Item 7.1 - Attachment 1 |
Previous Council Report |
ECONOMY AND DEVELOPMENT
ITEM NUMBER 7.9
SUBJECT DA Assessment
Governance Framework
REFERENCE F2008/00998 - D01951193
REPORT OF Group Manager Outcomes and Development
PURPOSE: This report reviews
key components of the Governance Framework for the assessment of Development Applications,
including: - Delegations to the Chief Executive Officer for the determination of
applications; - Site inspections; - Notifications of development applications over the Christmas period; - Referral of development applications to external agencies; and - Consideration of DAs at both Council meetings. |
(a) That
Council re-affirm the decision of 9 March 2009 and amended on 28 June 2010 regarding
the functions delegated to the Chief Executive Officer that relate to the
determination of development applications, subject to the following changes,
being: (1) Approve development applications
(including Section 96 applications) provided: i. There are not more than 9 objections to
the development; or ii. The development does not involve a
variation to a Development Standard of more than 10%; or ii. The development
application does not relate to land in which Council holds, or has recently
held, a direct pecuniary interest; or iii. The development
application is not known to have been made, or relate to a property owned by
a member of staff or a Councillor; or iv. The
development application does not involve demolition of a heritage item; or v. The
development application does not relate to a brothel, massage parlour, sex
service premises, restricted premises, tattoo parlour, place of public
worship, infill housing under the Affordable Housing SEPP or boarding house; vi. The application does not seek a review of
determination under Section 82A review; or vii. The
application is not a Section 96(AA) application, or viii. The
application is not a Section 96(2) application where the original development
application was determined by the elected Council; or ix. The
application is not a Section 96 (1A) application where the original
development application was determined by the elected Council and the
modification sought relates to a condition which was added by the Council
beyond the recommendation contained in the officer report. (b) That if any 2 or more Councillors
give the CEO notice in writing that a DA should be considered at a Council
Meeting, that application must be referred to Council for determination. (c) That a monthly report be
provided to Councillors listing in summary all development applications which
have any of the following characteristics:- i. still under consideration for 6 months or
longer; ii. more than $750,000 in value; iii. have
attracted any objections; iv. have an impact
or are in a heritage or conservation zone. (d) That
the site inspection, if required, occur in the week before the Council
meeting, once the officers’ assessment report has been completed; (e) That
an amendment to the Notification Development Control Plan be prepared to
introduce an extended notification period over the Christmas period as
outlined in the attached report; (f) That
referral to NSW Police Service of DAs be for liquor licences matters
associated with Hotels and Clubs unless the CEO determines otherwise; and (g) Further,
that the Code of Meeting Practice be amended to provide for the
consideration of development applications at all Council meetings. |
BACKGROUND
1. In
June 2010, the Council adopted amendments to the Delegations to the Chief
Executive Officer to determine development applications.
2. It
is timely that a review be undertaken into the effect of those changes. In addition, it is appropriate to consider
some other components of the DA Assessment Governance Framework including;
- site
inspections;
- notifications
of development applications over the Christmas period; and
- referral
of development applications to external agencies.
- consideration
of DAs at both Council meetings.
3. The
ATTACHED report benchmarks
Parramatta City Council’s DA assessment processes and performance against the
City of
ISSUES AND DISCUSSION POINTS
4. The
key issues discussed in the ATTACHED report are:
Delegations
¨ Current
delegations include some provisions which are unclear or redundant and there is
inconsistency in the call up provisions (3 Councillors for heritage items and 2
for other types of DAs).
¨ The
median value of the DAs referred to the Council for determination is only
$26,000.
¨ The
percentage of DAs being referred to the Council for determination is 14%, which
is significantly higher than the State average of 4%, and the highest it has
been at PCC in over 10 years.
¨ The
increase in the number of DA determined by the full Council aligns with a
decrease with the number of DA assessed in less than 40 days.
