $16.4 million program will fund improve mobile connectivity in bushfire-prone areas on the peri-urban fringe, where suburbs encroach into bushland, potentially creating bushfire risks for those living and working+

  • Five national projects to reduce the risk and impact of natural disasters on Australian communities are getting $4.2 million in new federal funding. The largest grant of $3 million will go to the Bushfire Building Council of Australia to develop a self-assessment app to provide site-specific mitigation guidelines to improve resilience. The CSIRO will receive+

  • An initiative using recycled glass as a natural sand substitute in local roads and footpaths has expanded to include 16 suburban Sydney councils. The Southern Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (SSROC) initiative turns locally recycled crushed glass into coarse sand suitable for use as a substitute for natural sand in asphalt, non-structural concrete and pipe+

  • Councils providing residential aged care have won a share of $150 million in funding under the Commonwealth’s 2020 Aged Care Approvals Round (ACAR). Seventy-two infrastructure projects have won on average about $2.1 million each in capital grant funding. The 2020 ACAR also includes the allocation of over 4000 residential care places and more than 1000+

  • The Australian Local Government Association is partnering with ICLEI Oceania to help councils tackle global warming and plan for a sustainable future. A memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed this week commits ALGA and ICLEI Oceania to work at boosting information and tools available to local governments. This work will encompass: Awareness-raising and promotion of effective+

  • Sixty-seven new mobile base stations will be built across Australia under Round 5A of the Mobile Black Spot Program. The 67 base stations, to which local governments will be co-contributing costs, will address coverage issues across regional and remote Australia, including in bushfire-prone areas and along major highways. They are expected to collectively deliver over+

  • Local government elections in NSW have been postponed for a second time as the current Covid-19 outbreaks in Sydney, the Hunter and Shoalhaven continue. NSW Minister for Local Government Shelley Hancock confirmed last Saturday the election date had been pushed back from September 4 to December 4 for all NSW councils except Central Coast Council,+

  • A federal parliamentary inquiry has called for a national homelessness strategy recognising the vital role played by local governments. The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs report on homelessness in Australia contains 35 recommendations, including that the Commonwealth develop and implement a 10-year national strategy in consultation with state, territory,+

  • The Australian Council of Recycling (ACOR) will develop a national accreditation/certification scheme to support resource recovery and the circular economy. The project will receive funding from the federal Department of Agriculture, Water and Environment (DAWE) and be aligned to key targets in the National Waste Policy Action Plan. Those action plan targets include reducing total+

  • Regional airports nationwide have been awarded nearly $30 million in grants under Round 2 of the Federal Government’s Regional Airports Program. The 89 projects awarded grants include: Charters Towers Regional Council for airstrip, fencing and other upgrades at Charters Towers Airport in Queensland ($400,000); Kempsey Shire Council for fencing to reduce wildlife intrusion at Kempsey+

  • Nearly six in 10 local government CEOs say the financial sustainability of their councils was negatively impacted by Covid-19, a new survey shows. However, the survey also shows the pandemic has provided the impetus for many councils to “think outside of the box” about how to maximise revenue, keep costs down, and “sweat” their assets+

  • The South East Queensland Council of Mayors (SEQ) did local government proud this week. Six years after they began exploring a Brisbane regional bid for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the Council of Mayors (working with the state and federal governments) have delivered spectacularly for their communities. The basis for the bid was always about+

  • Infrastructure Australia’s revised Assessment Framework taking into account sustainability and resilience outcomes has been published. The broadened assessment criteria will allow for a “more holistic review of a proposal’s potential benefits, in addition to those that can be monetised through traditional cost-benefit analysis”. IA says the revisions respond to input from stakeholders, align with state+

  • Regional motorists are being urged to give agricultural vehicles extra space on the road ahead of this year’s sowing and harvest seasons. National Heavy Vehicle Regulator CEO Sal Petroccitto said the increase in people moving to regional communities in the past year meant more traffic for agricultural vehicle drivers to safely navigate during peak activity+

  • The 2020-211 agricultural census has begun as part of efforts to build a better picture of primary production at a national, state, and regional level. Over 100,000 farms are being included in this census to ensure information collected is reliable and can provide the Australian Bureau of Statistics with the required level of detail to+

