West Tamar Council Approves Community Care and Recovery Package

Tuesday, 21 April 2020

West Tamar Council Approves Community Care and Recovery Package 21st April 2020

Today, the West Tamar Council have unanimously approved the Community Care and Recovery Package to assist our community to both manage and recover from the impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Along with the other levels of Government, West Tamar Council is actively working to prevent the spread of COVID-19 within our community. The safety and well-being of staff, Councillors, volunteers and the community remains our top priority.

We strongly support the approach of Federal and State Government and want everyone to stay at home to slow the spread of COVID-19.

There is no doubt that the COVID19 pandemic is now fully disruptive of our everyday lives and the situation continues to change on a daily basis. An important role for Council is to provide for the health, safety and welfare of its community and to represent and promote the interests of its community.

With this in mind, a number of actions to support many areas of the community that are in need has been developed and these include the following:

Immediate rate waivers for most owners of commercial and recreational property. Most properties valued and used for commercial and recreational purposes will not be charged rates from 1 April 2020 to 30 September 2020. Property use determined from the Valuer Generals assessed land use categories. Council will also be strongly advocating for cost savings to be passed on to commercial tenants such as small businesses. Supermarkets, shopping centres, nursing homes, banks, service stations, butchers, post offices, schools, UTAS owned buildings, doctors, chemists, government properties will be excluded. Six month waiver to rates interest. All property owners currently behind in rate payments will benefit from a 6 month suspension to interest charges. Suspension of any increase in annual rates, waste charges, and council fees and charges. All property owners can expect Council’s fees and charges not to increase for the next financial year. In addition any increases associated with changes to the CPI will not be applied. No fees for sporting clubs and community groups for Council facilities. All fees normally charged to sporting clubs and community groups for Council facilities will cease, effective immediately. This arrangement will remain in place until the COVID-19 emergency is declared over. Temporary removal of all fees associated with food business licensing. To assist the hospitality sector with recovery, there will be no fees charged for food business licensing during the 2020-21 financial year. Helping business cash flow. Council will process all early payment requests from creditors quickly to ensure cash flow for business. Assistance for economic recovery. Council will support contractors by fast-tracking a million dollars of small capital projects. By fast-tracking additional capital works, Council will be assisting by providing opportunities for local companies where it is possible to do so. Council will also add a further million dollars of stimulus works to the 2020-21 capital budget. Council will also bring forward the planning and design of our 2021-22 capital works program to ensure an array of projects are ready to implement as soon as practical. Rent relief for commercial tenancies. Council will provide rent relief based on applications received from its commercial tenants who are experiencing a significant downturn in business/turnover or are forced to close for a period of time due to the effects of the current pandemic. New hardship policy. Council will be putting in place a new hardship policy specifically designed to address serious hardship resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic. The policy provides an equitable means to consider welfare needs and those people facing genuine financial difficulty with regards to payments of Council’s rates, fees or charges. The Hardship Policy and Application for Financial Hardship Assistance can be found on our website.

Further information an a recording of our meeting will be available under the Current Agendas and Minutes section of our website on Thursday.