Council puts off almost $50M in capital works projects

A series of unfortunate events leads to amount of deferred projects almost doubling, though disasters aren’t the only culprit.

Upgrades to the Armidale Road will be carried over to next year’s capital works program. Photo: Clarence Valley Council

As councils are learning across NSW, it isn’t just natural disasters and lockdowns impacting their capacity to deliver planned projects on time. It’s also those dastardly state government grants.

While the coronavirus pandemic and natural disasters had a well known impact on Council works, increased expenditure by the NSW government has also influenced the amount of projects being put on hold.

With a number of stimulus grants contingent on projects being completed within a certain time frame, a number of projects on the 2020/21 capital works program had to be deferred so Council could take advantage of the huge state expenditure.

Prior to this week’s council meeting staff had identified some $26 million in projects which would need to be deferred and on Thursday councillors approved a further $21 million to be pushed back into 2021/22 program.

Phase 1 of the Ulmarra Riverside and Village Precinct Plan was part of the 2020/21 capital works program. With just 7 per cent of the project’s budget expended this year it will carry over to 2021/22.

Council staff also noted that as a result of the extra stimulus funds the capital works program was increased by more than $25 million to almost $100 million, though less than half of the money allocated had been spent.

Partially deferred projects include upgrades on Armidale Road, installation of solar energy systems and work on the Ulmarra riverside precinct.

One of the key factors which influenced the lack of progress on the capital works program included material supply issues stemming from the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Staff have recently observed long lead times with some products and material supplies that would ordinarily be available “off the shelf”,” staff stated in council documents.

The installation of solar energy systems on Council buildings will be held off until 2021/22. Photo Bruce Thomas

“A contractor recently advised that their supplier of mill finish metal was significantly impacted resulting in an estimated five-month wait for the shortfall.”

The numerous floods, one of which was classified in the major category, also didn’t help.

“There were (approximately) 150 flood affected roads throughout the LGA attributed to the March 2021 flood event with significant impacts to both the unsealed and sealed road network,”

“The reallocation of resources was also necessary from ‘business as usual’ activities to managing our flood response and recovery. As such, works that were intended to be completed as part of the 2020/21 Capital Works Program are now unable to be completed.”

Councillors voted to endorse the variations to the 2021/22 Revised Budget and Capital Works Program to reflect the removal of the deferred projects.