A word from Brent, Managing Director and CEO

And just like that, another year has come to an end. On reflection, we have achieved so much and we have many more goals in our sights for 2024.

You may have heard the Chair of our Board, Julie-Anne Schafer, speak at the LGAQ annual conference in Gladstone, about our achievements throughout FY 22/23.  It is important to highlight our achievements because they are also your achievements. Through collaboration and working together, we are improving outcomes in your communities and contributing towards enhancing community liveability.

• Legal and Workforce
  • 900 hours of support to councils under the LGAQ IR Helpdesk,
  • 27 councils assisted with enterprise bargaining agreements,
  • 11,000 hours in advisory services delivered.
• Training
  • 6,100 elected members and council officers received training,
  • 300 Cyber Security training sessions to councils fully funded by the Local Buy and Telstra IDF fund.
• 247
  • 130,000 community calls answered.
• Consulting
  • Grants
    • $43 million in grant funds secured for 14 organisations.
  • Energy
    • $14.8M total energy savings for the sector through tariff analysis and renewable energy initiatives.
  • Probity and Assurance
    • Office established to meet sector needs.
  • Professional Advisory
    • 13,500 advisory hours provided.
• Recruitment
  • 67 senior executives recruited across 24 councils.

One way or another, every council in Queensland uses our services. We recognise that the needs vary from council to council, region to region. Our various business lines are focused on what you need us to be. That need differs from each and every council. Whether you’re a larger council being supported by our call centre operation, or a smaller council leveraging the broad skillset and experience of our grants team, we shape our services to where they are needed most.

In other good news at annual conference, Charters Towers Regional Council were announced as the winners of this year’s Butch Lenton Memorial Bush Council Innovation Award and will receive a $10,000 bursary from Peak Services for their community masterplan focussed on economic outcomes and liveable communities for the future. A panel of judges from across Queensland Local Government, were impressed to see an application responding to community feedback and addressing the need to create liveable communities. Read more here

If you didn’t catch the showcase of the Long Drive For Drought video at annual conference, you can take a look on our website 

We’re excited to announce we reached $150,000 in fundraising for our charity partner Drought Angels this year, bringing our cumulative tally to over $415,000 since 2020. Thank you to all our sponsors who supported our efforts and to the councils that hosted us on the drive this year – we couldn’t do it without each and every one of you.

We've covered a lot of Queensland on the Long Drive For Drought over the past four years. Any guesses where we might be heading in next year?

As the end of the year rolls around, I wish all of you a safe and happy holiday period and I look forward to catching up with you sometime in 2024.

See you out there,

Brent