¨ The
full Council adopts the recommendation of the staff in relation to development
applications for 94% of DAs.
¨ The
average assessment time for DAs determined by the full Council is 136 days
compared to the average for all DAs of 80 days.
¨ The
average queue time due to the agenda preparation process for DAs which are
referred to Council for determination is 26 days.
¨ The
consideration of DAs at a Council meeting is a batching process which affects
smooth work flows.
¨ While
it is standard practice to refer DAs with a variation to a development standard
greater than 10%, to the Council for determination this is not reflected in the
terms of the delegations.
¨ With
the general call up provisions, it may not be necessary to set a number of
objections that would trigger referral to Council, other than those DAs that
have a Site Inspection (ie 10 or more objections).
5. It is recommended that the following
changes be made to the Delegations.
· That
only heritage matters involving the demolition of heritage items be referred to
Council and the general a call up provision remain in the event that a
Councillor is concerned about the nature of the building work associated with a
heritage item.
· That
Section 96 applications of DAs originally considered by Council only be
referred to Council when it is a Section 96(2) applications or where it
involves a condition which the Council added beyond the recommendation of the
Council Officers.
· DAs
that receive more than 9 objections be referred to the Council for
determination. This aligns to the Site
Inspection requirements and if a Councillor has a concern about a DA for which
there are fewer objections the “call up” provision would enable the Councillor,
with the support of a colleague, to “call up” that DA to the Council.
· DAs
that have a variation to a Development Standard of greater than 10% be referred
to Council.
Site Inspections
6. An
independent report, by Mr Jason Perica, recommended that the current Site
Inspection process be modified so that the Site Inspections do not occur until
after the Officer’s report has been prepared so that there can be no suggestion
that Councillors attending site meetings have either pre-determined the
application or are directing staff on the recommendation they should make in
the assessment of the application.
7. It
would be possible to conduct site inspections in the week before the Council
meeting. There is a 13 day window of opportunity to arrange these meetings.
Notification Policy
8. The
current notification policy specifies that DAs should not be on notification
from16 December until 14 January of the following year. This means that an application lodged in late
November may not commence notification until the 14 January, 40 days after the
application was lodged.
9. The
consequence of Council’s policy is that, on 14 January this year, 150 DAs
commenced notification and 14 days later most of these completed their
notification period. A key issue for the smooth processing of development
applications and an efficient use of resources is to create smoother work flows
(eg. remove batching of work).
10. The
current policy creates a significant batching problem with the assessment of
applications and also creates an expectation for applicants that once their
notification is completed officers will finalise the assessment. Without a significant change to resources, it
would simply not be possible to complete the assessment of 150 DAs quickly
after that period.
11. Batching
of notifications is reflected throughout the first quarter of every year and
the number of DAs determined in January and February is low and assessment
times higher through March and April.
12. It
is recommended that an amendment be prepared to the Notification DCP to provide
for an extended notification period over the Christmas period with reminder
letters sent during the notification period, to replace the no-notification
period.
External Referrals
13.
14. However,
an area where we have a number of optional referrals is the NSW Police
Service. This includes referrals to NSW
Police Service for crime prevention applications associated with massage
parlours, brothels and other sex premises.
Council’s Community Crime Prevention Officer has a very good
relationship with the NSW Police Service and he is in constant liaison with
them to understand emerging issues and trends.
15. Referrals
to the Police on average take 156 days on crime prevention matters and
57 days for liquor establishments. This
demonstrates that despite various efforts to engage the police on these crime
prevention matters their interest in these matters (at the DA stage) is
reflected in the referral times for these DAs.
16. It
may be appropriate to only continue with the referrals on liquor licences
issues associated with hotels and clubs including modifications to hotels and
clubs, and then allow the Community Crime Prevention Officer, who also comments
on applications to determine whether he should also seek advice from the NSW
Police Service. The Community Crime
Prevention Officer also has a responsibility to monitor the activities
associated with DAs to identify any matters that should be referred to him for
comments or to be referred to the NSW Police Service and any change to the
standard referrals would not alter that ongoing relationship.
