Town aims for more local tenders
The Town of Port Hedland has begun to look at ways it can contract local businesses to do more work for it by breaking down its large tenders into smaller packages.
With Pilbara businesses battling economic pressures caused by the mining sector downturn, chief executive Mal Osborne said the Town was keen to see more of its drainage, footpath and road works contracts go to local employers.
He said the Town was also studying ways to improve the ease with which it contracted local workers for electrical, air-conditioning, cabinetry, painting and trades-related services.
"The Town certainly wants to look at how we can support local businesses," he said.
"(As part of that) we've been really working on … putting in some more measures where we can break down some of our large contracts and get that work out locally."
"(Another target would be to put) a process in place where businesses can pre-register for work for us, show us their insurance policies, demonstrate their ability to do work, then when we have patches of work available … we can get that out (quickly)."
The measures come as the North West Telegraph last week identified up to 17 Pilbara businesses that had recently entered into administration or liquidation in a sign of the mining sector downturn's impact on the local economy.
But while Mr Osborne said the Town was not able to introduce policies that could exert a large influence over the mining industry, it had enough economic muscle to give a kick-start to certain sectors.
He said while the Town had an expected turnover of $124 million in 2014-15, its rates income was about $26 million.
"There is really a 4 to 1 leverage of what we are producing compared to what we are extracting from rates," he said.
In addition, the Town drew around 45 per cent of its income through fees and charges and around 25 per cent through grants from government and other contributions.
Yet not all of it the income could be spent locally, Mr Osborne said.
In some cases, such as insurance and electricity payments, the Town was forced to pay providers outside the Pilbara.
He said the Town would now look to complete an official breakdown of how much it spent locally in a bid to identify ways to spend more in the Pilbara.
