Metro Mayors push back on City Council call for council mergers across Adelaide
Adelaide metropolitan Mayors have rejected fresh calls for a cut back in the number of SA councils, saying communities risked losing their identity and constituents their voice.
SA News
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A call from the Adelaide Lord Mayor for a reduction in the number of SA councils has been met with a mixed reaction, with business leaders and academics backing the move but metropolitan mayors questioning the benefits and fearing the loss of community identity.
Adelaide Lord Mayor Sandy Verschoor sparked renewed interest in the long-running issue on the merits of council amalgamations in SA in a column in today’s The Advertiser.
SA Property Council CEO Daniel Gannon said Ms Verschoor’s proposal to expand the boundaries of the city council, including into surrounding suburbs, made sense.
“The benefits of recasting council boundaries substantially outweigh the costs,” Mr Gannon said.
Amalgamating the Adelaide City Council with neighbouring areas such as Burnside, Norwood Payneham & St Peters, Prospect, West Torrens, Unley and Walkerville would help save ratepayer money and improve efficiency, he said.
The Property Council is advocating for the number of SA councils to be cut from 68 to 32, with the number of councils in the metropolitan region halved from 19 to nine.
Mr Gannon said the mergers would be welcome during a period when “every dollar of ratepayer money will be spent wisely” while the economy is under “serious duress” as a result of COVID-19.
Executive Director of the SA Centre for Economic Studies Associate Professor Michael O’Neil said, historically, amalgamations had generally led to benefits for communities.
“There are opportunities to get (many) more efficiencies and scale economies in areas of procurement,” Associate Professor O’Neil said.
“Councils get better area planning” and better knowledge on “where to allow medium density housing and transport development” in order to maximise efficiency and reduce costs.
He also said mergers would allow for enhanced collaboration and discussion between councils and the state government and that would be good for atepayers.
He said one long-term benefit of amalgamating would promote the effectiveness of “systematic planning” and council development.
But Adelaide metropolitan mayors were cooler on the idea.
Burnside Council Mayor Anne Monceaux rejected the idea, saying a “loss of community identity” was a major concern for her constituents.
Norwood, Payneham & St Peters Mayor Robert Bria agreed and accused the city council of adopting a “very arrogant approach” to the issue.
Mr Bria said merging councils would result in a loss of ratepayer’s voices, removing the community spirit that councils thrive on and would also lead to “resentment” “jealousy” and “community division.”
He also said it would also be unfair for one council, which was managing its finances well, to be combined with another area that was not.
While Mr Bria said he supported voluntary amalgamations, he added that the calls from the ACC to merge are “more a cry for help than a genuine call for amalgamations” and refused to support forced mergers.
City of Prospect Mayor David O’Loughlin said his council was doing just fine on its own.
“Prospect doesn’t have high debt,” Mr O’Loughlin said.
“We’re not looking at asset sales, we haven’t made a single person redundant through COVID, our local businesses are booming, real estate prices are through the roof and we have a works program that’s bigger than any year.”
Unley Mayor Michael Hewitson also pushed back on the idea, saying he feared his constituents would lose their voice in any merger with a neighbouring council.
Such a change, Mr Hewitson said, would mean “a loss of say of the local people in the environment in which we live”.
“A local council wants a local solution,” he said.
West Torrens Mayor Michael Coxon amalgamation would lead to a decline in representation, particularly for elected female members, and would not represent the needs of all ratepayers equally.
“The needs of some communities in West Torrens would be significantly different to the needs of communities in other areas,” he said.
Mr Coxon also said his experience showed there were no real financial benefits to amalgamations.
He said that ratepayers expected amalgamations would lead to a reduction in rates but it in fact they lead to increases.
“I would be reluctant for the council to engage in any activity that would cause our ratepayers due financial stress.”
Originally published as Metro Mayors push back on City Council call for council mergers across Adelaide
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