At a Glance
• Draft Community Engagement Strategy placed on exhibition to strengthen meaningful participation
• Advocacy priorities formalised ahead of the State election cycle
• Strategic planning powers increasingly centralised within the NSW framework
• Campbelltown’s regional significance reinforced within the Western Parkland City

Balancing Law, Service and Strategy

In previous reflections, I have spoken about Council as a public administration bound by law. Yet within those legal limits sits a broad and demanding mandate. We are required to deliver essential services, represent our community, advocate to other levels of government and shape the long term future of place.

In this Minute, I wish to focus on three of those essential functions: community engagement, advocacy and strategic planning. Each, in its own way, defines how we exercise leadership within constraint.

Community Engagement: Beyond Ritual

Community engagement is not a slogan. It is the disciplined and respectful exchange between government and residents that enables participation in decision making. At its best, it gives people a genuine degree of influence over matters that affect them.

The International Association for Public Participation describes a spectrum from informing through to empowering. Informing provides balanced information. Empowering places final decision making in the hands of the community. Between these two points lies consultation, involvement and collaboration.

Arnstein’s well known ladder of participation reminds us that engagement can become ritualistic if it does not shift real influence. The criticism that engagement is tokenistic or dominated by special interests is not new. In my experience, these concerns arise less from the existence of strategies and more from how they are implemented.

Item 8.1 introduces the Draft Campbelltown Community Engagement Strategy for public consultation. I encourage residents to review it and provide feedback. A strategy must be tested against lived experience. If it does not meet community expectations, it must be refined.

I am committed to engagement that is meaningful and broad based. It must reach beyond the most vocal and ensure that quieter voices are heard.

Our recent engagement on the South West Sydney Community and Justice Precinct demonstrates what is possible when multiple channels are used thoughtfully. The campaign reached more than one million people through digital, print and face to face engagement. Over five hundred residents completed detailed surveys. That data now strengthens our advocacy. Engagement, when done well, becomes evidence.

Community engagement is the mutual respected communication and deliberation that must occur between the Government and residents, enabling the residents to actively participate in the formulation of Government policies and provision of services.

Those words capture both the aspiration and the obligation.

Advocacy in a Critical Political Moment

With less than six months until the State election, we enter a period where policy platforms are being shaped. It is incumbent upon us to articulate clearly what Campbelltown requires.

Through Item 8.17, Our Call for Support to the NSW Government, we have formalised several immediate priorities. These include infrastructure connectivity for one of the fastest growing regions in the country, investment in jobs and services in our city centre through the Community and Justice Precinct and a Service NSW centre, and major regional infrastructure such as expansions to the Arts Centre, Sports Stadium and Hospital.

These priorities do not exhaust our ambitions. They represent a distilled expression of key projects capable of transforming opportunity in our city.

I have freed time in my personal schedule to focus on advocacy in the months ahead. Effective advocacy is persistent, respectful and bipartisan. It requires meeting and re meeting with ministers, shadow ministers and candidates across the political spectrum.

I have also asked the General Manager to review our submissions to the State Government over the past twelve years and identify those matters yet to be advanced. Institutional memory is an asset. We must build on it.

Strategic Planning in a Centralised Framework

The third function I wish to address is Council’s role as a strategic planning authority. Since the mid twentieth century, councils have played a central role in land use planning. Over time, however, the planning framework in New South Wales has become increasingly centralised.

The Environmental Planning and Assessment Act has been amended extensively. Since 2018, elected councillors no longer determine development applications, with those decisions vested in panels largely appointed by the State. The creation of the Greater Sydney Commission, now the Greater Cities Commission, introduced a further layer of metropolitan oversight with powers to compel conformity of local plans.

I do not view this solely through a critical lens. The State has sought greater coordination and metropolitan coherence. Many involved in these institutions are dedicated professionals committed to public good.

Yet centralisation carries risk. When decision making moves further from local context, there is potential for distinctive local characteristics to be diluted. Campbelltown’s identity, geography and demographic profile are not interchangeable with other parts of Sydney.

The Commission’s Discussion Paper on the Six Cities Plan contains elements I welcome, including embedding First Nations voice, advancing digital connectivity and addressing housing diversity. At the same time, we must advocate for maintaining the centres hierarchy and recognising Campbelltown’s strategic importance within the Western Parkland City. The role of Glenfield and the direct relationship between councils and the Commission must remain clear.

Our own strategic review to align planning controls with the vision of Reimagining Campbelltown is progressing. I look forward to outlining the next stage shortly and engaging both the Commission and our residents in informed dialogue.

Community Spirit and Continuity

As we navigate complex questions of governance and planning, we must also remember the rhythm of community life. The return of the Festival of Fisher’s Ghost to its traditional November weekend marks more than a calendar event. It signals continuity after disruption and the resilience of local spirit.

Public administration, advocacy and strategic planning are serious responsibilities. Yet they ultimately serve a simple purpose: enabling communities to thrive, gather and celebrate.

Reflection

Local government operates within law, but it lives through community. Engagement gives legitimacy to decision making. Advocacy secures the resources that growth demands. Strategic planning shapes the long term character of place. When these functions are exercised with discipline and openness, they reinforce trust. That trust remains our most valuable civic asset as Campbelltown continues to evolve.

Read the original Mayoral Minute here: 13. Community Engagement, Advocacy and Strategic Planning