Now that the NSW Government is ranking councils on the time it takes to approve development applications, which councils are the fastest, and which are the slowest?
As councils assess approximately 85 per cent of all residential development applications, the NSW Government introduced a new Statement of Expectations and league tables as their performance is critical to confronting the housing crisis this month.
In FY 2023-24 up to 30 June 2024 Liverpool has the slowest average assessment time with 256 days for 730 assessments. On the flip side, Narrandera has the fastest average determination time with 20 days for 48 assessments.
During that time the Central Coast assessed the most development applications with 1,614 assessments, with an average assessment time of 140 days.
Property Council of Australia NSW Executive Director Katie Stevenson said while many councils are lifting their game, there were still too many examples of local planning authorities taking too long to determine relatively simple development projects.
“The release of this league table is imperative so that newly elected councils can hit the ground running with a clear understanding of their performance and the improvements needed, and to help maintain NSW’s profile as an attractive environment for investment.
“Introducing greater performance monitoring into the planning system is a sensible step to turbocharge state and local government assessment of new housing projects and see how we are tracking against our interstate counterparts,” she said.
“Allowing planning authorities to churn over the same application for years isn’t going to bring us closer to delivering on state or local housing targets.
“The housing crisis is real, and it is time that applications were processed with the level of vigour and velocity that matches the urgency of the need to deliver new housing,” Ms Stevenson said.
Regionally Significant Development Applications referral times to planning panels will be published from August, State Significant Development assessment timeframes for infill affordable housing will be published from September 2024 and TOD accelerated precinct assessment timeframes in 2025.
This data will monitor the State Government’s performance so that it also is held accountable.
The council league table and Statement of Expectations Order are part of the NSW Government’s Faster Assessments program. This includes $200 million in financial incentives for councils that meet the new expectations for development applications, planning proposals and strategic planning.
If a council consistently underperforms over time, the Minister for Local Government has the authority to issue a Performance Improvement Order. A Performance Improvement Order outlines the actions that the Minister requires to be taken to improve the performance of the council.