Ahead of the final Council meeting for the year, Lord Mayor Jane Lomax-Smith says the first year of this Council’s term has provided a solid foundation.
The Lord Mayor said ensuring financial responsibility had been a key focus of the Council’s first budget, with its main objective of delivering funds to invest in city upgrades.
“This Council had no option but to embark on post-Covid repair, which necessitated tough decisions around our finances,” said the Lord Mayor.
“After ten years of frozen rate levels, the cost of doing business required a revaluation of our rate base and slightly increasing most fees and charges.
“We took this action to ensure there were funds to pay for long overdue main street and footpath upgrades, as well as for critical infrastructure within the city and North Adelaide.
“I’ve said on many occasions that I want our city to operate with ambition and vision, but this cannot happen until we sort out the basics, such as much-needed work on our footpaths, roads and parks.”
The Lord Mayor said some of the key achievements in 2023 by Council included:
• Endorsing more than $100m in new capital works including main street revitalisation
• Funding a $6m upgrade of Rymill Park lake and $4.6m Adelaide Town Hall façade restoration
• Updating key management plans for the heritage-listed Adelaide Park Lands
• Developing new, separate economic development, climate resilience, homelessness and
housing strategies, including facilitating more adaptive reuse
• Selling the former Franklin Street bus depot to the State Government for housing
• Buying a former commercial car park on Flinders Street for housing
“We’ve also worked hard to deliver a new Strategic Plan and updated the Long-Term Financial Plan, two key guiding documents critical to the future delivery of Council’s legislated responsibilities,” said the Lord Mayor.
“As part of this, a new City Plan is being developed to help design the Adelaide CBD of the future using software developed by our staff.”
The Lord Mayor commended elected members for engaging productively with Council administration to deliver key priorities while thanking staff who worked tirelessly to keep South Australia’s capital city running smoothly.