Council Meeting Cycle
17. Council
currently considers DAs only once a month.
This adds to the queue time for DA assessment, causes delays for
customers and increases the impact of batching of work.
18. If
DA matters were considered at both Council Meetings, it is likely that if the
level of Officer Delegation was increased, then at each Council Meeting 5
applications would be considered. This
would provide smoother workflow and reduce delay for customers.
CONSULTATION
& TIMING
19. A
workshop was conducted with Councillors on 18 April 2011 to discuss these
issues.
FINANCIAL
IMPLICATION FOR COUNCIL
20. There are no financial implications to
Council in the adoption of any recommendations of this report.
Group Manager Outcomes and Development
REFERENCE MATERIAL
Previous Council Report |
DA Governance Framework Review May 2011
Preamble
In June 2010, the Council adopted amendments
to the Delegations to the Chief Executive Officer to determine development
applications.
It is timely to review those changes. In addition, it is appropriate to consider
some other components of the DA Assessment Governance Framework including
- Site inspections;
- Notifications of development applications
over the Christmas period;
- Council meeting cycle; and
- Referral of development applications to
external agencies.
This report makes a number of recommendations
relating to these matters.
Benchmarking
The State Government produces a yearly
Performance Monitoring Report.
Parramatta City Council’s performance was reported as one of the most
improved performances in terms of DA assessment times in the 2009/ 2010 period. This was the last reporting period.
Parramatta City Council is classified as a
Category 3 Council and generally its performance is reported on either a
State-wide basis or as Category 3 Council.
In undertaking a broader and more appropriate benchmarking exercise, Council’s
performance has been assessed against similar Councils in relation to the types
of DAs that are likely to be assessed.
The Councils selected for this comparison
were the Hills Shire, North Sydney, the City of
There were five main areas of difference
between
- 50% of DAs at PCC were subject to “stop the
clock”, where as the average was 32%.
- 9% of DAs at Parramatta require an external
referral, this compares to the average of the group at 3%.
- percentage of DAs determined by the full
Council was 9% compared to the average of the group of 7%. However,
the North Sydney Council results skewed the average and Ryde, the Hills
and City of Sydney have determinations by Council at less than 2%.
- Parramatta City Council’s net approval times
were slightly better than the average of the group while gross assessment times
were slightly higher than the average.
This probably reflects the issues associated with the “stop the clock”
and highlights the need to continue to improve the quality of the applications
lodged.
- the number of staff required to assess DAs at
Parramatta was lower than the average and a fulltime equivalent employee (FTE)
assesses more DAs than the average, suggesting efficiency in processes.
These observations
are reflected in the following graphs.
50% of DAs were subject to “stop the
clock”, where as the average was 32%.
9% of DAs at
% of DAs determined by
the full Council was 9% compared to the average of the group of 7%. North
Sydney Council results skewed the average and Ryde, the Hills and City of
Parramatta City
Council’s net approval times were slightly better than the average of the
group but gross assessment times were slightly higher than the average for
the group. This probably reflects
the issues associated with the “stop the clock” and highlights the need to continue to
improve the quality of the applications lodged.
the number of staff
required to assess DAs at
DELEGATIONS
The delegation to
staff to determine Development Applications is a key component of the
governance framework.
How the delegation
is provided to the CEO and the manner in which this delegation is used is
essential to the efficient and effective operation of the Council. The
authority to determine development applications must also be provided in a
manner that:
– Provides appropriate oversight of decision
making by staff
– Gives confidence to the Councillors and the
community that the decisions being made are sound and reasonable, even if
individual councillors may not agree with a decision.
In June 2010, the
Council amended the delegations to the Chief Executive Officer for the
determination of development applications.