  • Councils can now acquire comprehensive litter data for their respective local government areas with the Local Government Litter Index (LGLI). Offered by Keep Australia Beautiful (KAB), the LGLI is based on the KAB National Litter Index (NLI) with a range of new benefits and features. The KAB NLI was developed in 2005 as a common+

  • Projects in 34 local government areas have secured funding through the third round of the federal government’s Murray-Darling Basin Economic Development Program. The 51 projects range across the hospitality, tourism, development, and Indigenous cultural sharing sectors, and were selected to help Basin communities address challenges onset by drought, demographic change, and commodity price change. Grant+

  • Four northern NSW regional airports have been awarded $1.2 million for runway upgrades and other projects under Round 2 of the Regional Airports Program. The upgrades at the Tamworth, Armidale, Inverell, and Quirindi airports are the first Round 2 projects to be announced, with further notifications expected to follow. In Armidale, $300,000 in federal funding+

  • A joint project to make critical telecommunications more bushfire resilient has led to a start on upgrades for two sites in regional Victoria. The upgrades follow a joint CSIRO/Optus research project analysing where there is risk of damage to the network and where upgrades could reduce their vulnerability to future bushfire events. Optus is now+

  • A Commonwealth initiative supporting local job-creation has opened for applications, with up to $1 million available for innovative projects. The $50 million National Priority Fund will finance proposals “that address structural and other barriers to attract, recruit and retain Australian job seekers and workers in employment and/or complement job creation initiatives”. The fund is part+

  • Testing of Australia’s redesigned fire danger forecasting system has begun in north Queensland, Western Australia, and the Northern Territory. The operational trial of the Australian Fire Danger Rating System (AFDRS) program began on 1 July and will be extended to southern Australia in October when the fire season begins. In the most southerly areas, the+

  • Over 200 dangerous crash sites on NSW, Victoria, SA, Tasmania, and WA roads will get Black Spot Program fixes in 2021-22. Program funding of $86.9 million was announced this week, with the biggest share set to flow to councils in Victoria and NSW. Queensland Black Spot funding of $20.8 million to improve 67 dangerous crash+

  • Many local governments and communities lack the resources to identify appropriate solutions to local telecommunications problems, a new issues paper says. Published as a prelude to the 2021 Regional Telecommunications Review, the paper canvasses issues around adequacy, opportunity, and awareness of telco services in both rural, regional and remote areas of Australia. Public consultations for+

  • Thank you to local governments around the nation who have pulled out all the stops to aid the national COVID recovery process, including repeatedly offering to support the vaccination rollout. Given councils have been providing community immunisation services for decades, state and territory health agencies ought to have snapped up offers of local government facilities+

  • NSW childcare providers are being offered federal financial support to waive gap fees for parents keeping their children home because of Covid restrictions. The gap fee is the difference between the Child Care Subsidy (CCS) the federal government pays to a service and the remaining fee paid by the family. From Monday, July 19, childcare+

  • Australia’s ability to deliver social infrastructure post-Covid will be examined in depth at a Melbourne conference later this month. Convened by the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute, the day-long hybrid event will also look at urban transport options during a pandemic and population dynamics in a post-coronavirus context. Click here to register for the+

  • Rural shire council staff are being sought to take part in a leadership program to raise awareness about how regional Australia could benefit from international trade, investment, and tourism. The program will consist of six interactive webinars designed to generate ideas on how shire councils might capitalise on these as part of their Covid-19 recovery+

  • A draft strategy to build a nationally sustainable supply of native seed to enable environmental disaster recovery has gone on public exhibition. Developed by Greening Australia as part of the national response to the 2019-20 bushfires, the 10-year native seed and landscape restoration strategy (Project Phoenix) is a roadmap for growing the sector. As well+

  • The Federal Government’s recently revised national strategy to protect threatened species has moved to the public consultation phase. The Threatened Species Strategy 2021-30 was announced in May and calls for a more coordinated approach to culling feral pest animals and weeds that are pushing native species to extinction. It also proposes the deployment of new+

