Kiama Council is not the biggest local government area geographically but a lot is packed into those 259 square kilometres.

More than 22,000 people needing a range of services from Kiama Council and when it comes to infrastructure, there are 152 public buildings, 64 car parks, 137 parks, 32 amenities, 83km of footpaths and cycleways, 308km of roads, 80km of stormwater infrastructure, 32 playgrounds, five pools, four cemeteries, 35 bus shelters and six boat ramps.

Council’s recently appointed new infrastructure and operations manager Darren Brady is relishing the challenge of overseeing the range of services and assets used by the community.

Brady moved to Gerringong about two decades ago, living there for 16 years, and was previously Council’s engineering manager for design and development.

He spent the past three years working for the NSW Government in natural disaster responses, liaising with councils on recovery works.

“It was a good opportunity because I got to visit a lot of councils across the southern half of NSW, all these little towns and places like that which you often don't get to see,” he said.

“It was interesting - even though I wasn't in local government, I was still involved actively with local government and had a good understanding in terms of the issues and the problems that they would be facing in trying to get their infrastructure repaired and get it back in place, the community issues that they would be facing.

“The position came up at Kiama here and I thought it was a good opportunity to come back.”

His role covers all engineering aspects of Council under three divisions - internal engineering technical services staff, works and operations who cover maintenance and outdoor construction works, and waste and cleaning services, which looks after all the bin pick-ups across the LGA and the cleaning council buildings, amenities blocks, streets and public toilets.

Brady said the recent reopening of Jamboroo Mountain Road after an extensive closure period to repair sections of the road was an example of how Council’s efforts will ensure the region is better prepared for weather events.

“There's still a number of other projects out there which are still requiring further work,” he added.

“Council's been successful in obtaining some betterment funding to undertake further repairs on some other roads around the government area, to further improve the resilience of some of our roads.

“So hopefully when we get the next natural disaster that comes along we won't be impacted as badly.

Brady said the elephant in the Kiama Council chambers is the Performance Improvement Order imposed by the NSW Government which has financial implications until the books can be balanced in the next two years.

“We're currently reviewing all our services, undertaking service reviews of all the works that we undertake, to see whether there's opportunities out there to make savings and streamline our processes,” he explained.

“So that's part of our ongoing challenges, and that'll be continuing over the next year or so.

“Communities have a very high expectation of where they live and they want to maintain that.

“Council as a whole, we are trying to endeavour to maintain those standards as well. But we have to live within our means and we can only do what we can do with the funding that we have available to do that.”

Brady's remit includes working with Council’s executive team on the Housing Strategy so that infrastructure is in place for projects like the South Kiama development which recently had its stage one plan released.

“We get new subdivisions and release areas but that comes with additional roads, additional parks that we need to maintain. Additional bins that we've got to pick up.

“So these are all things that we need to factor into our operations and how we incorporate those into what we do at the moment. And how we manage those into the future as well.”

“People probably externally won't see that, but there has been a lot of work that's been undertaken by the staff and the executive here in Council and the Councillors, current and former, to get new processes and things in place.

“So it's really pleasing to come back to the organisation and see those improvements that have all been put in place to try and address the issues and things that are in that improvement order.”