These delegations
have resulted in a significant increase in the percentage of DAs being
determined by the full Council (from 9% to 14%). The State average for determination of DAs by
the full Council is 4%, and as discussed earlier in the comparative data, other
Councils, with exception of
At the Hills Shire,
the full Council determined only 1 DA in the 1500 development applications
determined by the Shire.
The following graph
shows the % of DAs determined by the full council since 2000/2001 for the City
of
In the graph below,
it is seen that DA assessment times have increased with the change to the
delegations.
With the increase in
the percentage of DAs determined by the full Council, the percentage of DAs determined in less than
40 days has declined, and the improvement in the gross assessment time has stalled.
There are other
factors affecting the assessment times at the moment including resources
associated with filling current vacancies with permanent staff.
The consideration by
the Council of DAs has an impact on assessment times for a number of
reasons. The first of these is that it
takes longer and consumes more resources on average to assess a DA which is
referred to Council for determination.
For example, from July 2010 until 14 April 2011 the Council determined
125 DAs. Mean gross assessment time for these DAs was 134 days. For all DA determinations the mean gross
assessment time was 80 days.
The other impact,
however, relates to batching of work.
Batching of work is the anathema to smooth work flow which is essential
for efficient and consistent work performance.
Batching causes backlogs and delays, affecting other DAs which are not
referred to Council for determination.
After a Council meeting 15 to 20 DAs determinations will be
processed. Ideally, to maintain a smooth
work flow, 5 DA would be processed each day.
DAs which are
referred to the Council also experience significant queue time. The graph below shows the queue time for
applications considered by Council from October 2010 to April 2011.
While the average
queue time is 26 days, the queue time for individual DAs varies significantly
and one DA had a queue time of nearly 100 days.
The most significant
impact of overall queue time is on customers, where some minor applications,
such as Section 96 applications and office fit-outs, are delayed due to the
cycle of Council Meetings. This queue
time also adds to the batching problem.
An assessment has
also been undertaken of the alignment of Council decisions in relation to
Officers recommendations. This was
conducted prior to February and shows that 94% of DAs are determined in accordance with Officers recommendations,
often with little or no debate.
The median value of
DAs determined by the full Council is $26,000.
This reflects the number of Section 96 applications and relatively small
developments that are now being considered by the Council.
The delegations from
June 2010 also have some ambiguity in their current wording. Therefore some amendment would assist for clarity. Below is the resolution of Council from June
2010, and in bold are the areas where clarity could be improved.
a) That Council re-affirm the decision of
9 March 2009 regarding
the functions delegated to the Chief Executive Officer that relate to the
determination of development applications, subject to the following changes,
being:
(1)
Approve development applications (including section 96
applications)
provided:
i.
There are not more than 5 objections to the development; or
ii.
The development application does not relate to land in which Council holds, or
has recently held, a direct pecuniary interest; or
iii.
The development application is not known to have been made, or relate to a
property owned by a member of staff or Councillor; or
iv.
The development application does not involve demolition or building works associated with a heritage item; or
v.
The development application does not relate to a brothel, massage parlour, sex
service premises, restricted premises, tattoo parlour, place of public worship
or boarding house; or
vi.
The application does not seek a review of determination under section 82A
review; or
vii.
The application is lodged as a ‘Fast
Track DA’ (i.e. swimming pool, garages, awnings, decks pergolas, change of use
and similarly small scale DAs) even if 7 or more objections are received.
With the following
exceptions:
i.
section 96(1a), section 96(2) and section 96(AA) applications where the original development
application was determined by the elected Council; and
ii.
where an application located on a heritage item, three (3) Councillors may
request in writing that an application be ‘called’ to Council for determination.
This written request is to be made no late than 1 week after the conclusion of
the public notification/exhibition period.
(b)
That all section 96 Development applications be
presented to Council for resolution whereby their associated original
development applications were not approved by Council but by an external
authority.
(c)
That a mechanism be provided so that any 2 or more councillors can call up any development application under
consideration for a Council resolution within 2 months, with the
corresponding reports listing the development applications’ recommendations for
approval or refusal, including associated conditions of consent.
