Principle 1
Actively include a range of First Nations’ voices and values in all decision making and placemaking to ensure ongoing community resilience.
Yarra Council adopts a series of planning and review principles to support future service delivery
10 April 2024
Project background.
Delivering value for rates and making sure our services meet the needs of our growing and diverse community is a priority for Council.
Like all councils in Victoria, Yarra is facing financial challenges including the rising cost of service provision and the impact of population growth. As part of our commitment to improving Council’s long-term financial health, we have developed a Financial Sustainability Strategy.
This Strategy identifies a review the service landscape as one of the 7 key strategies to achieve financial sustainability. The service planning and review principles will make sure our services are fit-for-purpose and are what our community wants.
The community's feedback on service priorities during the broad consultation in November 2023 was considered by a deliberative engagement community working group involving participants who represent Yarra’s diverse community.
We also conducted a social research piece which provided a baseline of community sentiment on service provisioning from a representative sample of the community.
This approach ensured that missing voices from the community were captured. These groups include young people, culturally and linguistically diverse communities, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and community members who are renting. This was also presented to the community working group.
The expression of interest to be a part of this community working group was open until 9am Monday 22 January 2024.
The participants of the community working group were tasked with developing a draft set of community-supported principles. These principles will help guide Council’s service planning and review program into the future.
What did we ask?
During the broad community consultation held in November 2023, we asked the community to provide feedback to help us understand community sentiment on Council’s service offering. The information and insights you shared helped inform the deliberative engagement stage of the project.
During the deliberative stage of the engagement, Council asked a community working group to consider Council’s financial pressures, Yarra’s increasing population and changing community need, all with the following dilemma in mind:
"How can Council deliver value for rates and make sure its services meet the needs of our growing and diverse community?"
With this dilemma in mind, the community drafted 16 principles to guide service planning and review.
Who did we hear from?
What did we hear?
The participants of the community working group were tasked with developing a recommended set of community-supported principles. These principles will help guide Council’s service planning and review program into the future. You can find out more about the process using this link.
The following overarching themes emerged across the four sessions:
- financial sustainability and appropriate resource allocation
- social justice and community benefit
- governance and evidence-based decisions
- maintaining influence of quality and social benefit
- get creative and think holistically
The draft principles were considered and presented at the Council Meeting on Tuesday 9 April 2024. The principles below were adopted at the Council Meeting.
When planning and reviewing services, Council will:
-
-
Principle 2
Be proactive in supporting communities and service providers to dramatically reduce waste and greenhouse emissions and prioritise regenerative systems to improve wellbeing and biodiversity and sustainable outcomes.
-
Principle 3
Ensure Yarra’s artistic and cultural identity is valued and supported given their contribution to community resilience.
-
Principle 4
Select service providers that are in line with Council’s sustainability policies and goals.
-
Principle 5
Be adaptable and proactive by identifying, planning for, and implementing solutions that respond to dynamic factors and the current and future community needs.
-
Principle 6
Deliver qualitative and quantitative evidence-based outcomes that include community input, which will be shared and communicated in an accessible way with the community.
-
Principle 7
Use a comparative benefit analysis to measure value for money and the positive impact of service reform for the community.
-
Principle 8
Actively engage the community, prioritising those most directly impacted and in line with Council’s Community Engagement Policy, where appropriate.
-
Principle 9
Prioritise financial sustainability and appropriate resource allocation to enable us to respond to changing community needs, now and into the future.
-
Principle 10
Prioritise service delivery models where it can maintain control of quality and influence the community benefits and outcomes.
-
Principle 11
Prioritise social benefits, especially those that address the needs of vulnerable and diverse people, within financial means.
-
Principle 12
Seek creative and innovative ways to continually improve and address challenges, including collaborating and partnering with other councils, other levels of government, not-for-profits, businesses, and volunteers.
-
Principle 13
Ensure social impact and equity are accounted for when pricing a user-pays, market-comparable service.
-
Principle 14
When making decisions, be considerate and evaluate the impact a change to one service will have on all other services.
-
Principle 15
When considering a change to service that is also provided by an external market, evaluate the external market against Council’s Social Justice Charter principles, of Access, Equity, Rights and Participation.
-
Principle 16
Assess and consider the accessibility of services within a user’s ability and means, both geographically and digitally, when proposing changes to service locations.
What comes next?
The service planning and review principles will be used for all future service planning and service reviews that council undertakes. Yarra's Financial Sustainability Strategy commits Council to undertake four service reviews per year.
We will be sure to keep the community informed for all appropriate opportunities to provide input into these decisions.
Subscribe to Yarra Life and the Your Say Yarra email newsletters so you never miss a chance to have your say.
Visit the project page.
To read more about this consultation please visit the "Planning and prioritising services for the years ahead" project page.
Never miss a chance to have your say.
Sign up to our monthly email newsletter to provide feedback on plans and decisions that impact your community.
