A Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) will be signed between City of Melbourne’s Lord Mayor, Robert Doyle, and Mayors from the State Government’s six designated Central Activities Districts (CADs) – Frankston, Maroondah, Greater Dandenong, Hume, Maribyrnong and Whitehorse – on Monday 22 November at 9.30am in the Frankston City Council Chambers to officially cement their unanimous commitment to seek State Government support and funding to create the most productive, liveable and sustainable city centres. 

The MOU acknowledges that mutual benefit can be derived by these municipalities through measures of mutual support, collaboration and by providing a united voice and joint approach to lobbying.

Frankston City Council Mayor, Cr Christine Richards said these six metropolitan hubs have been selected to attract people, investment and jobs and it is pivotal they remain supported to achieve the objectives of the State Government’s Melbourne 2030 and Melbourne @ 5 million strategies.

“This is a historical political event – the joining of Mayors to achieve a mutually beneficial outcome. The CAD municipalities are ready, willing and able to face the challenges ahead together to make our CADs thriving metropolises. However, we cannot do so without a whole-of-government commitment to CAD planning,” Cr Richards said.

Maroondah City Council Mayor, Cr Alex Makin, said despite the CADs individual differences, synergies do exist between the municipal city centres.

“This alliance means we can work co-operatively to provide a united voice with more weight that will give greater strength to plans and solutions to state-wide issues. We need a State Government supported implementation plan to ensure our city centres can achieve their designated potential,” said Cr Makin.

The Mayors’ will further discuss how to best achieve the objectives set out in the State Government’s Planning Policy Framework. The Mayors’ are unanimous that at a minimum CADs must:  

• have a functioning transit interchange – to enable comfortable, quick and efficient journeys by buses and trains throughout each municipality – in some CADs substantial infrastructure funding is still required to make this vision a reality
• create more local jobs – CADs need to expand their base of employers to create a greater range and number of local jobs available to local residents
• create more affordable housing.

“This Memorandum of Understanding between the Central Activities District Mayors and the Mayor of the City of Melbourne will allow for increased co-operation between our municipalities and allow us to jointly advocate for our key priorities,” Cr Makin said.

“Our main priority at a state level is to secure a long term funding commitment for the CADs. With Melbourne quickly becoming a city of many cities, we want to ensure certainty for the respective CADs, as well as bolstering the opportunity for all levels of governments to provide more services across greater metropolitan Melbourne”, Cr. Makin concluded.

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