Start of recording ¶
00:00:00 Speaker 4: Welcome everybody to the Services and Organisation Committee meeting on the 6th of August. I'm firstly opening the meeting because our Chair Councillor Finzel is on leave, so I'll start the meeting. I'd firstly like to acknowledge that we are meeting on the traditional lands of the Kabi Kabi people and I pay my respects to their Elders past, present and emerging. All committee members are in attendance except for Councillor Finzel, who's on leave. So we need to elect a Chair for this meeting. Mayor Wilkie: I nominate Councillor Nicola Wilson. Councillor Phillips: I second that. Speaker 4: So we have a nomination and a seconder, put it to the vote.
00:01:00 That's unanimous, carried. So Councillor Wilson, I'll let you take it. Thank you. Councillor Wilson: Welcome, everyone, to the SNO Committee meeting today. We'll move straight to the first item of business, which is the confirmation of minutes from the last meeting. Thank you Councillor Wilkie, and Councillor Zephyr, thank you Councillor Phillips. I'll move that to the vote. Thank you. Item number three, we have no presentations today. And number four, no deputations. So this brings us to item five on the agenda, which is under the reports for consideration of the committee. Contract number T, lots of 078, register pre-qualified suppliers for provision of fire tech services.
00:02:00 And we have Chris Bowden. Good afternoon, councillors. We have Chris Bowden about three or four minutes away to walk in the room if we wanted to wait. Otherwise, I'm happy to proceed. Speaker 4: We can defer if you'd like. We can wait and move to the next item. Councillor Wilson: Thank you. Thank you, thank you. Item number six, reports for noting by the committee is 6.1, Noosa Holiday Park's update. And I believe we have Robin Mercer online for this report. Robin, could you please give us a summary of the report? Speaker 7: Certainly. Good afternoon all. Excuse some coughing, I've come down with the flu that's doing around. This report provides an update on the Noosa Holiday Park's business unit for the period from 1 July 2023 to 30 June 2024.
00:03:00 The Noosa Holiday Park program consists of three camping and caravanning locations at Boring Point, Noosa North Shore and Noosa River. Overall, the program offers 294 camping and caravanning sites in accessible locations across the region with high quality natural amenity. Overall, the program offers 294 camping and caravanning sites in accessible locations across the region with high quality natural amenity. The program delivers pleasing results during financial year 23-24. This is reflected in year on year revenue growth of 1.8%, visitation growth of 5.6% and an increase in the number of nights sold by 1.35%. These metrics are all able to be viewed within the report. Our forward bookings for the current financial year are strong, sitting at over 2.6 million and we are keenly aware that there may be some business impacts arising from this. We are keeping a close eye on forward bookings.
00:04:00 While we have seen revenue, visitation and nights sold moving up and to the right over time, I will caveat that we may start to see some flattening in coming years as we are realising most of the upside or inventory available in the program. This is a natural outcome of the growth period over the past three to four years. Which has been characterised by investment in capital works, management services, operating systems and facility maintenance. And does indicate that we are ready to transition from a growth phase into an expansion phase. I will note that there is a typing error within section one financial performance of the report. The first bullet point should read the revenue of 4.53 million achieved in financial year 2023-24 is an increase of 1.2%. The second bullet point should read the revenue of 1.8% from the previous financial year period and the word million should not be there. Thank you very much.
00:05:00 Councillor Wilson: Thanks Robin. Does anyone have any questions? Mayor Wilkie: Thank you for the report Robin. Excellent report. Really good news. Just curious to get a clarification around what you mean by about to move from a growth to an expansion phase. Could you, for the benefit of those who might be listening and for me, just clarify what that might look like please. Speaker 7: Sure. So what we're seeing is, as I said, we've got just over 294 camping and caravan sites. So that's our inventory. And we're starting to see that we're tipping out on our uptake on our occupancy levels. So there's not a lot more to sell each year. Which means that our revenue growth isn't delivered by selling more, rather only by any price increases that we put in place. So I guess naturally within a commercial program, if you wanted to continue to grow your revenue,
00:06:00 we would look at expanding on the 294 sites and creating more inventory as part of an expansion rather than growing what we've already got. Mayor Wilkie: And which campgrounds are they likely to take place at? Speaker 7: We're maxed out within our current campgrounds. So strategically we would start to look at alternate sites where we could expand into. Mayor Wilkie: So is that, you mean adjacent to the existing sites, Robin, or separate sites altogether? Speaker 7: Both. So we would look at parcels surrounding. So there are some opportunities in Boren Point for that. Council did acquire John's Landing several years ago, so we can run some due diligence in that space. Or look alternatively throughout the region for the sites that are suitable from planning and topography and natural amenity from those perspectives.