(d)
That a
monthly report be provided to Councillors listing in summary all
development applications which have any of the following characteristics:-
i. Still under
consideration for 6 months or longer;
ii. more than $750,000 in
value;
iii. have attracted any
objections;
iv. have an impact or are
in a heritage or conservation zone.
The current
delegations require all DAs involving demolition or building works to a
heritage item to be referred to the Council for determination. There is also a provision providing for the
call up by Councillors on the same type of DAs.
The call up provision is therefore redundant.
In addition, the
call up provision for heritage item DAs requires 3 Councillors and must occur
within a certain period of time. This is different to the call up provisions
for other DAs.
The reference to
“Fast Track” DAs refers to a process no longer in operation. The term “Fast
Track DAs” is not defined and therefore is not applied. In addition, it allows
for approval of a DA with 7 objections, but clause (a) (1) would not allow
approval if there were 5 or 6 objectors.
For this reason this provision is not used by staff to approve DAs.
There is a
requirement to refer Section 96 applications to Council for determination where
the Council or another body (eg L&E Court) have determined the original
DA. Section 96(1a) applications by
definition “have a minimal environmental impact” It therefore seems unnecessary to have these
applications referred to the Council, unless it relates to a condition of
consent that the Council added in addition to the conditions recommended by the
officer’s report.
Part B (reference to
Section 96 applications) is covered by clause i in the resolution and therefore
clause i is redundant.
The current
delegation would allow staff to approve DAs with significant variation to
policy. Standard practice is to refer
development applications involving DAs with variations to a Development
Standard of greater than 10% to the Council, and for completeness this should
be included in the limitations of the delegations.
With a general call
up provision, combined with a requirement to refer matters to the Council which
involves a variation to policy, having a
set number objections as trigger to refer matters to the Council seems
unnecessary. Currently if a DA receives
more than 9 (ie. 10 or more) objections a site inspection is conducted, clearly
these applications should be referred to the Council for determination.
Recommendation
It is recommended
that the following changes be made to the Delegations.
· That heritage matters involving the demolition of heritage items be
referred to Council and the general a call up provision remain in the event
that a Councillor is concerned about the nature of the building work associated
with a heritage item.
· That Section 96 applications of DAs originally considered by Council
only be referred to Council when these are a Section 96(2) application or where
it involves a condition which the Council added beyond the recommendation of
the Council officers.
· DAs that receive more than 9 (ie. 10 or more) objections be referred to
the Council for determination. This
aligns to the Site Inspection requirements and if a Councillor has a concern
about a DA for which there are fewer objections the call up provisions would
enable the Councillor, with the support of a colleague, to “call up” that DA to
the Council.
· DAs that have a variation to a Development Standard of greater than 10%
be referred to Council.
SITE INSPECTIONS
Currently, where an
application receives more than 9 objections, a site inspection is
conducted. Two Councillors may also
request that a site inspection be conducted. Council commissioned an
independent report to investigate complaints alleging in appropriate behaviour
of Council Officers. The Consultant, Mr
Jason Perica, concluded that there was
no inappropriate behaviour by any person but he also made 16 recommendations
for improved work practices.
One of these
recommendations directly affects the Governance Framework (all other
recommendations have now been implemented), this recommendation related to the
site inspection process.
He has recommended
that this process not occur until after the officer’s report has been prepared
so that there can be no suggestion that Councillors attending site meetings pre-determine the application or are
directing staff on the recommendation they should make in the assessment of the
report.
It would be possible
to conduct site inspections in the week before the Council meeting. There is a
13 day window of opportunity to arrange these meetings. Council reports are
finalised on the Tuesday and that will
enable invitations to be sent to applicants and objectors on the Wednesday and
Thursday, and for site meetings to be held the following week from Wednesday or
the weekend prior to the Council Meeting.
