City of Palmerston CEO Luccio Cercarelli appointed to head prominent government department
A prominent Top End council CEO has been appointed to head Steve Edgington’s mega housing, community development and local government department – and he will have a pressing item of business when he starts.
Politics
Don't miss out on the headlines from Politics. Followed categories will be added to My News.
The City of Palmerston will appoint an interim chief executive officer and begin recruiting for a permanent head after its CEO of almost seven years was poached by the incoming CLP government to head up a department.
On Tuesday afternoon, Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro announced a suite of changes to the leadership of a number of government departments and agencies, with Luccio Cercarelli, the council’s CEO, announced as new head of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Community Development.
His final day at the council will be on September 27.
In a statement, Mr Cercarelli said he was “incredibly proud” of what the council had achieved during his tenure.
“I will watch on with great interest as City of Palmerston continues to thrive and achieve even greater milestones in the future.”
Palmerston Mayor Athina Pascoe-Bell said Mr Cercarelli successfully navigated complex challenges, implemented significant initiatives, successfully obtained funding and worked tirelessly to enhance the wellbeing and prosperity of the Palmerston community.
“The past six-plus years have seen significant changes to operations, customer service and delivery of significant projects in the city, including the rollout of smart LED streetlights, Gray Community Hall, SWELL Palmerston, Christmas Wonderland, Darwin Festival, the first stages of Zuccoli Community Hub, new animal management by-laws, and numerous changes to the way the council interacts with the community,” she said.
“These changes would not have been possible without a chief executive officer of Luccio’s calibre.”
Before his appointment at the City of Palmerston, Mr Cercarelli was the city operations general manager for the City of Darwin.
Although the mayor was fulsome in her praise of Mr Cercarelli, his reign has not been blemish free.
There exists a fractious relationship between local developers and the council over what the former says is chronic instability within the latter’s planning and assessment team, and the council has in recent months been plagued by chronic short-staffing former employees say is due to a poor workplace culture.
A pressing order of business for Mr Cercarelli will be settling spooked horses within the local government sector, which is deeply wary about CLP plans to de-amalgamate regional councils, believing it would weaken finances unacceptably due to duplication and reduced rates bases.
The sector has nothing against de-amalgamation in principle, but wants appropriate consultation and financial support for affected councils if that is the path the government ultimately travels.
In a statement issued before the announcement of Mr Cercarelli’s appointment, Local Government Association of the Northern Territory president, Darwin Mayor Kon Vatskalis, said the sector was ready to work with new minister Steve Edgington.
“The CLP has indicated they have a focus on delivering best-practice local government and a desire for grassroots collaboration and consultation, and we are looking forward to playing a positive role in the future of local decision making, particularly in regional areas, where 89 per cent of elected members are Aboriginal,” Mr Vatskalis said.
New $100m federal cash pool to help women escape DV, homelessness
Organisations helping Territorians escape domestic violence have a chance to access $100m as part of a new federal push to build crisis shelters and emergency housing.
Crims could get two years jail for boasting online under new laws
Territorians who post videos of crimes online could face up to two years behind bars under new ‘post and boast’ laws set to be introduced when parliament sits this month.