THE application date for councils to apply for a share of the $500 million Regional and Local Roads Repair Program has been shifted forward a week to Wednesday 11 January 2023.

This means successful applicants from the 128 councils across NSW can begin work a week earlier.

Minister for Regional Transport and Roads the Hon Sam Farraway, in Coffs Harbour on Monday 9 January made the announcement urging councils to get themselves organised and get their application in from Wednesday.

With potholes pitting roads of the Mid North Coast, this move to get them repaired sooner is welcome news.

“We have gone one step further to reprioritise this program within NSW to bring the application process forward by a week.”

Applications will close on 20 January.

“We have worked hard to simplify the process and remove the red tape,” said Sam Farraway.

“We want to be able to assess these applications, turn them around and get money into councils’ bank accounts, like Coffs Harbour, by the end of this month so they can get working on their road repairs for 2023.”

All 128 councils are eligible for a one-off payment to help them fix roads that have been damaged by successive severe weather events throughout 2022.

Councils need to make an application to Transport for NSW, which will allocate the funds based on total kilometres of roads managed in each local government area.

The funding split will provide $280 million for rural and regional councils and $220 million for councils in Greater Sydney and outer metropolitan areas.

Minister Sam Farraway said the NSW Liberal and Nationals Government made the decision to open applications earlier following an overwhelmingly positive response from mayors and councils.

“We understand the job councils have ahead of them and that’s why we have been helping with financial assistance since early last year and providing engineers, road workers and machinery.

“Our road maintenance crews have been hard at work repairing the state-managed road network since the first bout of severe weather hit, patching more than 200,000 potholes on major roads and highways since last February.

“We have already provided $50 million to regional councils that will allow them to repair over 400,000 potholes on their roads, but this funding will go further and see sections of roads regraded and rebuilt in the worst hit parts of the state.”

This new money is on top of existing funding and assistance to councils including the Regional Roads Block Grant program and NSW Disaster Assistance Arrangements.

Dominic King, Greens candidate for Oxley said there was a major flaw with the NSW Government plan.
“There is a big hole in this plan,” Mr King said.

“As Mayor of Bellingen and as Director of the Local Government NSW Board, I argued that the current funding model disadvantages local councils and their residents.

“This funding is purely a band aid solution to an ongoing problem,” he said.

According to Mr King, as welcome as this funding is, the bigger issue is the need for a long term and fully funded plan for local government, especially for small coastal Councils with large networks of roads.

“The current funding model doesn’t provide local governments the autonomy or certainty they require to best manage and maintain their own infrastructure in an efficient manner.

“The local government councils of Nambucca, Kempsey, and Bellingen all have small rate payer bases and don’t have the ability to revenue raise the funds needed to properly address their infrastructure backlog,” he said.

Andrew Beswick, City of Coffs Harbour’s Director Sustainable Infrastructure told News Of The Area, “Late last year, the City received a $305,053 grant under the latest round of the $50m State Government Fixing Local Roads Pothole Repair Program to supplement the costs of the road repairs we undertake all year round on our nearly 900-kilometre road network – and especially after the wet weather of last year.

“We are looking forward to receiving the application guidelines for this new $500m of funding which was announced last week and we will explore how the funding may be best used to assist the City with ongoing road repair and renewal requirements.

“It is important that road renewal is undertaken rather than just patching to increase the longevity of our road assets.”

By Andrea FERRARI