The $50 million Crago Mill Precinct Project takes shape at Yass and will become Yass Valley Council’s new administration building. Photo: Yass Valley Council.
Yass Valley Council wants to get its act together internally before considering hiking next financial year’s rates.
That’s according to Mayor Jasmin Jones, who reckons the council’s true financial position in recent times has been muddied because money has been allocated incorrectly in the various council departments including water, sewage and waste.
Council’s finances came under notice from the Office of Local Government last year over concerns about how to repay a $50 million loan for a controversial redevelopment project.
“While the office of Local Government has asked the council to consider pulling all the potential levers to improve its financial situation, our first priority is to increase our internal efficiency, exploring business opportunities for revenue growth and conduct service reviews in discussion with the community, but we will do this before we consider any rate increases,” Ms Jones said.
The mayor said using proceeds of land sales and government grants, the council would lessen the financial impact of the controversial $50 million Crago Mill Precinct Project that will create new administration offices, a library and an emergency operations centre for Yass.
And despite the council resolving in late November last year to bring in consultants to take a deep dive into the council’s true financial position, and consider refinancing the $50 million loan and delaying stage two of Crago Mill, it will instead consider other money-saving measures.
The decision was made at an extraordinary meeting on 30 January. The councillors set aside the previous motion on 28 November and instead resolved to get advice on where to allocate money in its various departments, such as waste and water and overcome errors in its internal financial accounting.
The council will also issue a report it received from a financial presentation made on 18 December.
One dissenting councillor, Adrian Cameron, said the decision on 28 November, which had been unanimously supported and initiated by a mayoral minute, should have been followed through. It was a breach of trust not to do so because the councillors had told the community they were going to investigate the finances. “The bottom line is, we don’t know what we don’t know,” he said.
Ms Jones said circumstances including the appointment of a new chief financial officer, Jason McGuire, overtook the council’s previous decision, and the work (of reviewing council’s financial position) was being achieved through other means.
“Pleased to meet you”. Yass Mayor Jasmin Jones greets the council’s new chief financial officer Jason McGuire. Photo: Yass Valley Council.
“Rather than push on with something we have already achieved, it makes much better financial sense to use the money and build a fresh scope, which is the next plank on the floor towards financial sustainability,” she said.
Mr McGuire previously worked for the Tasmanian Government for 18 years and before that, the Australian Government for 17 years.
Ms Jones said with 30 years’ experience in state and federal financial and resource management he would lead any reviews of the council’s position.
“We are already seeing Jason is quite capable of leading this process. However, there are some bodies of work that will require resourcing up our financial team, and we will take some advice from Mr McGuire if and when it is needed to implement consultants to help us,” she said.
Ms Jones said that, looking at the council’s financial position, everything would be up for review, including the Crago Mill Precinct Project.
In a Facebook post in December Ms Jones said the council was working to provide clarity around the finances that support this project.
“While a loan for the full amount was secured, council has since discovered land sales to offset the project were no further progressed and general accounting documents were not showing council’s true financial position with the waste account sitting inside this masking our true position.”
Separate from that post, the mayor said: “What we really need to be watching is our cash position and current level of service and whether there are any opportunities for some blue sky thinking as well, to look at ways we could not only look to the efficiencies which I’m sure the office of Local Government wants us to do, but also potentially increase income from other streams.”
Meanwhile, applications for a new CEO closed on 7 February after the council sacked its previous chief executive Chris Berry in November last year.
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