North Sydney Council couldn’t get its rate rise. You might pay for that on New Year’s Eve

North Sydney Council will consider a crackdown on parking offences, ticketed entry for New Year’s Eve celebrations and increased fees on harbourside parks for events as it attempts to raise revenue and repair its budget after the pricing regulator rejected a proposed 87 per cent rate rise.

The council is poised to cut services and sell assets months after warning it faced “critical decisions” as the cost of the fraught North Sydney Olympic Pool rebuild spiralled upwards to $122 million.

The council will consider ticketed entry to New Year’s Eve celebrations at fireworks vantage points around the harbour.Credit: Wolter Peeters

Mayor Zoe Baker said the council would conduct a full review of its services and programs before making decisions, and measures to repair its finances would not be a “slash and burn” exercise.

“The staff recommendation is that we have a good look at service levels and seriously consider council asset sales, with the purpose to address the level of debt we have as a result of the pool.

“We will have to struggle with those decisions in coming months.”

The council applied to the NSW Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal for a special rates variation to increase property owners’ rates by 87.05 per cent, as well as increasing its minimum residential rate from $715 to $1548, over two years. The tribunal shot down both proposals after finding the council had failed to make a compelling case for the increase to payments.

Council staff had hoped the proposed increase to rates would glean more than $25 million. The tribunal’s decision means the local government cannot raise rates above the 4 per cent rate peg increase in 2025-26.

Councillors this week voted to place a revised delivery program and operational plan on public exhibition before they decide whether to adopt them at an extraordinary meeting on June 30.

Baker told the meeting there was “no cause for celebration over IPART’s decision” and the council would need to slash or defer $12.5 million worth of infrastructure renewals in the next financial year, sell off council buildings or land and reduce or cut service levels for thousands of ratepayers.

The council is considering cuts to services including community transport, verge mowing, street sweeping, graffiti removal and maintenance of parks and gardens, and customer service levels.

Construction on North Sydney Olympic Pool is expected to be completed in October – three years later than expected.Credit: Dion Georgopoulos

It will also explore revenue-raising measures such as increased “compliance activity” for parking offences, ticketed entry to New Year’s Eve events, increased advertising on council property and places – such as selling sponsorship or naming rights to North Sydney Oval – and new or increased fees and charges for using parks and open spaces for events, and for road closures.

Baker said the request to increase rates was an attempt to improve the council’s financial position “without cutting council services, or flogging off council buildings and land as a short-term sugar hit to address the liquidity crisis we must face over the next 12 months because of the pool”.

“The devastating impacts of the pool project have generated $61 million in external borrowings but also drained council’s reserves of nearly another $49 million.”

Councillor MaryAnn Beregi said the debts of nearly $100 million “have to be paid back, and by allocating internal reserves, we are kicking the can down the road on infrastructure renewals”.

North Sydney mayor Zoe Baker.Credit: Janie Barrett

“It was not this council, but a previous council, that committed this community to the disastrous and ill-conceived pool project, which continues to plague us and plague us and plague us.”

Councillor James Spenceley said the elected officials had “absolutely failed the community”.

“What a mess. We shot for the stars – 87 per cent. And here we are, making service cuts, talking about asset sales, using debt, all the things we should have done to reduce the impact of that proposed rate rise. This is ad hoc decision-making at its worst.”

Liberal councillor Jessica Keen said the rates decision showed “the residents of North Sydney were heard”, but “there’s got to be other options for our residents so they don’t have to face service cuts”.

Councillor Nicole Antonini took aim at Liberal councillors and MPs who stridently opposed the rate rise, and said councillors had to fix the mess left by previous councils.

“It’s not just the mess of cleaning up a vanity project of an over-the-top pool that has put our council in debt, but years of ignoring our community assets, allowing them to fall into disrepair.”

”Our only library that floods regularly, a sports centre that’s had its roof blown off, an archaic computer system. We now even have engineers checking on our bus shelters, assessing their safety and whether they need to be closed and removed, with no funds to rebuild.”

The pool closed in February 2021 and work began in March. It was originally forecast to reopen in November 2022. The cost of the project has nearly doubled from an initial estimate of $58 million.

Developer Icon says construction on the complex will be completed in October; the council has estimated it probably won’t be finished until November and might not open until early next year.

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