East Gippsland Water recently held its first Land Development Forum with property developers, consultants, town planners, contractors, plumbers and representatives from East Gippsland Shire Council discussing water, sewage and recycled water works in the region.
The forum was an opportunity for the water corporation to update attendees on several continuous improvement initiatives and to seek feedback from those regularly involved in undertaking land development activities in the region.
Some of the key topics discussed included the review of the corporation’s sewer and water service district boundaries, the New Customer Contributions Project, a briefing on upcoming process improvements and to share recent observations and trends.
East Gippsland Water representatives also spoke about maximising integrated water management opportunities and briefed the forum on the corporation’s draft Land Development Manual for stakeholder input.
Attendees were able to ask questions of a panel of East Gippsland Water staff and provide feedback on their experiences with the organisation.
Manager district growth Adrian Kelly said part of East Gippsland Water’s role is to set clear framework and timely processes to enable developers to construct water and sewage assets that will meet the organisation’s standards.
“We set standards for the infrastructure because it will be transferred to our ownership and maintenance responsibility when connected into our network,” Mr Kelly said.
“There has been a large increase in the rate of land development activity in East Gippsland following the COVID pandemic. The unforeseen increase in activity presented a range of challenges and we have recognised various continuous improvement opportunities. It was an ideal time to meet with our stakeholders and ask them about their recent experience completing work for us.
“We are undertaking some work now to better align our standards with the broader water industry. This will create consistency for property developers who work on multiple projects across the state and aims to improve the quality and timeliness of our overall service in the process,” Mr Kelly said.
“East Gippsland Water wants to enable development, so we appreciate everyone who took the time to attend – some of whom travelled from as far as Melbourne. People were really engaged; we were able to answer a lot of questions and received feedback that will help us continue to improve our services,” Mr Kelly said.
East Gippsland Water plans to hold another Land Development Forum in 2025.
