Comparative Analysis of Community Development in Cockburn and Melville

This article provides a comparative analysis of community development in Cockburn and Melville, two local governments in Western Australia. It discusses their approaches to natural resource protection, infrastructure projects, and community engagement.

Running Head: COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
Comparative Analysis
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
Topic - case study on community development of Cockburn and Milleville
In the southern suburbs of the Western Australia, the city of Cockburn is a local
community that is governed by a kind of council that has taken up the responsibility to make
decision on the behalf of the community it works for. The Councilors and the Mayors meet
together once in every 30 days in order to discuss the policies, issues and programs for the local
communities. The chief executive officer of the city guides the council who is highly
accountable to the elected members (Communitynews.com, 2018). The operations of the CEO
functions alongside with the council in order to ensure that the city is being saved professionally
and efficiently. The local government in the city of Cockburn looks after the matters like
facilities and buildings, footpaths, road maintenance, parks and others that are likely to affect the
communities.
The local government of Cockburn also issues licenses for the planning, building and
development in order to look after the local environmental and public health. The important
community facilities are also provided by the local government which includes recreation
centers, halls and libraries(Communitynews.com, 2018). The city of Cockburn arranges some of
the services and programs which encourages connection, participation, success and happiness
across the Cockburn community of Australia. It helps its own community to access services like
child health care centers, playgroup, parenting and education services. For building a better
future for the young people of the age group of 10-24, the local government of Cockburn named
as the city of Cockburn has arranged so many programs such as the mobile youth bus, mentoring,
monitoring and holiday programs (Thewest.com, 2018). The local government is helpful for the
people of the community as it helps to access events, support programs, activities, old age home
community cares in order to make an age –friendly community.

2COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
The people with disability are highly benefitted by the government’s programs such as
formation of the disability reference group. The aboriginal people of the region and the Torres
Strait Islander are helped by the local government in terms of advocacy, reconciliation action
plan and aboriginal reference group. Support programs have been initiated for the new residents
and people of Australia (Cockburn). The city of Cockburn provides a confidential and free
financial counselling services to the residents of the community. A healthy Australia is also the
focus of this local government of Cockburn(Communitynews.com, 2018). Among the various
health programs conducted by the city of Cockburn, the heart foundation groups, heal healthy
eating, lifestyle and activity programs. Among the other community facilities, the most
important are the volunteers who are at the heart of the community.
The staffs of the city of Cockburn collaboratively look after a wide range of
responsibilities that includes the natural area management, sustainability, environmental
education, climate change mitigation and also adaptation , bushland conservation and restoration.
The environmental service team is aimed at delivering brilliant conservation, climate change
initiatives and sustainability. It has become possible because the ongoing members who have
been elected, the city staffs as well as the executives are sufficiently supportive (Ward, 2018).
The team of city of Cockburn, consists of Environmental service manager, environmental
education officer, sustainability officer, natural resource officer, environmental supervisor and
six bushland maintenance officer. The operational team manages 1,018 hectares of wetland and
bushland areas. The city of Cockburn works with the developers, schools, businesses and other
local community in the environmental management and restoration(Communitynews.com,
2018). They empower the community by looking after their local environment and hosting
regular events to encourage people around the community.

3COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
The team delivers necessary funding for the conservation and sustainability throughout
the year. The greenhouse gas emission is also monitored and reduced across the city by the
initiatives taken by the city of Cockburn. The city of Cockburn acknowledges that the traditional
land of Nyungar people must be preserved and taken care of. An aboriginal community
development officer is employed to coordinate with the city’s relationships with the aboriginal
community and the Torres Strait Islander people. They consider the Nyungar people as the true
custodian of south west of western Australia. The City of Cockburn has traditionally come from
the original name of the land Beeliar Boodjar (Ward,2018). In order to mend the gaps between
the Australians and the aboriginal people, they focus on the language factor as a method of
reconciliation. The community development officer of the city of Cockburn assists in
strengthening the relationship between the aboriginals and the Cockburn people. The officer is
also provided the task of promoting and encouraging the programs of community development
and raising awareness among the people of Australia. There is no such recent community
outrage. Hence, the relationship between the local community and the local government in
Cockburn is stable and healthy.
Among the major projects of the city of Cockburn, Calleya Estate Treeby Community
Centre is an infrastructure project. It will be built in the main town. The Aboriginal cultural and
visitors center is also being built which will be located in the Bibra Lake and it will be an
educational and tourism model for the purpose of educating the aboriginal and the Nyungar
community. The recreation facilities plan has supported the development of the Franklin Park.
Another improvement is the Coogee Beach Reserve. It will advance the quality of the outside
areas and also highlight the presentation of the reserve entrance.

4COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
The City of Melville is another local government authorized controlled area which is
situated in the southern suburbs of the Western Australian capital, Perth. It is more than 12
kilometers south of the central business area of Perth. The city has a population of 98,000 ad
covers 52.73 square kilometers area according to the reports of 2016. Russell Aubrey is the
Mayor of the city of Melville. In the year 1900, on 14th December, Melville was first established
under the Roads Boards Act 1871. Six months after the establishment, the city of Melville was
renamed. The Jandakot Road District provided a large amount of land to Melville in the year
1923 (Green & Haines, 2015). In the year 1961, it got converted to a shire having followed the
enactment of Local Government Act 1960. Now, the city of Melville takes care of 463 km of the
roads and also 2.10 km square of the gardens and parks.
The local government in the city of Melville is aimed at improving multiple sites along
with the foreshore. It also enhances and maintains the natural beauty. The government is much
concentrated towards the betterment of the communities around the city. It has been found from
the news reports that it is focusing on foreshore revetment works in the area named Apex park
south and the Coffee point by the year 2019(Perthnow.com, 2018). The two locations have been
found poor conditioned and have suffered from extensive and natural erosion of land that has
affected its useful life. The city of Melville is facilitated with the funding from the Department
of Transport in order to create a number of safe and active streets which can link the Riseley
Street Activity Centre with Garden City Shopping Centre. The local streets are safe which runs
with few cars at lower speeds and prioritize bicycling and improve the conditions for walking.
These safe streets are an integral part of Perth’s transport network which ensures comfortable
and safe routes for people.

5COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
The city is concerned about the ageing sporting reserve in certain ways that identifies the
value as a community and at the same time as a local area of participation. It conducted an
investigation which included the engagement with the local residents and those people who make
use of the reserve for casual recreation and the sporting clubs. The investigation of the city of
Melville informs that construction of additional on-street parking was complete in the year 2017.
The existing community facility has been demolished.
Although there is no such outrageous relation between the community and the local
government of Melville, the Mayor has recently put some questions on the high salaries of the
WA local government CEOs. It has been found that Melville chief executive Shayne Silox’s
salary has raised upto 40 %. However, whatever be their salaries, there is no such issues with the
accomplishment of projects for the betterment of the city of Melville(Perthnow.com, 2018).
Hence, the city of Melville can be considered as a mature local government with the operating
revenues of $80 million per year. The city is served by a well-constructed transport routes and
also has other community facilities. The two strong features of the city of Melville are Swan and
Canning Rivers(Perthnow.com, 2018). There is sufficient natural and formal public space in the
city. It is the fourth largest local government in terms of population in the Western Australia.
The city of Melville works closely with the State Government bodies in order to plan for the
broader adjoining precincts. it ensures that proper planning has been undertaken along with the
growth and development.
The local government has also contributed to the local employment and other business
activities. Although Melville is predominantly a residential city, there are so many levels of
higher incomes and unemployment rates are low. The local government services are properly
delivered to the Melville community. The business organizations of the city have a diversely

6COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
skills workforce as well as high qualified executives. This strength in the workforce has enabled
the city to operate with almost 200 different products and services with higher
standards(Perthnow.com, 2018). The most important point is that the city has a flexible and
mature model for the development of community which supports to tailor the product and
services among significant neighbourhoods. The community assets are sufficient in the city
which provides opportunities for the community to deliver services to the local and adjacent
communities.
The city of Melville does not step forward without the consultation of the community and
the staffs. They involve all in order to know their requirements and demands welcoming the
suggestions they provide to make the city a better one. The communication with the community
is done in many ways especially during the submission preparation period. It enables them to
have a cross-section of the community(Perthnow.com, 2018). However, despite the fact that
there were no less endeavours to know the suggestions of the community, there is still some gaps
in the methods and received responses. The responses were somewhere unsure , unanswered and
sometimes displayed general apathy to the issues.
The city of Melville views that the reduction in the elected members will result in undue
workload and will not be fruitful. Since the local government is about the local representation of
the concerns of the community, the reduction in the elected members will surely reduce the
number of opportunities (Perthnow.com, 2018). This is an area where the community is a bit
offended with the local government of Melville. Otherwise the local government of the
community is well structured and supportive.
Therefore, it can been seen from the above portray of both the local governments of
Cockburn and Melville, that Western Australia has a well –structured government. These

7COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
governments are devoted to the development of the communities and at the same time focused
on the preservation of the natural resources as much as possible. After the study on both the
communities, it has been found that the local government of Cockburn is more lenient towards
operating the natural resource protection and preservation plans. On the other hand the methods
of Melville is devoted towards the infrastructure projects.

8COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
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9COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
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10COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
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