April 2024
Michael Courtney
Managing Director
Introduction to our Sustainable Council Program
CT Management Group has developed its Sustainable Council Program to integrate service planning and asset management to ensure Council’s levels of service are optimised, meet future demand and are financially sustainable.
Councils of the future
The environment in which Councils operate is demanding greater transparency, longer term strategic planning and an ever-present focus on financial sustainability.
The 2024/25 Sustainable Council Program has been developed to support Councils prepare to meet future challenges and remain financially sustainable.
The Sustainable Council Program is in response to the challenges facing the sector with the dual focus of remaining financially sustainable in an environment of diminishing revenue and growing community expectations.
The program seeks to have a strategic and operational focus to advance sector capacity and capability during these challenging times.
“Business as usual” is not an option so increasing sector collaboration, establishing long term financial plans with integrity and enhancing the strategic capacity of the sector are the key challenges.
We believe the program will greatly assist the new Council induction program and facilitate strategic discussion around the long-term financial sustainability of the Council.
The Program
The Sustainable Council Program is a maturity assessment framework to assess Council’s financial sustainability – that is the Council’s capacity to:
- fund its range of services in accordance with the current level of service.
- meet changes in demand for services into the future and be able to provide alternative levels of service.
- meet capital investment requirements that arise from existing services (renewal), updated service levels and new services.
- adapt and meet future intergenerational challenges at the local level.
The Sustainable Council Program examines 8 key areas:
- Understanding financial sustainability
- Corporate Governance
- Asset Management
- Financial Reporting
- Annual Planning Budgeting & Rating
- Long Term Financial Management Plan
- Service Management
- Financial Management Skills- Councillors & staff
A facilitated session examining key issues under each of the key areas provides participants with a self-assessment supported by an independent evaluation against compliance requirements and best practice.
The benefits of the SCP to Council participants are:
- Understanding where the gaps/deficits are in policies and compliance.
- Detailing improvement opportunities into an Improvement Plan.
- Benchmarking with peers.
- Providing a focus to improve the quality of their LTFP and the respective elements that support the plan.
- Focus on the integration of Asset and Service Management.
- Improving financial strategy competencies.
- Assessing alignment of the LTFP to the Council Plan,
- Determining risk of Council’s financial sustainability in the long term- e.g. DCP’s.
Financial Ratios Data
CT Management have a 10-year history of financial ratios data including the Councils Budget information. Annual Report data collection commences as Councils publish their Annual Reports to their websites.
This information will form part of the benchmarking component of the program.
Council Report
The performance of the Council will be reported on through a Summary Report plus comparative performance data for each Council.
Look forward to your response & further enquiries at michaelc@ctman.com.au
Michael Courtney
Managing Director
CT Management Group