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Business Entry Point and Penrith City Council

Streamlining Building and Development Applications

By Barbara Grundy*

All local Councils, regardless of their location or constituency, deal daily with dog registrations, swimming pool maintenance, library services, development applications, building approvals and standards, and a host of other services that differ only in volume and complexity rather than substance. These services form much of the daily work of Councils in even the largest urban municipalities.

Recent changes to NSW planning laws have meant that development, building and subdivision plans can now be submitted through a single application process. This rationalisation will benefit both developers and the community and has provided at least one Council &endash; Penrith City &endash; with the opportunity to look at new ways of streamlining its services.

With the help of the Federal Government, through the Business Entry Point Demonstration Program, Penrith City Council is developing a Building Application Development Application (BA/DA) system that will allow developers to submit and pay for Development Applications and Construction and Building Certificate Applications electronically.

The project will also provide an electronic lodgement facility for Statutory Certificate applications under Section 149D of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979. Penrith City Council processes 4000 &endash; 5000 applications yearly and by allowing lodgement and payment over the Internet, Council expects significant reductions in approval times, as well as in processing costs.

Council anticipates that electronic receipt and processing of applications will reduce manual processing times and costs by increasing the speed of data flows and reducing error rates. This in turn will improve Council's ability to manage information and control work flows.

Overall, the BA/DA system will lead to major improvements for Council in service delivery, productivity, cost savings, and resource management.

The (BA/DA) project has been partly funded under the Business Entry Point Demonstration Program, which has $1m allocated over two years to finance projects that provide a demonstration effect to other government agencies of the value of Business Entry Point and online transactions.

The Demonstration Program is receiving a growing number of viable proposals due to an increasing awareness of the availability of electronic payments and authentication services.

There is significant interest in the Local Government area in Penrith's BA/DA system as the information technology applications of the project will provide other local Councils with vital information in developing their own electronic service delivery transactions.

The BA/DA system will be accessible either through Penrith City Council's own website www.penrithcity.nsw.gov.au, or through Business Entry Point (www.business.gov.au) alongside other Commonwealth and State Government transactions.

*Barbara Grundy is Marketing Officer with the Business Entry Point Branch.

Click here to visit the Business Entry Point web site

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