Hello everyone. Councillor Liam Ley here bringing you this week's Council video message.
I'll start with the July Council wrap-up, and here's what went down earlier this week at the Council meeting. We officially thanked our mates in local government. Council formally thanked neighboring councils for their help during the May floods, from pothole repairs, waste access, and their support made a huge difference, so thank you very much. That came from a Mayoral Minute, and the mayor said that some of them had so much fun filling our potholes that they came back for a second round, which is much appreciated.
Pushing for change on biodiversity laws, the mayor also put forward a Mayoral Minute that Council voted on to write to the NSW Minister to review how the Biodiversity Conservation Act is impacting development and housing in particular. We're pushing for a more balanced and affordable approach, especially near our town centres. We often find that this is quite a roadblock, unfortunately, to young families or the people who just want to build homes in the actual town centres. Sometimes these laws can act, I guess, more like a tax, and are not encouraging at all for housing targets. So that's the focus that the Mayor is pushing there.
The Rural Land Strategy Committee is back! After really strong community interest, three new community members have joined the Rural Land Steering Committee, which will guide land and ag-related issues in the Shire for Council. Thank you very much to all those people who nominated themselves, and congratulations to those three people who are now on the board.
Now to the waste contract extension. Council extended the waste collection and recycling contracts with JR Richards and Sons for two more years. This gives us time to plan future services like FOGO, and if you don't know what that is, we'll be in for a fun time. I think it's due in 2030. Most states have to roll out to this new system. So we'll see how that goes for us.
I will say that I have also had quite a lot of people come to me about damage from some rubbish trucks, either to buildings or anything else. They have reported that damage to JR Richards and haven't got a result there. I would just say to you, if you sustain any damage, just also send it to the Council so the Council can track that as well.
Clarence Town road upgrade, Segment nine on Clarence Town Rd has been voted on for the next major upgrade. So that will be going forward now for tender, which is really exciting. A lot is happening around Clarence Town way at the moment.
Local Legend Shout Out. This is a motion I put forward, and that's to officially congratulate Earth and Elm Studio and Wellness Services for winning Business of the Year, and the winner of Personal Services at the 2025 Hunter Regional Business Excellence Award. This is a really big win for this business. It's actually the oldest and one of the biggest business award events that's still going on in the state, and it incorporates a huge number of areas. So for a little business in Dungog Shire to get such an awesome result, it really does show the caliber of business we have here in Dungog Shire. So really big congratulations to them. And I will also say another big win, one of the co-owners, Xavier King, also became an Australian Citizen earlier this month, as well, here in Dungog. So absolutely kicking goals there and I'm excited to see what they come up with next.
To the caravan park. Recently, I put forward a motion to look at establishing a caravan park again in Dungog Shire. Happy to say that we got two proposals from the recent EOI that went out. So the next steps will be the council meeting and having a workshop to ensure that the proposals align with our vision. So stay tuned for that. The Showground Committee is still looking into establishing camping there in the showground again. They're in the phase of looking at management. So stay tuned and hopefully there'll be some news on that going forward.
So, more Council business. We had the Code of Meeting Practice out for public feedback. This is essentially the standards that the Council must abide by when meeting. The Minister for Local Government is proposing a new set, so this is essentially a placeholder until the Minister decides to roll out those new plans or not.
The review of the 2011 road strategy is underway. Councillor Carruthers put forward a motion to review the road strategy. This is how we assess the roads that are going to get worked on. So this is a really huge step. I've said this so many times, but I'll say it again, here in Dungog Shire, we have the very unique situation of having over 700 kms of roads, we have really high rainfall, which is not good for good for roads in general, we also have an incredibly low rate base, and we're also one of the only Shire's in the state that does not have a single state road. So, the ability of the Council to maintain our roads is impossible unless we get a funding boost or NSW categorises some of our roads as state roads. There is absolutely no amount of budgeting we could do to fix the roads. I think we all know the roads are not to the standard that any of us want. So this motion is really important, because whilst we might not have money, we're not just sitting there. We're looking at ways that we can improve roads that don't rely purely on funds, because we know we just don't have them. So that's a really good motion that was passed.
A lot of positive feedback was received and tabled at the council meeting, and some labor hire tenders were declined, specifically because the current providers were much more cost-effective. If you do want to read any of that, you can jump online to the council's website. The full agenda is there, plus the meeting notes as well, so you can see exactly who said what, and who voted on what.
So moving on, the Dungog Housing and Infrastructure Master Plan is still very much underway. Vacy and Paterson are the next locations where community information sessions will be held. They are on Sunday, 3 August. If you haven't already been to one of these sessions, you can still go to that one, or you can also jump online to the council's website and provide your feedback via the online survey as well. From the reports I've seen, there's been quite a lot of response from the public. So thanks very much. If you do want to contribute, I encourage you to do the survey.
The viewing platform is another survey you would have seen that is out now. Dungog Shire, in partnership with Dungog Regional Tourism, is calling on locals to nominate their favorite lookouts across the Shire. Surveys open until 27 July, so for about another 10 days. You can jump online and fill out the survey. It doesn't take long at all.
I've had a lot of questions about this as well, so I think I'll just provide a little bit of context around this. This initiative isn't diverting any Council funds away from roads or essential services. It's about working with Dungog Regional Tourism, a passionate volunteer-run community group. We're working with them to explore sites for a potential scenic view, which is in line with their mission. It's also in line with the Dungog tourism policy documents. So there's no money being spent on building anything. This is simply just the start of the community engagement process. It's just to gather ideas and locations and see if we can work on something in the future.
I've just talked about the roads, but Council's number one priority is roads! That hasn't changed, and it's not going to change into the future as well. And I will just say, if the council had the money to fix the roads, they would tomorrow, you know, but it's just not the reality that we're living in at the moment, unfortunately. If you are curious about where the money is being spent and how the Council is spending money or investing money, I encourage everyone to jump on the Council website. You can look at the council budget. They have a capital works program and some really handy financial summaries if you don't want to trudge through those documents, which I don't blame you for. It's all there, it's updated regularly, so you can jump online and you can look at it all. This is about Council working with community groups, helping community groups like the DRT, to find low cost, grant-funded ways to support tourism, to promote our Shire. It's not taking anything away from our core priorities. This is a really big focus for this council in general. We have all these amazing groups in our community. They're actually doing amazing things, and it doesn't cost anything for council to really leverage and work with these groups, and that's something that we really should be focusing on. It makes the shire better for all of us. If you haven't already, jump online and fill out that survey if you know a spot.
I think that's about it from me. If you see me around, or you want to chat, or you want to send me a message or phone call, please feel free. I'm always around. Thank you very much. Have a good week.