00:07:00 Mayor Wilkie: Yeah. So the figures do suggest that there's an increased demand for these low-cost holiday camps. And that's what the experiences of the campgrounds provide. Your report notes that Noosa North Shore Campground was mainly responsible for the increase in visitation and revenue, recording annual growth of 6.2%. What do you put that down to? Speaker 7: Yeah, I get asked this question sometimes about what's the drive behind growth. And I think it has to be a combination of the two. It's a combination of multiple things. So Noosa North Shore is like a very blessed location. Obviously, right on the beach, it's a very special location. So I think having beachside location in a park with that quality of infrastructure and amenity is quite a unique product offering.
00:08:00 And it's just steadily grown over time since Council very cleverly invested. I think it was just over $2.5 million in that refurbishment in 2019 and 2020. So I guess following a big capital investment, we are just seeing the product come to fruition in terms of how consumers enjoy it. Mayor Wilkie: And do we have any, sorry, go ahead. Speaker 7: I was just going to say, and it's a bit of a mix, it's getting pricing right. We've done a lot of work there with getting sites leveled. So we don't lose the capability to sell sites during periods of rainfall. So, you know, having the roads looked after and facility maintenance, you know, chairs and tables and the camp kitchen being really pleasant places to use. So quite often it's a combination of multiple things working together.
00:09:00 Mayor Wilkie: And do we have any data that indicates where all the visitors to these campgrounds are coming from? And are there any particular region, people from certain regions attracted to one of the other car parks, caravan parks? Speaker 7: Yeah, so we do have access to that information within our booking system. We can do a postcode analysis of guests in there when they put in their booking information, making the assumption that it's their home address that they're entering. I have done that exercise recently about a year ago. I did it for Boring Point Campground and it showed that over 52% was coming from out of region. When we've heat mapped visitation over time, looking at year on year, we can see that the visitation from outside of the region is definitely growing over time. Mayor Wilkie: Thank you. Councillor Wilson: Any questions from you? No, thank you.
00:10:00 I just want to note as well for the minutes that we've had, Councillor Lorentson and Councillor Wegener have also in attendance as observers in the gallery. Any questions from you councillors? Speaker 1: Hi, just a continuation with John's landing. It was in 2017 when it came to acquiring the land and my question is how is it paid for and what was the purpose of acquiring the land? And was there an intent at the time that it was to be rehabilitated and repurposed for recreational use or was it rehabilitated for other use? Councillor Wilson: Robin would you like Trent to answer that one? He's got his hand up. Hi, Trent. Speaker 4: Trent, let me come up closer to the mic.
00:11:00 Speaker 2: Through the Chair. Good afternoon. It was purchased, the funds used to purchase it were a proportionate mix of environmental reserves as well as general unconstrained cash. The intent of that mix of funding was that then the use of the land was that proportionate mix of environmental land and potential for a proportion of that for activated purposes. And obviously one of the opportunities for the site was discussed was in regards to potential of the site such as the holiday park. But the work hasn't been done yet on the feasibility of achieving that sort of activation on the site and that's part of our program. Robin alluded to that expansion program before coming out of the realignment and the work we're doing in terms of the revenue diversification strategy looking at what is the best return and what are the opportunities for that site.
00:12:00 And to some extent that probably feeds into also the strategic land project which is also on the operating plans to deliver this year. If we look at each land parcel, there are a number of competing and complementary uses. It's what gives the best value outcome in terms of financial but also social or environmental outcomes. So that land parcel of work in progress that we've committed to as part of the strategic land review and the council minutes upon acquiring the property to look at those options. Thank you. Hopefully that helps. Councillor Wilson: Yes. Thanks Jack. Speaker 2: Thanks. Councillor Wilson: Any further questions? The recommendation here is that council note the report by the commercial business advisor to the services and organisation for the meeting dated 6 August 24 providing an update on operations of the Noosa holiday park's business activity to 30 June 2024. Thanks for that report Robin. Would anyone be willing to move the motion?
00:13:00 Mayor Wilkie: I'll move the motion Madam Chair. Councillor Wilson: Thank you. Do we have a seconder? I'll second. Does anyone wish to speak to the motion? Mayor Wilkie: Yes. Just thank you Robin for the report. It's always good news and it's great to see how well the parks are being managed which is important because it's very important that we continue to provide these sort of camping experiences for families in the Noosa Shire. You look across the country and councils seem to be more and more divesting themselves of campgrounds so it's wonderful to see that this sort of experience still exists in Noosa Shire. Councillor Wilson: Thank you. Councillor Phillips: Can you speak? Councillor Wilson: I'll speak briefly. It's a great news story. On this returning a small profit really. Thank you. It helps our community in terms of reducing the burden on ratepayers but also of course providing lower cost accommodation for the community and visitors as well.
