In Boroondara, we appreciate having strong, respectful leaders in Council who make transparent decisions and manage resources carefully. We like to be involved and informed about Council services and facilities to ensure everyone benefits and has a say. We also value Council advocating for community priorities and keeping us in the loop. Our strategic objective is to ensure that all decisions are financially and socially responsible, made through transparent and ethical processes.
Major achievement
Through major initiative 7.4, we started building our new Strategic Asset management system to enable effective strategic management of Council assets.
Strategic asset management system
In 2023, we introduced new online software to improve our financial management of assets across Boroondara.
The software uses predictive modelling, which helps our team understand and plan for more effective asset renewal or maintenance for a variety of Council managed assets.
The predictive modelling helps to guide financial decisions on when is the best time to invest in repairing an asset to extend the life of our infrastructure and avoid costly replacements. These assets include:
- roads and footpaths
- bridges
- traffic management devices (such as speed humps)
- buildings
- storm water drains
- open space assets (such as playgrounds, pavilions and sportsgrounds).
By including data in our decision making, we can ensure that funds are allocated in a socially responsible way across Boroondara.
The ultimate benefit is to our community who will have infrastructure that'll meet your expectations and remain fit for purpose for longer.
Highlights for the year
- Council has strengthened its strategic partnership with Swinburne University of Technology through its 3-year Memorandum of Understanding.
- Improvements were made to Council’s website, including the enhancement and streamlining of e-forms, making it easier for the community to find necessary information.
- Promotion of consultations increased to improve the way Council consults and engages. Community members were encouraged to sign up for email alerts about new consultations on the Your Say website as well as trialling a new translation tool.
- The target average speed of customer calls answered of 45 seconds was achieved for the financial year, surpassing the performance of other councils, according to the Australian Customer Experience Professionals Association.
- Significant navigational and structural improvements were made to the Council website to align with customer needs and facilitate more effective pathways for information and service discovery. This resulted in increased online engagement, reduced bounce rates and reduced usage of the ‘Contact us’ feature.
- Council’s long-term infrastructure renewal program was developed, including the use of specialist software to forecast future asset condition and performance based on given investments.
- The implementation of the upgraded Asset Management software, Conquest 4, has enabled field-based officers to record asset data, address customer requests and fulfill work orders in real time.