  • The Productivity Commission will hold public hearings in Sydney, Canberra, and Melbourne from 19 July as part of its “right to repair” inquiry. The commission has been asked to look at the barriers and enablers of competition in repair markets and the costs and benefits of a regulated right to repair, including facilitating access to+

  • A new federal parliamentary committee inquiry into how to reduce trauma and deaths on Australian roads will focus on heavy vehicles and the gig economy. The Joint Select Committee on Road Safety will “investigate and identify opportunities to improve road safety programs and policy; embed road trauma prevention across agencies; and reduce road trauma in+

  • Voting options for NSW’s local government elections are being widened as authorities try to bring a Covid-19 outbreak in Sydney under control. Changes to local government regulations announced on 9 July will allow for an online option under similar circumstances to postal voting, along with broadened pre-poll eligibility for all electors, and an expansion of+

  • The City of Cockburn will install a fringing reef off a beach south of Fremantle in what it is describing as a unique coastal management trial. Engineered reef modules totalling about 100 metres in length will be anchored 50m offshore at the northern end of C.Y. O’Connor Beach in early 2022 to break down wave+

  • The Federal and Queensland Governments have agreed to invest $20 million each in the Recycling Modernisation Fund (RMF). With Queensland industry set to match that $40 million amount, there will be combined $80 million available through the RMF to fund new plastic, glass and tyre recycling infrastructure upgrades across the state. Deputy Premier and Minister+

  • National shortages of civil and transport engineers, urban and regional planners, landscape gardeners, and construction project managers are forecast to last well into the future. The 2021 Skills Priority List compiled by the National Skills Commission and released last week also reveals a national shortage of surveyors, arborists, childcare workers, aged or disabled carers, and+

  • Local government’s willingness and capacity to step up on behalf of local businesses and local communities has again been to the fore this week. Responding to current COVID lockdowns, councils in Brisbane and Sydney put additional support measures in place to protect local jobs and to support local businesses. Councils in all states and territories+

  • The City of Newcastle Council will consider a state government-backed plan to mine sand offshore from Stockton Beach to repair erosion damage. It follows a six-week exploration program by the NSW Government to locate three offshore sand deposits to replenish the beach north of Newcastle. The exploration data will now go to Newcastle Council for+

  • The Foreign Arrangements Taskforce is thanking all councils for their engagement with the Foreign Arrangements Scheme over the past six months. Efforts to ensure local governments meet their obligations under the Scheme are much appreciated, and the arrangements notified to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) demonstrate the breadth of Australia’s international engagement+

  • ICLEI Oceania is inviting local government councillors and city practitioners to a webinar exploring the use of nature-based solutions in urban planning. Nature-based solutions (NBS) are broadly defined urban planning interventions based on nature and ecological functions to address societal challenges, such as climate change adaptation and mitigation, population health, food security, and natural disasters.+

  • Regional Drought Resilience Planning and Farm Business Resilience Planning programs have been rolled out in Western Australia. Federal Agriculture Minister David Littlepround said on Sunday that $1.3 million has been set aside to support partnerships of WA councils, regional organisations, communities, industries and farmers to develop regional drought resilience plans. A further $2.2 million will+

  • The City of Hobart Council has begun enforcing a by-law prohibiting takeaway food businesses from using single-use plastics. The city council enacted the by-law in March 2020 but allowed a year’s grace for traders to transition their supplies and for community education and awareness-raising. Businesses that provide or sell food in single-use plastic packaging in+

  • The World Economic Forum is urging cities to “close the loop on water use” to insulate communities from future climate-related shocks. In the first in a series of papers to highlight new ways of thinking about global water resources, the WEF says increasing water stress due to population increases, global warming, and climate change poses+

  • Feedback from local governments is being sought to build a common understanding of shared responsibilities for developing and delivering drought support. This work by the federal Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment (DAWE) is intended to drive an integrated approach to drought and to inform future policies that ensure all communities are well prepared+

  • The National Strategic Plan for Asbestos Awareness and Management 2019-23 establishes a framework for all levels of government to work together to effectively deal with the harmful legacy of asbestos in homes, workplaces, and the environment. The plan aims to eliminate asbestos-related diseases in Australia by preventing exposure to asbestos fibres.  This article by the+