Council over promised capital works by $29.8m

THE Bass Coast Shire Council has been full of self-praise in the past week over “our largest ever program delivery expenditure of $36.5 million” in its 2021/22 Capital Works Program.

But at last Wednesday’s council meeting, Cr Rochelle Halstead has warned the shire’s administration against “over committing and under delivering” and pushing an “eye-watering” amount into the next year’s budget.

While praising the administration for completing 22 of 25 projects from its Annual Action Plan 2021/22, plus substantial progress on the other three, Cr Halstead said the council had over-reached on its ambitious capital works program and a wholesale review might now be needed in light of inflation and unavailability of labour.

“It’s pleasing to see the amount of work Council has completed especially in the protecting of the natural environment where the community can see the impact on the ground. The report shows a significant amount of work has been achieved through adoption of plans and strategies, a critical part of the process.

“This work is time consuming, and I look forward to the focus now being on the delivery of on-the-ground outcomes.

“Due to increased costs and labour shortages, it may be necessary for council to do a full review of not only its four-year and 10-year plans, but its capital works program, keeping capital works within achievable targets and reducing carryovers from non multi-year projects.

“To have a carryover figure of $29,809,000, the continued delivery is eye watering in my view and there may be a need for council to consider seeking organisational and capital works' savings.

“It seems Council is keen to overcommit and under-deliver where what we need to do is be realistic, make the available state or federal government grants fit into the needs of our community and ensure that our budgeted works are achievable within the year they are allocated in order not to impact on future budgets.

“Today I will be supporting the recommendation (That Council receive the April – June 2022 Quarterly Performance Report), however I wish to flag with councillors that it is my intention to seek their support through this chamber in considering adjustments to reporting processes and the detail in reports presented to this council on the matters I have raised.”

Cr Ron Bauer also weighed in with his concerns, noting council had turned an expected "adjusted underlying result" of $300,000 into a deficit of $700,000 for the year, an unfavourable movement of $1 million in the 2021-22 result.

He repeated comments he had made at budget time, that the shire's four and 10-year plans needed to be reviewed and he was pleased to see a briefing session on the subject had been scheduled.

"We cannot continue to hope and pray that manna dollars will keep falling in our lap. We've been very lucky with contributions and grants but this luck will only take us so far."

Cr Leticia Laing acknowledge the $1 million unfavourable result but claimed the figure shouldn't be looked at in isolation with a higher than budget workers compensation insurance payment following the dissolution of the MAV WorkCare scheme, increased waste related and development planning expenditure, and the gifting of library assets to the new not-for-profit library organization MYLI.

She said the audit and risk committee had been reviewing the capital works carryovers, which was an ongoing process, and she was comfortable with how this was being managed while council attended to a record program of capital works.