Website gives snapshot of council performance

Council’s service standard for statutory planning matters and the time taken to decide on planning applications also is much higher than other councils around the state.

On the flipside, council’s performance in roads and animal management improved.

Performance summaries for council’s key business areas have been updated on the Know Your Council website.

The Know Your Council performance requirements provides a detailed analysis of Baw Baw’s performance compared to similar councils and all councils in Victoria.

The latest results for the 2015-16 year showed poor performance results in food safety assessments and the time taken to decide on planning applications.

Council has blamed resource challenges for its low number of food safety inspections while circumstances outside council’s control was said to be the reason for many planning applications taking 27 days more than other councils to decide.

Council’s performance in key service areas including animal management; food safety; statutory planning; roads; maternal and child health, libraries; home and community care; aquatic facilities; waste collection, financial performance and sustainable capacity.

Results showed an improvement in the overall satisfaction and performance of local sealed roads across the shire, which was the only result council focussed on in a media release.

Food safety:

There are 502 class one and class two food premises within the shire, which is an increase of 17 from 2014/15. Of these, 251 were inspected in 2015/16 due to resourcing challenges. This was only 50 per cent of food premises inspected, compared to 90 per cent of other councils.

Similarly, the number of critical and major non-compliance notifications followed up by council was only 40 per cent compared to 92 per cent across the state.

The report said council received 181 critical non-compliance notifications but because of “resourcing challenges” followed up only 74.

Council was below the average of all councils in its time taken to action on food complaints, being one day turnaround compared to 2.15 days for other councils.

Statutory planning:

The median number of days to process a planning application increased 23 per cent to 96 days, compared to 69 days for all councils.

“The median number of days for processing planning applications includes steps outside of council control including time taken by applicants to respond to requests for further information and to complete public notification,” the report said.

Half of council’s planning applications (51 per cent) were decided within 60 days, compared to 69 per cent for other councils.

Five out of eight council decisions were upheld at appeals at Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal.

Roads:

The results showed a significant improvement in the quality of the shire’s local sealed road network, with 978 kilometres of the 1042 kilometres network considered at or above the required condition standard.

Council received 349 requests in relation to sealed local roads, which had significantly decreased compared to the previous year.

In the shire’s media release, community assets director Phil Cantillon said council has received fewer community requests in relation to sealed roads, while community satisfaction was up and costs were down.

“Whilst the results remain slightly below the average of large rural shires, it is encouraging to see reporting that reflects an improvement.

“Council’s capital works program has made a substantial commitment to improving our sealed road network over the past four years.

“Importantly, the cost of sealed road reconstruction is down by 33.1 per cent from the previous financial year, and resealing costs are also down by 8.4 per cent.

“A highly competitive market, better packaging of works and their earlier release to the market each financial year, has resulted in reduced tender prices, with the savings generally returned to the projects to extend the works completed on the ground,” he said.

Governance:

More than 15.5 per cent of council decision were made at meetings closed to the public, compared to 11.5 per cent of other councils. Of these decisions, 70 per cent were then released to the public.

Community satisfaction scores for council’s consultation and community engagement was scored at 48 out of 100, compared to 55 of other councils.

The cost of governance per councillor was $36,623, which was significantly lower than other councils who averaged $48,651 per councillor.

Animal management:

The time taken to action animal management requests was 1.49 days compared to 2.19 days of other councils.

There was a significant increase in the percentage of impounded domestic animals returned to their owners. Of the 419 animals collected, 292 were reclaimed.

“While every effort is made to reunite impounded animals with their owners, it is the owner’s decision as to whether to reclaim the animal,” the report said.