00:14:00 Thank you for that. I shall put it to the vote and that is carried unanimously. Thank you. Speaker 4: Thanks Robin. Councillor Wilson: Thank you very much, I'm glad you could come. We'll return to item five on the agenda. Speaker 4: I'll run without Chrissy. Chrissy would you like to come up? Yes. Thank you. Councillor Wilson: Another report for consideration of the committee, the register of pre-qualified suppliers for provision of fire tech services. Speaker 3: Apologies for the lateness, I was just running a HUB member function and I missed it by a couple of minutes. Councillor Wilson: Would you like to give us a summary of the report please? Speaker 3: Yes, perhaps just a bit of context and certainly we have some briefings coming up over the next few weeks and I hope we will have the chance to really dive deep into the underlying thrust behind this report.
15 minutes in ¶
00:15:00 But the Digital HUB runs a program called Fire Tech Connect which was born out of the 2019 bushfires that ravaged the town, almost burnt down the Digital HUB. And severely affected Peregian, initially the beachside suburbs and then subsequently Tewantin, Cooroy, Boat, etc. We resolved that the Digital HUB could play an important role in how technology could be used to improve the bushfire resilience of not only our town but other towns like ours that are faced with bushfire as a significant threat. It's amazing, sort of five years later, with lots of rain, sort of forget the fact that the number one threat that we have really existentially is a massive bushfire. Those of us that were around for that I think really did have a shock at, you know,
00:16:00 if we don't do enough on the bushfire resilience front, all the other things we do are somewhat moot. So that was the reason that we made it a priority to think about how the Digital HUB could be an asset in that particular objective of building resilience. Over the last five years we've created a program that's become very well known around the country and indeed has some global prominence where we have sought to identify promising technologies across four different categories and provide a platform to allow those technologies to be trialed with the objective of accelerating their adoption, both at the local council level but also by the state emergency authorities and others that are in the business of protecting communities. The four areas of focus are bushfire detection, so using technology to detect bushfire very, very early on when it starts.
00:17:00 Bushfires have got to the point where once they begin they're very difficult to bring under control beyond things like back burning. So the only way to really deal with a major bushfire is to deal with it very early when it's small. So detecting early is a critical initiative and there are some fantastic technologies that we've been trialing that can assist with that. We then sort of have technologies that assist with understanding how fires might evolve and behave so that we can better predict what actions we should take to ameliorate their effects. We then have technologies that as these fires grow bigger and more dangerous, and if you remember the fire in Peregian in particular, we were talking about 100 foot high flames and firefighters standing with hoses, incredibly dangerous situations.
00:18:00 So how can you use technology to help bring those first responders further away from points of extreme danger by using things like robotics and other technology that can help with that? Can reduce the risk factor there? And the fourth category is how do we use drones, which are an increasingly powerful technology that gives us eyes in the sky and another dimension for fighting these fires. And one of the frustrations of the bushfire in 2019 was that we weren't able to use drones. The Peregian community and others went for four days with no idea what was happening on the ground because we just weren't able to get intel. It was too dangerous to go in and see what was going on. Drones flying overhead would easily have been able to tell us that information and we could have saved a lot of pain and heartache when people who thought they'd lost their homes, pets, airrooms, etc. for four days went through massive psychological trauma. We weren't able to do that because the regulations prevent drones from being used during the bushfire. So we have been trying to prove that specially qualified pilot, specially equipped drone, special set of operating procedures can indeed allow for the orchestration of drones
00:19:00 and crewed aircraft safely in an airspace. So those are the four areas of trials. The way we do this is that we typically have attracted funding from NEMA, which is the National Emergency Management Authority, federal authority, and more recently we've attracted some grant funding from the state government that has allowed us to fund a series of trials across those four categories where we use what we call the living lab in our Noosa hinterland in combination with the Peregian Digital Hub's AI lab to prove that these technologies can indeed be used safely and that they can make a difference. And in so doing, help give emergency authorities and other councils the confidence to adopt them more rapidly and build resilience in those towns. The report before council today is we've worked very closely with our procurement team over the years to develop a mechanism where we can work with these kinds of third parties in a very collaborative and exploratory way.
00:20:00 This is unlike a typical sort of tender where we have a specific job that needs to be done. We go out to market, we pick a winning vendor, and we assign a contract. In this particular instance, what we've done is we've built a register of pre-qualified suppliers, a panel if you like, that gives us a sort of wide array of potential collaborators. And as we sort of attract funding and develop specific hypotheses around trials we might want to conduct, we then engage with folks on that panel that have been pre-qualified and gone through our procurement process. We've done this a number of times, and this particular report is, if you like, a refresh of that panel which allows us to add additional suppliers that we have vetted through an ITQ process, a procurement process, so that through the next phase of trials we have additional vendors we can work with and collaborate with. So that, in a very large nutshell, is the report.
