Members Roundtable Meeting - Guest Speaker Michael Keys, WWCC

The Board, Members & Guests of Committee for Wagga held the first Round Table event for 2020 on Friday 28th February.  The event was hosted by Wagga Wagga City Council, with guest speakers Michael Keys Director, Regional Activation and Peter Thompson, General Manager.

In the latter half of 2019, the Board adopted our Business Plan for 2020. Amongst the objectives outlined in our plan for 2020, is the desire to have members engage directly in topics of interest, so as to add their valued skills and knowledge to the efforts of our Board and Executive in delivering on our core objectives.  Secondly, we want to promote and facilitate engagement between our business community members, government agencies, political representatives at all levels of government and key business advocacy & representative bodies outside the City.

For this event, the Board had identified four focus areas for discussion, these being considered critical to the growth and development of the City, in line with the Wagga Wagga 100,000 target:-

a.     progress on the Local Strategic Planning Statement

b.    how we ‘market the City’ – and the collaboration between WWCC, C4W, Wagga Business Chamber & others

c.     addressing the efficiency of the WWCC Planning Dept process; perhaps consideration of a joint project between WWCC/C4W to improve understanding, processes & costs (especially in comparison to the development approval processes for businesses considering establishing in the Special Activation Precinct)

d.     Smart City Strategic Planning and Digital Connectivity path forward for the City (we are in the preliminary stages of evaluating the holding of a seminar mid-year)

The luncheon was well attended by Members and Guests and the discussions were open and constructive.  Michael Keys shared a presentation that Council use to promote the City, in particular the Bomen Industrial Estate / SAP, to potential new businesses to the City.  Also shared was an early draft of the 2020 Economic Snapshot for the City.  (Both of these documents are available for viewing on Committee for Wagga’s website under Wagga Wagga 100,000).

As regards the Local Strategic Planning Statement, Council anticipates that it will be released for public comment and workshops in May and subject to feedback received, be in a position to be adopted in July 2020.  The Local Strategic Planning Statement is a narrative as to how it is envisaged the City will grow and develop in the future and essentially replaces the Spatial Plan.

Productive discussion was also had around the Planning process, the passage of Development Applications and benefits of the Sydney office in attracting skilled planning resources to Council, with attendees agreeing that further collaboration between members and Council, likely to take the form of a Developers Forum tentatively scheduled for April, being the next step forward.

There was much interest and clarifying discussion surrounding the marketing of property in the Special Activation Precinct – which is held by a mix of Council and private landholders – and how the Regional Growth, NSW Development Corporation will fulfil this role.  Further information on the SAP will be available at a briefing meeting to be hosted by the Regional Growth, NSW Development Corporation and Wagga Wagga City Council on 10th March.  Michael Keys and Peter Thompson also provided further insight into the progress of the RiFL Hub, with tenders for construction to close soon and works expected to commence in May.  The Terminal facility is expected to be built and operational no later than December 2021.

A reflection of the engagement between members and Council was that insufficient time remained to address the Smart City Strategic Planning and Digital Connectivity in any detail. However, these issues continue to be discussed between Council and C4W by way of separate forums.

C4W and WWCC are also in discussion regarding the path forward for establishing a collaborative group post the Wagga Wagga 100,000 seminar in 2019, particularly in respect to strategies for economic development and marketing the City.

The Board anticipates that the next Member Round Table event will be conducted in April, with member organisations having the opportunity to host the luncheon.  Members interested in hosting should register their interest by contacting the C4W Executive Team at admin@c4wagga.com.au.  Details of topics for discussion and guest speaker(s) will be shared in advance of the event.