Governing the City State - Chief Minister and Treasury Directorate ...

• The linkages between service provisions including public transport and land use planninghave not been committed to or demonstrated. This leads to lack of capacity forinnovation.• The principle of a single agency responsible for clear and effective implementation of aplanning system is being obstructed by a failure to codify requirements or to definecriteria that is able to be reliably interpreted and assessed by ACTPLA and referralagencies.The overriding message received from the business community during the review was adesire for consistency of interpretation, and coordination of effort from elements of theACTPS engaged in the planning and development approval process. There was significantgood will expressed to share with the Government in the development of the city. A commonrefrain was “we are not trying to build bad buildings – we live here and want to be proud ofwhat we have done”. This was coupled with a desire from developers that the ACTPSfacilitate development and make their decisions once and stick to them.Contributors to the review noted that because of a lack of specificity in the drafting ofrelevant policies, official have had room to, and on occasion have, imposed requirements nototherwise specified, or have changed interpretations such that historical practice is rejected insubsequent applications. One example related to the provision of space for garbage trucks toaccess commercial buildings, while another related to an agency imposing a particular viewof how the Government’s stated aim of a 40% reduction in water usage was to be achieved.In this context, a Submission to the Review noted:there is a tendency for ACTPLA to seek to achieve some of its social goals by subtletychanging its interpretation of the Territory Plan from time to time without actually changingthe instrument … various representatives of ACTPLA are even prepared to say publicly fromtime to time that they have ‘rethought’ some particular problem and will not accept solutionsformerly deemed acceptable.These examples demonstrate the importance of specificity in government policies, and thedesirability of officials interpreting compliance with policy constructively, rather than settlingon fixed means of implementation, which risks dampening innovation and creativity.The Chief Minister’s first Industry Roundtable in early 2008 highlighted a range of concernsthat Industry had with the development process. Some of the comments made include:• the application process was too complex and time consuming;• small scale development required too many forms for an approval and clogged up thesystem;• code compliant applications required too many initial clearances from referral agencies (Itwas easier to lodge them as merit applications and let ACTPLA undertake the referrals);• too many requests for further information;• staff not understanding the costs to developers of delays in the assessment process; andAdministrative Arrangements Changes: 190