00:21:00 The report before us, there are eight technology companies on that list to be added to an existing list of 14, and the eight companies there span a wide variety of capabilities across those four areas that I've talked about. Councillor Wilson: Thank you. Always great to hear about the work that's happening in the future as well. Does anyone on the table have any questions? Mayor Wilkie: Just a question about what does Kaplano do? Speaker 3: Kaplano is a very interesting name, and there are some fascinating names on that list. Kaplano is in the business of using advanced and AI technologies for detection and prediction capabilities with bushfires. Mayor Wilkie: And how operational are these technologies at the moment? How are we going? Speaker 3: You know, that's a very good question, and that is the ultimate sort of benchmark for are we having the kind of impact that we really want to have with this,
00:22:00 is to see technologies being adopted, not just in our own council, but more broadly. And there are some really good examples of where this has happened, and where we've certainly played a direct role in building confidence around deploying these solutions. We've expanded the allowable use of drones quite significantly, and a recent bushfire in southwest Queensland, tapped into the trials that we've been conducting to use the methodologies that we trialled there, to actually use drones to help in a real bushfire, which, you know, hard to put a sort of number on the value of property saved, or whatever it might be, but certainly added a significant... You can think about fighting fires on the ground in two dimensions, but having a third dimension makes a hell of a difference. So that's an example.
00:23:00 The detection technology that we've been trialling over a number of years has been rolled out in a number of places around Australia. The sensing technologies for understanding the environmental conditions that give rise to really bad bushfires have also been rolled out in a number of places, in particular in New South Wales. So it's an ongoing process, and part of what we try to do is develop playbooks that make it easy for others to adopt technology in the way that we've trialled it here. Mayor Wilkie: Just on a local level, has the cameras or the sensors detected fires early and been able to... Their notifications alerted QFES and directed resources to fighting fires early here in the Shire? Speaker 3: Yes, over the last few years, as we've actually trialled multiple different sort of camera systems and detection approaches, and they have indeed played a role. One of the challenges that we've discovered through the trials,
00:24:00 the whole idea of a trial is, you know, the concept is you have a hypothesis. We think this technology is going to work. What do we learn from the hypothesis? What we've learnt is that AI-enabled cameras are incredibly good at detecting fires. Now, if you put an AI detection camera on top of Mount Mbiwa with a 360 panoramic view, it has an incredible view of almost the entire Shire, and I hope to show that to you in good time. But there are lots of fires that happen at any point in time across the Shire, and one of the challenges is, how do you discern the difference between a fire that may be a legitimate fire, a fire that is not legitimate but isn't problematic, and a fire that is rapidly evolving into something that needs to be adjusted? And that has been a key learning of that trial, and indeed, we've sort of paused the detection part because we're satisfied that the detection is taken care of. The next phase for us is really having the intelligence
00:25:00 around figuring out, given constrained resources, which of the fires that have been detected really do we need to get onto very quickly? Because you could imagine the nature of the plumes of smoke, maybe the colours of smoke, there are a whole range of things around that that give you signal as to which of these need to be addressed very quickly before they become a big fire. So the actual detection is working really, really well. It's now almost the characterisation of that fire. Is this a problem fire? As opposed to, is this a fire? That's the next lot of trials we need to run. Thank you. Councillor Phillips: I have a couple of questions. I worked through the fires as a police officer at Peregian, so I kind of like the concept. It sounds really exciting. As a drone operator, that will be an external... It won't belong to QFIS or QPS. Have you gone into consideration around how that communication is going to assist? Because I can tell you what it's like to work on the ground in a fire
00:26:00 and external communication coming from inexperience or other... It will be very challenging. Having operational people on the ground, having even a drone tell you what to do when these guys have worked in fires and they... Like that, the Peregian fires was... A, it was lit, deliberately lit, but also the weather, the wind, caused that to be almost impossible for them to dictate where it was going to go. So I'm not sure how a drone will assist. Or can you tell me... Can you explain it to me, I guess? Speaker 3: Yes, I mean, you've hit the nail on the head. Coordination and communication are really the fundamental aspects. And a lot of the trialling that we're doing really is around the sort of... It's not... Is the camera strong enough to see what's going on on the ground? The technology is well proven in that respect. It's really the coordination and communication. So we have a thing called a common operating picture,
00:27:00 to your point, which is all of the various stakeholders, all of the agencies need a common operating picture of what's happening in the air. Because, of course, the reason you're not allowed to fly drones is the assumption is during a bushfire, there will be crewed aircraft, both helicopters and fixed wing. And it's just too big a risk, particularly during smoky and visibility-constraining conditions, to be having drones in the air. However, with a special set of operating procedures, special software which shows the location of every single one of those aerial vehicles in the air, de-escalation procedures, everyone on the same comms channel, and literally a team of dedicated people on the ground coordinating all that, we believe it can be done safely. We've been working in lockstep with QFES and CASA, the Civil Aviation Regulator, who has guided each step of these trials to say, look, if you can prove that this particular incremental step can be done safely, and this step, and this step, and this step, we'll gradually open the regulation to allow for that to happen.
