Delays impact council budget
Delays to some developments in the Kingston Park project in southern Tasmania could have a significant impact on the local council’s budget.
At Monday’s council meeting, Kingborough Mayor Paula Wriedt (pictured) said the council was in a position where it had to pay interest on loans taken out for Kingston Park.
“There are some loans in relation to Kingston Park that are now accruing interest, that were originally interest free,” she said. “That has had an impact on our bottom line, the interest is around $600,000 per year.
“It had initially been anticipated when we entered into the agreement with the developers for Kingston Park that it would have been completed by now and we would have been recouping all of the money from a majority of the stages.”
Ms Wriedt said there were many reasons why construction had not started on some stages of the development.
“Unfortunately, in that time there’s been a range of factors, including the pandemic, which effectively halted a lot of work and then of course there’s been a significant upturn in building and construction costs and council and developers are not immune to that,” she said.
“The continued development of Kingston Park has been delayed as it’s not the climate at the moment for the developers to be able to make a profitable investment.”
Ms Wriedt said the council had been in talks with the developer.
“We are continuing to have discussions with them because we want to see the land developed and the project completed,” she said.
“There are two apartment buildings and one commercial building that have not been commenced as yet, that money is delayed in flowing through to us, that is impacting on us.”
Ms Wriedt said Tasmania wasn’t the only state affected by construction constraints.