Councillors may also
wish to consider whether or not upon gazettal of the new LEP they wish to
continue with site inspections.
Recommendation
The Site Inspection
Process be modified, so that where a Site Inspection is required this occur in
the week before the Council meeting, once the officer’s assessment report has
been completed.
NOTIFICATION POLICY
Council’s current
notification policy states that DAs should not be on notification from16
December until 14 January of the following year. This means that an application lodged in late
November often does not commence notification until the 14 January, some 40
days after the application was lodged.
The implication of
Council’s policy is that, on 14 January this year, 150 DAs commenced
notification period and 14 days later most of those completed their
notification period. As discussed
earlier, a key issue for the smooth processing of development applications and
an efficient use of resources is to create smoother work flows.
The current policy
creates a significant batching problem with the assessment of applications and
also it creates an expectation for applicants that once their application is
completed that notification period Officers will finalise the assessment. Without a significant change to resources, it
would simply not be possible to complete the assessment of 150 DAs quickly
after that period.
Batching of
notifications is reflected throughout the first quarter of every year and the
number of DAs determined in January and February is low, and then there are
higher assessment times through to April.
A review of the
Councils benchmarked as part of this review indicates that all of them continue
notification through the Christmas period but allow for extended
notification.
With Council’s
on-line DA tracking system, neighbours may become aware of applications and be
concerned as to why Council has not commenced notification if there is a
significant delay before notification commences.
Recommendation
It is therefore recommended that a Christmas
Notification period be established and during this period, notification does
not commence and notification is extended beyond the period of the Christmas
notification, by the period of the notification period, if the notification
period would otherwise be completed in that period. It is recommended that this Christmas
Notification period be the 19 December to 5 January.
To further assist
members of the community who may receive notification of DAs before this period
and which extend during this time, Council could send reminder letters during
the period.
This change will
require an amendment to the Notification DCP.
DA REFERRAL TO EXTERNAL AGENCIES
Parramatta City
Council has a very high number of referrals to external agencies. On average it takes 86 days for the external
agency to respond. We have a large number of mandatory referrals which cannot
be modified. These include Rail Corp for
development near rail corridors, and the RTA for development around significant
road corridors.
However, an area
where we have a number of “optional” referrals is the NSW Police Service. This includes referrals to NSW Police Service
for applications associated with massage parlours, brothels and other sex
premises on the basis of Crime Prevention advice. Council’s Community Crime Prevention Officer
has a very good relationship with the NSW Police Service and he is in constant
liaison with them to understand emerging issues and trends.
Referrals to the
Police on average take 156 days on crime prevention matters and only 57 days
for liquor establishments. This
demonstrates that despite various efforts to engage the police on these crime
prevention matters their interest in these matters is reflected in the referral
times for these DAs.
It may be
appropriate to only continue with the referrals on liquor licences issues
associated with hotels and clubs including modifications to hotels and clubs,
and then allow the Community Crime Prevention Officer, who also comments on
applications to determine whether he should also seek advice from the NSW
Police Service. The Community Crime
Prevention Officer also has a responsibility to monitor the activities
associated with DAs to identify any matters that should be referred to him for
comments or to be referred to the NSW Police Service and any change to the
standard referrals would not alter that ongoing relationship.
Recommendation
That only DAs
relating to liquor licence matters be for hotels and clubs referred the NSW
Police Service.
That the Community
Crime Prevention Officer liaise with the NSW Police Service on all crime
prevention matters associated with Development Applications.
COUNCIL MEETING CYCLE
Council currently
considers DAs only once a month. This
adds to the queue time for DA assessment, causes delays for customers and
increases the impact on batching of work.
If DA matters were
considered at both council meetings, and the level of officer delegation was
increased, then at each council meeting 5 applications would be
considered. This would reduce work flow
issues associated with batching.
Recommendation
That the Council
Code of Meeting Practice be amended to allow consideration of DAs at both
meetings.