00:28:00 So, yes, you're 100% correct. It's that communication and coordination between these assets. When things are frenetic, there's a lot going on. To be able to see a common picture of what is in the sky, what is on the ground, where are the human responders, and be able to see that all in one picture is a crucial element. And, indeed, that's something that is a key part of these trials. Councillor Wilson: Okay. Thanks. Any questions, new members? Any questions from councillors? There's an hour. Thank you. There should, do I need to read out the whole recommendation? No. So we're going to note the report, prove the award of contract to the listed suppliers, and authorise the CEO to approve the option to approve it. It's going to look like that. It's appropriate to turn. Sorry. I've got a message. Mayor Wilkie: I'll move it. Councillor Wilson: Second. Second. Would anyone like to speak to the motion?
00:29:00 Mayor Wilkie: Yes. Thank you, Chris. Excellent report. Thank you for the summary and the explanation of that fire tech program. Generally, as someone who was evacuated twice in six weeks in the Peregian fires, I really appreciate the need for this work to be done. And it's very exciting. I'll ask a question. How is NASA involved in this, or even distantly related to this work that's happening at the Peregian Digital Hub? Thank you, Mayor. Speaker 3: Thank you for the feedback and the question. This is an unsolved problem. This problem, councillor, that you raised, is an unsolved problem globally. You know, drones, it feels like they've been around for a long time, but the idea of drones and crewed aircraft in the same airspace is not a solved problem internationally, which is why this project has attracted interest from the likes of NASA, XPRIZE, some of the major aerospace players, which I'll be telling you about in the weeks ahead, because we have a really fantastic opportunity
30 minutes in ¶
00:30:00 through this project to move the needle and set a kind of national and international sort of standard for how this gets done. We have a real prerogative to do it and recent memory on why this is important. But it is an unsolved problem and it's the reason that this kind of collaboration is so valuable because you can bring in expertise and technologies in ways that we would never be able to develop ourselves. Mayor Wilkie: Thank you. Councillor Wilson: Can you just speak to the mic? No, thank you. I was looking forward to hearing more about this in the future and it's just excellent to hear that the work that's happening right now in our community has been such a real risk as well to our community. Thanks, Jo. Thanks, Council. Thank you for your work. Mayor Wilkie: Thanks very much. Councillor Wilson: I'll give it to the vote. Eric Anderson, thank you. Mayor Wilkie: Thank you, Chris. Thank you. Councillor Wilson: Moving to 6.2, Capital Programme 23-24, Delivery Status.
00:31:00 So we'll wrap up for the financial year. And we have Melissa Hanley-Gray, Queen of Peace Report. Could you please give us a summary of what that list will be? Please. Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm going to speak today on behalf of Mel. She's actually got laryngeitis. No, no, I just lost my voice. Councillor Wilson: But thank you. Speaker 6: Thanks. Speaker 5: So as mentioned, this is the capital status report for 23-24, truly summing up the final quarter. Can you give us an update on that? Just some key stats were that we had a capital budget of $45.9 million for 23-24, and that included $19.5 million for 22-23. As of 30 June, we had expenses. Expended 72% or $33.2 million, with $5.9 million in commitments. The resale programme is one of the success stories.
00:32:00 And that's expended 100% of its $5 million budget for 23-24. And there's currently 53 multi-year projects still in completion. So they're over multiple years. Thank you. Councillor Wilson: Any questions or answers? Mayor Wilkie: So how are we tracking? Are you happy with the progress? Speaker 5: Well, really, in 22-23, we had two large projects, being Beckman's Road and Moose Parade. And that allowed us to outsource those projects and achieve a big sort of chunk of our programme. And that year, I think we delivered on $45 million. But this year, we were challenged with a different type of programme, where we had multiple smaller projects over the whole Shire. So we had different complexities in Shire. We had different challenges. Plus, we've seen a turnover of staff in the last two years, especially seniors. So we're in a process of rebuilding and developing our team at the same time.
00:33:00 So we've got different challenges this year. But I believe that we've achieved the best we could with the circumstances that we've been faced with. Mayor Wilkie: And this is separate to the work that's being done with the QRA-funded disaster recovery work? Yes. Which is happening concurrently, could you? Speaker 5: Yes. So that programme's been treated separately. Yes. And that's got external resourcing delivering that programme. However, we are providing some support with that programme also. Mayor Wilkie: Yes. And what was the impact of the very wet weather we had earlier in the year? Speaker 5: I mean, there has been delays. But it's probably not as much as what we saw in 22-23. But it hasn't helped us. I know it's impacted the disaster projects probably more so. Yes. I think our challenge was just the sheer number of projects and the size of those projects in not being large, but being small.
00:34:00 So they're the challenges that we've faced. Mayor Wilkie: And how you set up in terms of resourcing down infrastructure? Currently? Yes. Speaker 5: We're pretty much full at the moment. I think we have two vacant runs. But it's really developing the team and building the team and upskilling the team. We have a lot of younger staff. And they're the ones that we're developing and investing in there. Mayor Wilkie: And in recent years, you've employed a couple of graduate engineers? Speaker 5: Yes. Yes. Mayor Wilkie: And they're getting very good experience here beyond what they would get perhaps elsewhere? Speaker 5: Yes. Yes. And we've got a report coming up shortly. And we'll have Lindsay presenting that report. And that's part of this development programme. And I don't mean to single anyone out. But Jasper's a great story where he's come through a student placement graduate, project officer, project manager. Mayor Wilkie: And Liam's following that path.
