Member for Parkes, Mark Coulton has urged communities who were unsuccessful in the Growing Regions funding program to contact him so that he can advocate for their projects.

In the most recent round of the Federal Government’s Growing Regions Program, several key applications in the Western Plains area were unsuccessful in attaining funding.

While Dubbo Regional Council was awarded $14.6 million under round two of the Federal Government’s Growing Regions Program to upgrade the runway at Dubbo Regional Airport, it was the only successful submission from the Western Plains neighbourhood.

“I'm disappointed this was the only project in the Parkes electorate to receive funding under Round Two of the Growing Regions Program when we have so many worthwhile projects that desperately need funding,” Mr Coulton said.

“It’s also interesting that Round Two has been announced before Round One recipients are yet to even sign a contract, let alone receive a cent of the funding that was promised to them back in May last year,” he said.

Those five projects include:

• the Brewarrina PCYC Youth Hub and Indoor Sports Centre, 
• Moree Artesian Aquatic Centre Redevelopment,
• Wiradjuri Cultural Tourism Centre and Keeping Place, Gunida Gunyah Community Cultural Hub, and
• Narrabri Shire Tourism and Cultural Precinct – which cannot start until a contract has been signed. 

“It’s extremely frustrating for those communities which have been waiting for eight months to see these important projects get underway. I’m worried the continued delays are just a way for the Labor Government to avoid parting with this money altogether before the federal election, further starving our regions of funding.” 

Round two funding 

Mr Coulton said he was aware that not every application could be successful in the latest round of funding, but given the size of the Parkes electorate, there should have been a stronger allocation.

“Considering the Parkes electorate makes up half of New South Wales, it would have been nice to see a few more of our worthwhile projects receive some much-needed funding under this program.

“I’m not discrediting any of the projects that did receive funding under this round of the Growing Regions Program – I’m sure they’re all worthwhile - but I know there are also just as many good projects that did miss out. More transparency from the

Department around the reasons for why certain projects were successful and others were not would be useful,” he said.

“The Growing Regions Program is the largest infrastructure funding opportunity for our regional communities – there is no other program that offers that much money for those big projects, so no other opportunity for many of our local applicants.

“There are programs like the Regional Airports Program that provides funding to upgrade regional airports, but those grants are much smaller than the ones provided under Growing Regions. For example, the largest grant provided under the latest round of the Regional Airports Program was $5 million compared to the nearly $15 million that Dubbo Regional Council received under the Growing Regions Program.

“There are also other more specific programs, like for roads or bridges, but nothing of this scale for general infrastructure projects in our regions.”

Mr Coulton said applicants who missed out on funding should contact his office so that he can follow up and find out why they were unsuccessful and work with them to try to secure funding in the future.