In September 2005, an amendment to planning legislation in New South Wales introduced the requirement that only one Development Control Plan (DCP) per planning authority could apply to the same land. After amalgamation in the Clarence Valley, six different Local Environment Plans (LEP) and 73 Development Control Plans existed.
Manager Strategic Planning, David Morrison, said that initially Council wanted the 73 DCPs reduced to 32, however the new State Government legislation will mean they need to be reduced to seven.
“We will form one DCP for each zone,” he said. “For example, one for residential regulations, one for industrial land and so forth. The new DCPs will need to include regulations concerning building height, development footprint and other specifications. Previously, each of these regulations would be in a different DCP.”
David Morrison said that Council has already consolidated the six LEPs into one, but streamlining the DCPs is a two year program that is still in progress.
“We need to go through all previous regulations in the same area and ascertain the most logical from these,” he said. David Morrison said that Council is using a staged approach.
“We have formed some consistency, especially for the everyday matters,” he said. In forming the new DCPs, the Strategic Planning team of six are striving to make the regulations more user friendly so that they are accessible to a broader audience. David Morrison said it is not the policies themselves that are being changed but the small details.
“The majority of differences between the existing plans were minor,” he said. Planning for future growth and development represents a challenge for the Council planning team and a number of forward planning studies are scheduled to commence in the near future.
