The April Council meeting was held in Linton on Tuesday 24 April; please find below a summary of what happened at the meeting. Council offers residents this summary as a further service to residents who wish to learn about key Council business and decisions, but may not have the time to read the full minutes.
Our ‘Council meeting summaries’ complement the Council meeting update video from the Mayor as well as the detailed meeting minutes, which are made available to the public a few days after the meeting.
Please note these summaries do not outline all of the discussion or decisions from the Council meeting – these updates are designed to just provide key information and meeting highlights.
Citizen recognition
As part of the meeting, the Mayor recognised two young citizens for their fantastic sporting achievements.
The first to be recognised was Mikayla Hogg for her outstanding achievement in show jumping. Mikayla is 14 years old and lives in Berringa, and has been selected to represent Australia in the Russian Friendships Games, just outside of Moscow in July and August this year. Mikayla was selected for the Games after a strong performance at the State Championship, where she finished in sixth place. At the Games, Mikayla will compete in show jumping as both as an individual and in a pairing with a Russian rider, where they will compete as a team.
We also recognised Kaitlyn Schurmann. Kaitlyn is a Maude resident and is no stranger to Council; she was the recipient of our 2018 Young Citizen of the Year award and has also been an integral member of many of our local youth-led committees. Kaitlyn was recognised as she is competing in the Paracycling World Cup in May, in both road race and time trial events in Ostend, Belgium.
Council Plan and Draft Budget
As we do each year, Council considered both the Council Plan and the Draft Budget and endorsed each for public exhibition. Significant work has gone into the preparation of both documents by Council staff from across the whole of the organisation.
Council is required to review its four year Council Plan annually to consider whether the current Plan requires any changes for the remaining period. The Council Plan (2017-2021) is the key document setting out the strategic direction for Golden Plains Shire Council from 2017 to 2021 and beyond. In response to this review, Council has drafted 21 changes to the Council Plan (2017-2021) which aim to improve the document’s clarity, and enhance its representation of community aspirations.
The Draft 2018/19 Budget was also considered. We have worked hard to find opportunities to redirect more money into the maintenance of our assets, with additional expenditure of $750k redirected that way for next year. Overall we have been able to continue to deliver the services that we planned for, but rate capping is starting to have a significant effect on us.
Both documents will be on public exhibition from Monday 30 April.
Reports to Council
Council received a copy of the quarterly Council Plan progress report, showing that we are on track, and a number of Council Policies were reviewed and adopted: Citizen Recognition, Staff Delegations, and Citizenship Ceremonies. Council also approved the attendance of the Mayor at the annual National Australian General Assembly of Local Governments in Canberra in June.
One particularly interesting report was a proposal for Councillors (and senior staff) to commit to host four pop-up Community Conversation Posts over the remainder of the 2018 year:
- Saturday 23 June, 2.00pm-5.00pm, Round 11 Inverleigh vs. Bannockburn, Inverleigh Reserve
- Wednesday 1 August, 2.00pm-5.00pm, Bannockburn Country Plaza High Street
- Saturday 15 September, 9.00am-1.00pm, Smythesdale Country Market
- Saturday 24 November (Morning State Election), Napoleons Primary School.
Golden Plains Community and Civic Centre
Council approved the appointment of the architects to commence the detailed design of the new Golden Plains Community and Civic Centre; this has been a long time in the making, but we are now on our way. The timeframes are tight and lots of work is required to meet them. It is envisaged that construction will commence in early 2019.
The architects will start on three new concepts, which will incorporate some changes to the Council Chamber and community spaces. The architects will also look opportunities to consider building into the spaces to the west or south so as to minimise the movement of staff from the portables during construction.
The full meeting minutes are published within five working days after the meeting here.