Councillor critiques city’s monitoring of community plan

THE City of Greater Geelong has reported considerable progress over the past 12 months as it works towards its 30-year vision to make Greater Geelong a clever and creative city, but one councillor has questioned the effectiveness of its monitoring system.

On Tuesday, the council met to present a quarterly update on its Community Plan 2021-25.

The plan, which outlines the city’s priorities and desired outcomes over the four-year period, is supported by an annual budget, as well as an annual action plan.

A total of 75 actions were committed to in the council’s annual action plan for the 2023-24 financial year, with 57 now considered “complete”, at the end of June this year.

A further 18 actions are considered “ongoing”, including the implementation of the city’s social housing plan, finalisation of the Market Square quarter masterplan and the implementation of stage 2 of the Drysdale sporting precinct master plan.

Speaking at the meeting, Cr Jim Mason said he understood that “all cannot be done at once”, but suggested some of the city’s operations were not being monitored adequately.

“Though we have done some excellent work, there still needs to be improvements in our monitoring system,” he said.

“For example, we do intend to harmonise various policy documents, especially those related to the management of climate change and environment, and this is a work in progress and in the hands of our excellent environmental team, but I don’t know that we monitor that as well as we ought to.”

He also pointed to a resolution made by the council at its November meeting last year to develop a business case for livestock and information exchange, suggesting that while steps have been taken toward this resolution, the agriculture sector required further attention.

Cr Mason did, however, celebrate the progress that had been made on several of the initiatives and projects outlined in the community plan, highlighting the city’s work on the prevention of family violence and violence against women, its partnership with the Geelong Zero Alliance to co-design a strategic approach to end homelessness, and the incorporation of environmentally sustainable design principles into new urban growth areas.