The Local Land Services Stakeholder Reference Panel has taken another step forward in building the new Local Land Services, releasing a final draft of regional boundaries for the new organisation.
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“After more than 800 individual submissions through the
Have Your Say site
from farmers, stakeholders, community groups and interested members of the public, we have come to a majority decision on regional boundaries for Local Land Services”, Natural Resources Commissioner and Chair of the Panel, Dr John Keniry AM said.
“As a result of this feedback, the Panel has made numerous changes to the initial proposed draft map we released for comment earlier this month.
“The final draft map with amended boundaries, which have been agreed to by the majority of Panel members, is now available on the Have Your Say site.”
Dr Keniry said that feedback received from a broad range of stakeholders was invaluable in informing the Panel’s decisions.
“The majority of feedback received was from farmers, who made up 40 percent of the respondents to the Have Your Say site,” Dr Keniry said.
“There was a strong preference to change the boundaries for the proposed Central West, Southern Tablelands, South West Riverina and Murray regions.
“There are still 11 individual Local Land Services regions, but we have now created a South East and a Central Tablelands region.
“We’ve also made changes to other boundary lines to better correspond with landscape, region size and existing catchment areas.
“The Panel is confident that we have come to a rational final draft of these boundaries, but we recognise that the opportunity for further public comment is vital to getting them right.
“We welcome any further suggestions regarding the boundaries as well as continued general feedback on Local Land Services via Have Your Say site.
“Further consultation on the boundaries, as well as other key features of Local Land Services including governance structures, core functions and the rating framework, will also take place in community consultation workshops planned for February and March next year. Session dates will be published on the Have Your Say site later this month.”
“Following these workshops, recommendations on key features of the new Local Land Services will be made to the Minister for Primary Industries.”
The Stakeholder Reference Panel is an independent body guiding the development of Local Land Services andwill continue to work with community and stakeholder groups to identify how the new organisation can best deliver valuable services to the people of rural and regional NSW.