As little as 12 months ago, the Conargo Shire Council in regional New South Wales did not have an asset management plan, strategy or policies in place. After adopting the IPWEA’s NAMS.PLUS tools, the council today has a 10-year financial plan and asset management strategy.
The Council’s General Manager Barry Barlow says, prior to the change, the organisation had used a basic asset register that recorded the value of each item.
“We didn’t have an idea of the ongoing maintenance and renewal needs of those assets,” he says. “We conducted an overview of the assets just before the start of the new financial year and tried to incorporate something into the budget to a reasonable level.
“But we didn’t have a clear indication of the exact funds needed for each asset.”
Jeff Roorda was engaged by Conargo to assist the council upgrade their planning using the NAMS.PLUS tools.
“The council was really well run before this, but essentially it was reactive,” he says. “If someone said to council: ‘Are you financially sustainable?’, they wouldn’t have been able to answer the question. The assumption would then be: ‘No, you probably aren’t’.”
Roorda says the council’s new approach balances the long-term financial plan with the asset management plan. The asset managers conducted a stringent regime of tests to ensure the plans were sustainable.
“They carried out a number of scenarios to determine what services levels they could afford,” he says. “They reported the current and target service levels based on the asset management plan and the council adopted them.
“They also modelled the potential risks and the council accepted that they were all manageable at the determined service levels. From the outset, the council was very enthusiastic about the project.”
Thanks to the new tools, Conargo is able to allocate its resources towards maintaining and improving its assets with much more confidence.
“The 10-year financial plan has mapped out a way to maintain our assets to a fairly high level,” Barlow says. “We’ve got adequate funds and reserves that can cover any unforseen expenditure and we’ve got funds set aside to renew assets when required.
“The whole planning process has given us a lot more certainty in ensuring we can sustain our assets into the future.”
Roorda adds: “the council can now report on the state of the assets on an annual basis. It can track, for the first time, whether the service levels are improving or declining. It also allows them to look at providing the same service level at lower cost or providing a higher service level at the same cost.”