00:35:00 And I'm sure Lindsay will be a success too. And they're all Noosa Shire locals, I understand. Speaker 5: Yes. Yes. Yes. Very successful programme. Mayor Wilkie: Yes. Very good. Councillor Wilson: Any questions? Councillor Phillips: I do. Please. Please. Because one of the ones that I'm quite interested in, in emergent works coming up, 2023-24, it says Noosa Heads, Noosa Drive, CCTV and street lighting replacement. Councillor Wilson: Could you tell me more about that? Mayor Wilkie: Sorry. Speaker 6: No, it's fine. It's okay. So that project has been completed. So the project that you're referring to in the emergent works, so that listing is a list of all the emergent projects that came up throughout the year. So the project has been closed off now. And that was based on, we had some grant funding through the state for fixing up through Mays Car Park. And then there was an accident on one of the street poles that took out the CCTV as well.
00:36:00 So at the end of the initial street lighting work we did in the Mays Car Park, we undertook the additional CCTV and street lighting repairs. And my understanding is that our governance team were chasing up insurance to fund that separately, sort of thing, and make a claim against our insurance for it. But that work is now complete and wrapped up. Speaker 5: So Mel, I think we were renewing the poles and we took the opportunity to do the CCTV at the same time. Speaker 6: Potentially, sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 5: So there was an opportunity there where we were coming and renewing the lighting poles and there was an opportunity to do the CCTV at the same time. Councillor Phillips: I think that's the only one. Give me a second. You jumped someone else. There you go. Thanks. Councillor Wilson: The report says there are 53 multi-year projects in various stages of completion. How does that compare to the normal kind of work total previous years? Speaker 5: My understanding is that's more than previous years.
00:37:00 Yeah. So this is part of the challenge of having just the sheer number of projects. I think we've got 146. Speaker 6: Yeah. That's quite significant. Yeah. Speaker 5: Whereas in other years you may have down around the 100 mark and even in previous years where we had smaller budgets. So we've seen an increase in value over the last, say, four to five years from 28 million to 53 million, plus the complexity and sheer number of projects is increasing. So 146 projects, whereas when our budget was, say, 28 million, it might have been around 70 or 80 projects. So it's . Speaker 6: And if I could extend on that as well. The infrastructure team has done a lot of work on putting emphasis on planning at the beginning and the initiation stage. So we're profiling our projects over multiple years to make sure that what we're allocating per financial year is going to be more in line with what we expect to spend rather than adopting a project budget and realising or having that then move over a few years.
00:38:00 We're instead getting on the first foot and profiling it over the years at the start. Speaker 5: And I think another key factor is, and Sam's a good example, where we had a window governed by birds and fish and the environment. And another good example is the Noosa Trial where we were governed by the end of our peak Christmas period. And then we've got a major event coming up. So we couldn't build that in one financial year. We actually had to span that over two financial years. So your projects don't run to a calendar year or a financial year. Councillor Wilson: That's such an event. And we're doing our next question to clarify. So a monthly year project, whether that's a project that takes longer than 12 months or it's that it struggles to function. It's kind of like that. Speaker 1: Yeah. Speaker 5: Yeah. And it's really just cash flowing that over the two financial years. Councillor Wilson: It could be six months total of work that just happens to fall within two financial years. Speaker 5: And sometimes that provides opportunity from a budget point of view as well.
00:39:00 So it's not putting too much on us from one point each year allows that spread over two financial years. Thank you. Councillor Phillips: I remembered my question. I got to it. Dog Beach. The nourishment works. Can you tell me more for the people listening? Why do we do that? And maybe just give me a bit of back story and how we get to this and when we will expect the next one if you can. Or. Speaker 5: I can't talk to. Speaker 4: Yeah, look, it ultimately is because it's been made. It's created as protecting the river. The river always wants to get back to where it originally was. Yeah. So what's happened over a number of years is it's just it's just virtually eroded and eroding. They got to a point where we didn't want it to break through. Otherwise we would have had to intervene with something more substantial like rock, rock wall and things like that. So the idea was to replenish it with sand and use sand out of the river mouth, which
00:40:00 makes sense anyway, because it was already silky enough. So to that point, we use that sand to replenish the beach, which then protects Noosa, Noosa Sound, but also Noosa Plain Beach because it's all part of the same exercise. The idea now is that we did let it get to a point where it was getting quite critical. So we had to intervene in a major way. So we spent a bit of money on that and doing it properly now to create a much better environment down there as we talked about previously. But in the future, the idea is to not have to go back and do our major work. It's just to continue to replenish it and use a smaller bridge on a regular basis. So part of our normal works that we do along the river in terms of Noosaville, in terms of Gibby Terrace, we're constantly having bridges going on there and just replenishing to protect the foreshore there. So we do the same thing for the dog bridge. So just continue to put some sand on there so we don't have to let it get more away.
