NSW Public Spaces Legacy Program
The NSW Government has released guidelines for the NSW Public Spaces Legacy Program offering up to $5.5 million for local space in LGAs that can demonstrate they will improve planning assessment timeframes.
To be eligible for funding the council must make a commitment to accelerate its median assessment timeframe for development applications by 20% between 1 September 2020 and 30 June 2021. The improvement target is to be benchmarked against evidence of councils’ assessment performance over the past 2-3 years.
Councils will also be required to:
- Identify regionally significant development applications that have been in the planning system for more than 180 days and commit to their determination by 31 December 2020
- Provide an outline plan for accelerating rezoning to help deliver a 33% reduction in rezoning timeframes
- Metropolitan Sydney councils will need to show how they will update their LEP to ensure there is 6-10 years of housing or employment supply capacity.