The council unanimously endorsed a reassessed proposal for our ‘Fit for the Future’ review at the July council meeting.
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The updated 10-Year Plan demonstrates how we meet six of the seven criteria the New South Wales Government has set, and how we will meet the seventh within a reasonable time-frame.
We are confident that the hard work done in recent years to improve our financial position has put us on the right path to being financially ‘fit for the future’.
The ‘fit’ tag is important for us to gain access to low interest loans that make projects more affordable.
Long before the Fit for the Future reforms were announced, the council had introduced many improvements in how we manage our finances and service delivery.
We have been working on a whole of organisation approach, and have achieved annual savings of over $3 million over the past five years. But we also knew that to make real and lasting improvements a thorough review of how we deliver services and facilities across the Shire was needed.
This review is well underway and will deliver further savings of $500,000 over the next three years.
Along with the many cost-saving initiatives introduced to council’s day-to-day operations, we have improved how we build and maintain our road network, and how we calculate the value and depreciation of our assets.
Over the period being assessed, a seven per cent rate increase will need to be considered for the Kempsey Shire in 2018/19 to keep up with the budgeted programs and services we provide – well down from the 25 per cent gap previously identified.
We’ve made a good start but we still have a long way to go to put our community in the best position possible for the years ahead.
Our new proposal makes a strong case for the Kempsey Shire to be reassessed as ‘Fit for the Future’ so we can get on with the job of building a healthy, wealthy, safe and sociable Macleay Valley.