Regional centres stretched by growth spurt

A hot property market and soaring median house prices are not the exclusive domain of Perth, with regional centres also getting a good dose of property fever.

So far this year the regional centres of Geraldton, Kalgoorlie/Boulder, Mandurah and Bunbury have all recorded strong price growth.

But the strong buyer interest in these areas has also come at a cost to community infrastructure and the councils that must provide it.

Perth’s near neighbour, Mandurah, has not been immune to these population pressures, and is believed to be Australia’s fastest growing regional city with a population of over 62,000 and a growth rate of 5.9 per cent during the 2004-05 financial year.  

City of Mandurah chief executive Mark Newman told WA Business News Mandurah council was struggling with a size of only 178 square kilometres and had serious difficulty attracting skilled staff from engineering, surveying, and accounting professions.

Mr Newman revealed the city had borrowed money to its maximum limit and had made appropriate rate revenue adjustments to keep pace with the magnitude of community infrastructure its residents required.

“We’ve coped pretty well so far and, as with any local government life-cycle, eventually we’ll catch up,” he said.

Council is already starting to play catch up by joining with the Urban Development Institute of Australia (WA) and the WA Local Government Association in preparing a report to Planning and Infrastructure Minister Alannah MacTiernan on the merits of making developers pay a community infrastructure contribution. 

In the meantime, council is likely to approve the creation of 601 new lots this week, spread across the communities of Lakelands, Meadow Springs and Greenfields.

Further north in WA, the shire of Greenough and the city of Geraldton are also under pressure from housing demands.

Shire of Greenough chief executive Bill Perry said his planning department had struggled with the workload during the past two years, which had included the creation of 4,000 lots across the subdivisions of Glenfield and Drummonds Cove.

“We’re short of urban planners, health inspectors, engineers and accountants, but this problem applies to all councils,” Mr Perry said.

“The biggest problem for the shire is the lack of builders up here and people waiting up to 18 months to have a home built.”

In nearby Geraldton, property prices are on the way up and the city’s development services department is busy.

Chief executive Rob Jefferies said prices remained well below other regional centres and the city still had a good supply of land.

“I’m pretty confident the boom will continue here as we’re seeing strong growth in the Mid-West mining industry and the fly-in/fly-out workers are choosing to live here on the coast,” Mr Jefferies said.

Skills shortages are also affecting the city, with an urban planner recently leaving and a position for a senior building surveyor still vacant after 12 months.

“We need help to build our social and economic infrastructure if the population is to reach 100,000 people by 2015,” Mr Jefferies told WA Business News.

The city is in the process of re-branding and upgrading its CBD and foreshore areas, due for completion in three years.