8 March 2018

Greater Wellington Regional Council receives AA CouncilMARK™ rating

Wellingtonians are being well served by the Greater Wellington Regional Council, a report completed under the local government excellence programme CouncilMARK™ shows.

Greater Wellington Regional Council (GWRC) received a AA rating in its first CouncilMARK™ report released today, with its strong focus on financial decision-making, transparency and communication and public engagement noted as “stand out”.

GWRC joins Waimakariri District Council as having received AA ratings, the highest achieved by councils so far and the system’s second top in its nine-point scale.

The report is the eighteenth to be released by the CouncilMARK™ local government excellence programme Independent Assessment Board, and the second this year. CouncilMARK™ reports are designed to give councils and communities an informed and independent view on how they are carrying out their role as councils, including on where they are excelling and areas for improvement.

The reports and more information on CouncilMARK™ can be found here.

Local Government New Zealand President Dave Cull says the AA rating is an excellent result for GWRC and the report will be a useful guide for further improvement and a resource for the wider sector.

“I congratulate Greater Wellington for showing leadership by joining the CouncilMARK™ programme and on what is an excellent result,” Mr Cull says.

With 18 assessments now complete and a further 11 scheduled for the coming months Mr Cull says he encourages more councils to join the programme during 2018.

“CouncilMARK™ is the gold star assessment system for councils and communities and has been praised by many of those to have completed it so far, with both the assessment process itself and the final reports proving valuable,” he says.

“Local government is committed to providing the best possible outcomes for our communities and doing this requires the sector to focus on delivering the best performance and value we can. LGNZ’s National Council strongly encourages all councils to put themselves forward to be assessed by 2020.”

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CouncilMARK™ releases Greater Wellington Regional Council’s report

The Independent Assessment Board which oversees the local government excellence programme CouncilMARK™ has today released the Greater Wellington Regional Council assessment report. Greater Wellington received an AA rating.

Speaking on behalf of the IAB, board member Albert Brantley says the reports measure indicators across leadership, finance, asset management, service delivery and community engagement.

The programme was launched in August 2016 with 18 councils signed up for the inaugural year. To-date 18 reports have been released. A further 12 councils have registered their interest to take part in the programme in 2018 and there is capacity for more to participate.

Reports and more information on CouncilMARK™ can be found here.

Mr Brantley says the reports are designed to give councils and communities an informed and independent view on how they are carrying out their role as councils, including on where they are excelling and areas for improvement.

“The reports have been completed by independent assessors under the direction of the Board, and offer an independent assessment of each council’s performance in key areas,” Mr Brantley says.

“These reports will provide valuable information to both councils and communities. Measuring performance means councils can assess how to better deliver ongoing and increased value, including building excellence and sharing good practice with the sector.”

Greater Wellington Regional Council is the second regional council to participate in the programme.

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