It was a week of big announcements at our Annual Conference in Gladstone. There were so many amazing moments during the three days...and we had the national spotlight on us, too.

From Monday, Queensland’s local government family descends on Gladstone for the LGAQ’s 121st Annual Conference. We are aiming for the star of the show to be the launch of a path breaking initiative an

Mayors like the late Butch Lenton, who sadly passed away last Sunday, are the reason I'm still working at the LGAQ after 25 years. Leaders like Butch are my inspiration and drive me to want to come to

One of the most common inquiries I get as I travel around the State visiting member councils is about Financial Assistance Grants, or FA Grants as they are known in the local government sector.

Behavioural economics, choice architecture, nudge theory. The lexicon of academia can sound a little daunting. Doubly so to those in local government whose work to better service their community does

As we head towards the LGAQ’s 121st annual conference, it’s time for some reflection about how we go about representing the State’s local government sector as its peak body. We tend to move at the spe

Never let it be said that the local government sector in Queensland waits around for others to decide what is best practice in terms of transparency and accountability.

Results suggest councils perform best in the public’s view on services to do with activities such as parks and garden maintenance, sporting facilities and heritage protection.

A decade or so ago, I was lucky enough to read a book titled The Wisdom of Crowds by James Suroweicki. His argument was that extracting information from groups and making decisions accordingly is bett

If campaigning in the 2016 local government elections marked a low point of bad feeling and aggression, then the deterioration of public debate since means that the 2020 elections risk being nothing s

The Ipswich mayoral by-election to be conducted tomorrow has heralded the apogee of dirty gutter level campaigning. How low can it go?

The Bush Councils Convention 2017 was a ripper

On the road for most of this week, I have been thinking about the differences between the environment in which local councils operate and the influences that are brought to bear on our federal politic

The number 21 carries magic qualities our society. It was for generations the point that young men and women were said to come of age, after a very decent party of course. It's also a biblical number,

The battle to ensure our national Government understands the challenges Queensland’s local communities face and recognises its role in overcoming them never ends.