By Andrew Cantwell
While the world’s attention has been turned to matters of survival in the Covid-19 pandemic, the Casey Council has been hard at work on matters of revival, assessing changes to its operations in the post-councillor period.
The administration has in the past two months taken a good hard look at itself … under the watchful eye of interim administrator Noelene Duff.
At the council’s meeting on 7 April, Ms Duff considered an audit report on Casey’s operations in relation to eight ‘pillars of good governance’, developed during the administration period of the City of Greater Geelong.
The comprehensive audit considered 52 different aspect of operations under eight broad categories: direction and leadership; culture and behaviour; structure, systems and policies; decision making; communication and community engagement; capability; risk and compliance; and monitoring and review.
From these, 12 areas have been identified in an action plan for further improvement in a process to be undertaken in the second half of this year and into next year.
Regular reports will come back to the public council meeting under the administrator.
As part of the audit, councillor obligations were also assessed against 12 criteria developed under a Local Government Monitor’s oversight of the Wimmera Shire Council in 2018.
Casey found itself compliant in eight of those 12 areas, and partially compliant in the others. There were no areas of non-compliance.
Those areas of partial compliance will also be reviewed over successive months.
The work is being undertaken to prepare Casey for the return of councillors in elections in 2024.