00:41:00 It's really well protected, I believe, at the moment because of the amount of sand there. The biggest issue is if we get a cyclone or a number of cyclones in a row, you know, that's nature and we can't. We have to deal with it as best we can. So what we've done is protected it as best we can with sand. But if we get a cyclone, my understanding is if we get a cyclone that sits up to the north around Pagari, then the prevailing winds and the waves will come through the river mouth and basically on the dog bridge and cause quite a bit of erosion. So that's what we're trying to protect against and we believe now we've done our best to protect that. So if it happens again, I mean, that's nature and that's what we've created and we need to deal with it accordingly. Speaker 5: And we do have a monitoring program there. We do have lines of, what would you call it, intervention where we can survey, take measures and then we trigger interventions. Speaker 4: Okay.
00:42:00 Yeah. So we know when you need to sit in and who's getting to that point of the red line. And we needed to give that, we needed to particularly then fix it as well. We've gone as hard as we have and created what we've done. But we believe that that's a good outcome. It's a fantastic looking outcome but it's also a good outcome for the protection. Okay. Councillor Phillips: So we won't anticipate seeing the extent of what it got to before we do some... Speaker 4: Well, that's the intention. Yep. To do it on a regular maintenance. And if there was a major storm or a major... Then you punch. Yep. You've just got to deal with what's at hand. But generally, we would be looking to just continue the maintenance of it now. Okay. Councillor Phillips: You mentioned rock or something. Has there been a study or something done to see, because I imagine it's quite costly... Yes. ...to continue even the works of something long term, a solution long term? Probably. Speaker 5: Yeah. So when council's amalgamated, there was a project developed and we've seen stage...
00:43:00 We've seen two ends done of that. That's the groin, sandbag groin that's there. And then there's some rock around the pump area there. So there was a second or a third stage to do some protection around the centre of the dog beds. However, when council de-amalgamated, there was a report presented and there was a decision made not to go down that pathway. The new use of council. So that was, that's a good 10 years, 10 years ago. And so, yeah, that's the information that we have. And that's been presented to all the studies that have been done and come up with the SEMPT program that we've got now. So we've had studies done of that area and we've included the information from Sunshine Coast Council. We've developed up this program. It's more of a softer approach. Okay. Councillor Phillips: Thank you. One more question. When we do it, because I'm not a boatie, but I've run the river a lot.
00:44:00 And recently I've seen quite a number of boats. What do you call it? When they like, you know, they accidentally, like they didn't, they didn't mean to, but they're stuck. What do we do for education around what it will do to the river mouth? Speaker 4: I mean, that's a, that's an ongoing program. The sand's moving all the time. Every time you're down with it, the channels are marked, but they're changing regularly. So that's, that's really as best we can. Plus it's an MSQ mixed with water. Yes. But it's, yeah, it's a moving piece. Speaker 5: I think it's probably like driving to see the road conditions. It's probably very similar because the tide's changing as well. It's a dynamic environment. So it's similar with the gravel road. You need to drive to see the road conditions. We can't speed pace that. So when working in a dynamic environment like the ocean, you need to be aware and slow down
45 minutes in ¶
00:45:00 and make decisions. Councillor Phillips: Oh, I completely agree with that. I'm just wondering what part of, like a road, we do road safety. We do lots of education from TMR. So what's MSQ doing for? Yeah. Speaker 5: Throughout the project, there was regular communication. Throughout the project, educating that there was going to be a change from the channel was here, explaining what the intent of the project was and then how the channel would be moved over to the centre of the river. So there was that education process that the channel was changing and that we were dredging and opening up the channels. But if people still run aground, I mean, there may be some experience or inexperience issues there. I'm not saying that may be all the case. Yeah. But we are a tourist town and we do have a lot of hire boats. And a lot of people don't need a boat licence to drive those boats. Exactly. Yeah. Councillor Phillips: Thanks. We have a question. Thank you. Mayor Wilkie: Just a more general question.
