The third Future of Local Government (FOLG) Summit was staged in Melbourne in June. Three frameworks were discussed and endorsed to help Councils across the nation share an agreed vision for the future. This vision embraces internal reforms and addresses key challenges in a proactive and collective way.
The FOLG Summits have been hosted by the Municipal Association of Victoria (MAV) to lead, encourage and inspire the sector to define its preferred future direction and create the roadmap to achieve it.
The pursuit of internal reforms was also a key recommendation of the PricewaterhouseCoopers national financial sustainability study produced last year for the Australian Local Government Association (ALGA).
President of the MAV, Councillor Dick Gross, said the frameworks are about finding a common approach for Councils to adapt to changing community needs, adopting solutions to combat the ongoing pressure on Council rates, and creating the impetus for better intergovernmental funding arrangements.
“The common foundation principle was Local Government’s primary responsibility for ensuring community wellbeing,” he said. “All three frameworks represent action plans for the sector to take control of its destiny by driving ongoing improvements and delivering required community outcomes.”
The ‘performance framework’ details how Councils can achieve accurate measurement to guide more accountable and transparent performance. It suggests a list of national indicators, which will be proposed to ALGA for agreed development by State Local Government Associations. The draft list of indicators includes community wellbeing, satisfaction, engagement and leadership; percentage of asset renewal demand being funded; and the Local Government cost index.
This framework also includes the development of a clearing house of continuous improvement case studies in Victoria, which may grow to a national clearing house; along with a step type improvement program to be initiated by the MAV.
The ‘cooperation framework’ identifies sector wide processes for regional collaboration to improve services and save costs.
Under the framework, each State Local Government Association is expected to identify statewide opportunities for inter Council cooperation, facilitate an online clearing house or knowledge bank with case studies from Australia and overseas, facilitate study tours for Councillors and officers to assess leading cases of inter Council cooperation and initiate regional workshops.
It also encourages more regional Local Government meetings, working groups, sharing of reports and partnering arrangements between metro and rural Councils.
The ‘accountability framework’ advocates more engagement using community planning models as the key driver for stronger Council Plans that deliver on local service needs and priorities.
Further details of the three frameworks are available at www.mav.asn.au/folg
