Mayor Rejects Misleading Claims on Council DA Performance

Published on 29 April 2026

Statement from Mayor Jesse Fitzpatrick

The comments made on radio today regarding Wingecarribee Shire Council’s development assessment (DA) processes were disappointing particularly due to conflicting and inconsistent messages from the Hon Paul Scully MP - Minister for Planning and Public Spaces.

On 15 March 2026 the Minister wrote to me as Mayor stating that: I acknowledge that Council has made strong progress in reducing the backlog of undetermined development applications and shortening average assessment timeframes. I also note the effort that Council is investing through its Development Assessment Action Plan.

On 25 March 2026, Council received written correspondence from a Senior Officer at the NSW Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure stating: We noticed the average assessment days in February dropped to their lowest level in a long time so just reaching out to say congratulations. Do you think that is down to implementation of new procedures and processes at Council, clearing legacy DAs or something else? It would be good to know so we can raise Council’s good work.

On local radio today the Minister stated that: I think what we have done is appointed an expert planner to go in and come up with improvements to process to the way things are looked at try and improve those numbers.

It has now been over 9 months since the Minister’s expert planner visited our Council and we are yet to receive the final report and action plan from the Minister despite Council providing feedback and following up. Instead, Council has implemented our own Development Assessment Action Plan, which the Minister notes in his written correspondence to me dated 15 March 2026.

The Minister then stated on radio that: What we need is to see the willingness from the leadership of the Council to say, actually, you know, we need homes in this area, we need jobs in this area, we need to make sure that were providing good communities and we can do that, but we need to do that at pace…….And the reality is, every month we publish a league table of all 128 Councils across NSW to demonstrate their performance against our statement or my statement of expectations of their performance. And if you’re consistently in the top handful of slowest performers, then you can’t pretend that there is not an issue that has to be dealt with here.

As Mayor, I encourage our community to look at the Minister’s Council League Table online. If you do you will see that Council has made significant progress in reducing the DA backlog and average assessment times. Unfortunately, the narrative of some media outlets has not changed nor recognised the current state.

The Minister’s Council League Table shows that for March 2026:

• 77% of our Shire's DAs were determined within the Minister's expected timeframe, whilst the NSW average for March was 67%.
• Our Average Days to determine DAs is our lowest ever, at 115 days, only 10 days short of the Minister’s expected timeframe of 105 days.
• During March, Council determined 47 DAs whilst 31 DAs were lodged.

Increasing and ongoing success is evident with our Council beating the NSW Average in 3 of the last 4 months for the percentage of DAs being determined within the Minister's expected timeframe.

For this current financial year, our Council has determined 33% more DAs than the number of DAs received resulting in net increase in determination value of $42.5m. This follows the full 2024/25 FY where Council determined 21% more DAs than what we received.

I am proud that our Council is one of only 34 NSW Councils to have determined more DAs than received for this current financial year. Of those 34 NSW Councils, only 11 have determined more than 100 DAs with Wingecarribee Shire Council determining 414 DAs.

Since the Minister launched the Council League Table (July 2024), our Average Assessment Days have reduced by 140 days.

Over the last 12 months Council has reduced the total backlog of undetermined DAs from 286 to 82 with 70% of the 82 DAs currently under assessment being below the Minister's expected timeframe of 105 days.

Council acknowledges that there have been delays in DAs, and we have never shied away from that. We have been transparent with our community and are actively implementing reforms, including additional resourcing and process improvements.

To suggest Council leadership is ignoring the issue is simply incorrect. Councillors, the General Manager and staff have been focused on improving timeframes while ensuring DAs are properly assessed and meet legislative requirements.

Council remained committed to balancing the urgent need for housing and jobs with responsible planning outcomes.

We want to see more homes delivered, real progress is being made, and we will continue working constructively with the NSW Government to deliver further improvements.

Cr Jesse Fitzpatrick
Mayor, Wingecarribee Shire Council