00:46:00 During COVID and post-COVID, there was a lot of migration of staff, more local governments to private industry and between local governments. Has that settled down now? Speaker 5: Yeah. Mayor Wilkie: But any industry-wide changes? Any feedback about that? Speaker 5: What I've noticed is probably in the last two years, we've had at least eight seniors leave our team. So we've lost that depth layer. That's what I've seen in the last eight years. What I'm seeing is there's been a change in the employment market where we're now starting to get good quality candidates. We're now starting to get good quality responses in numbers as well. So I think it's starting to shift back towards the employer. I think people are looking for, I suppose, more security, more secure jobs. And there are opportunities now going forward from an employer's market, I think. I think it's probably shifted from an employee's market over the last two years to an employer's
00:47:00 market. I think the opportunities that a local government can offer are security, training, working for the community. Yes. Yeah. Mayor Wilkie: The other question is around emergent works. There are quite a... There are a number of them. And when the work emerges, it's issues that have to be dealt with immediately. And they are. But there's also a lot of proactive work going on in the background to minimise the amount of emergent works that occur. Could you just talk a bit about that, please? Speaker 5: Sure. Sure. And I think one of the key challenges is funding that emergent works. I think that's a real key role that MELD plays, that it's looking at renewal, depreciation, grant funding. So is there ways to take the burden off the general rates and still fund those emergent works? You know, is there an opportunity to use some of the depreciation funds? Is there grant funds available?
00:48:00 And that's what we're constantly working on, to balance that capital works program. Yeah. Mayor Wilkie: I'm talking about the asset assessment work that's being done. Yes. Yes. Okay. And all the audits of assets. Speaker 5: Yes. Yes. So we do have a Shire-wide ongoing program, and a couple examples of that are CCTV inspections of our stormwater, our bridge inspection programs, our footpath programs, our road programs. So we're constantly inspecting all of our assets. We're trying to inspect all of our assets, but it's a very large program. And then the idea of that program is that we're anticipating assets that are depreciating and we're intervening before they fail. So there's a measure where we can come in, allocate funds, and it may lift the life of that project back up for another 25 to 50 years. And our bridge program's a classic example, and Garth Proud's a classic example where we've intervened at a 50-year life, and we hope to extend that for another 50 years and get
00:49:00 100 years out of that bridge. Yeah. But we can't always be ahead of that curve, and we can't always be seeing what's under the ground. And some of the emergent projects that are coming out are, say, water pipes at Noosaville, we couldn't see what was under the ground. And similarly, we've got a similar pipe up at Bullring Point. So they're the ones that we can't see. Mayor Wilkie: Yeah. Thank you. Speaker 1: Okay. Councillor Wilson: Any further questions? The recommendation is that Council note the report by the Infrastructure Planning Officer to the Services and Organisation Committee meeting for 18th of August, providing it has an update on the delivery of the 2023-24 capital program as updated June 24. Do you want that to move the motion? I'll move it. Are you beating me? Oh, sorry. Councillor Phillips: No, it's fine. It's all good. Councillor Wilson: Do you want to put that to the vote?
00:50:00 Councillor Phillips: Look, thank you. Mayor Wilkie: Could you please pass on our thanks to the team, a very hardworking team, great work with the recruitment. It's good to hear you've got a full complement of staff down there. As you explained, it was a program of 140 plus individual projects, not necessarily high value, but tricky. And you've had significant challenges with weather, and it's a very hardworking and ambitious team down there. So please pass on our thanks for the good work done. Thank you. Speaker 6: Thank you. Thank you. Mayor Wilkie: And get better soon. Yeah. Thank you. Councillor Phillips: Sorry to ask you that. Speaker 6: Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Councillor Wilson: Now we have item number seven, which is a confidential item. Before we actually move into the confidential session, I just want to say a few words so that those watching in the public can have a bit more transparency about why we're actually going into the confidential session.
00:51:00 So when we do move into the confidential session, we will discuss a report prepared by Lindsay here, who is a project engineer. That report makes a recommendation as to which supplier should be awarded the contract. The report contains details of all suppliers who tendered for the contract under the privacy rules and information provided for the team to make the decision. This includes the prices each supplier submitted and is therefore commercially sensitive financial information for the team. As councillors might refer to this information when asking questions about the report, the meeting will be closed to the public. So, we'll now move a motion to a move that the meeting be closed to the public first you enter section 254J 3G of the local government regulation 2012,
00:52:00 for the purpose of discussing item 7.1, confidential, not for public distribution, Contract number CN00644, construction of pathways, package 3. I'm supposed to just... Speaker 1: Yep, I'm supposed to. Speaker 4: We'll just hear the recommendations again. Because it's... We can't hold it.
00:53:00 Councillor Wilson: Okay. So I move that the staff recommendation be carried. The Council note the report by the Graduate Engineers for Services and Organisation Committee dated 6th August 2024 and award contract number CN00644 for construction of pathways 2023-24 package 3 to the trustee for Integral Completing Services Family Trust as outlined in the report and authorise the CEO to negotiate and finalise contracts on Council's behalf with the trustee for Integral Completing Services Family Trust. I'll second it. Speaker 4: So just to just to clarify that this is a recommendation that goes to the Council meeting next Thursday and that's where it will be ratified and it becomes formal and can be continued on for just the people watching.
00:54:00 Councillor Wilson: Great. Thank you. And I've got that to the right. I'll carry it unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. That was the last item on the agenda for today so that brings us to the end of the meeting and we close the meeting at 2 o'clock. Councillor Phillips: Thank you Chair. Mayor Wilkie: Thank you Madam Chair.