Budget & finances
Comparing raw dollar totals between councils isn't very useful — bigger councils naturally have bigger numbers. What does tell you about a council's financial health are normalised indicators: the standard ratios that every NSW council reports against the Office of Local Government's benchmarks, plus per-property figures you can compare to the NSW average. The ratios below are from the NSW Government's 'Your Council' / OLG time-series data for 2023–24.
New to these terms? Read them in plain English
- Operating performance ratio
- Whether everyday income covers everyday running costs.
- Own-source operating revenue ratio
- How much of the council's income it raises itself vs. grants from other governments.
- Unrestricted current ratio
- Whether the council has enough spare cash to pay its short-term bills.
- Debt service cover ratio
- How comfortably operating cash covers the council's loan repayments.
- Rates & annual charges outstanding ratio
- The share of rates bills that haven't been paid by year-end.
- Cash expense cover ratio
- How many months the council could keep paying bills if income stopped.
- Infrastructure backlog ratio
- The cost of fixing run-down assets, as a share of what those assets are worth.
- Asset maintenance ratio
- Whether the council actually spends what it should on maintaining its assets.
- Building & infrastructure renewals ratio
- Whether assets are being renewed as fast as they wear out.
- Operating result (surplus / deficit)
- Income minus expenses for the year's normal operations.
- OLG benchmark
- The healthy target set by the state for each financial ratio.
- Average residential rate
- The typical yearly general-rates bill for a home in the area.
- Office of Local Government (OLG)
- The NSW body overseeing councils; publishes the financial data.
- $1,802 / yearAbout 58% above the NSW council average of ~$1,140 — Kiama sits in the higher range, similar to other Illawarra/South Coast councils. A separate domestic waste charge (~$651) applies. (OLG 'Your Council' data.)
- Operating deficit — performance ratio −17.6%Kiama recorded an operating deficit in 2023–24. Its Long-Term Financial Plan sets out measures (including service reviews and a possible special rate variation) aimed at returning the council to a sustainable position.
- Infrastructure
- Meets all 3 OLG infrastructure benchmarksBacklog 1.9% (benchmark <2%), renewals ~185% and asset maintenance ~100% (both benchmark >100%) — Kiama has been renewing and maintaining its assets at or above the benchmark.
- Liquidity & cash
- Healthy — unrestricted current ratio 2.63×, ~6.8 months cashBoth comfortably above the OLG benchmarks (>1.5× and >3 months).
- Domestic waste charge (2023–24)
- $651 / yearA separate annual charge that funds the bin service; by law it can only recover the reasonable cost of providing the service.
| Indicator (2023–24) | Kiama | Meets? | |
|---|---|---|---|
| −17.6% | > 0% | No | |
| 64.4% | > 60% | Yes | |
| 2.63× | > 1.5× | Yes | |
| −1.33× | > 2× | No | |
| 2.6% | < 10% | Yes | |
| 6.8 months | > 3 months | Yes | |
| 1.9% | < 2% | Yes | |
| 100.4% | > 100% | Yes | |
| 184.8% | > 100% | Yes |
Kiama's financial-health indicators, 2023–24, against the NSW Office of Local Government benchmarks. 'Meets?' simply states whether the figure is on the benchmark side of the line. Source: NSW Government 'Your Council' / OLG time-series data, 2023–24.
These ratios are the standard, size-independent way to read a council's finances, which is why we use them instead of raw dollar totals. Kiama met 7 of the 9 benchmarks in 2023–24. The two it didn't — the operating-performance ratio and the debt service cover ratio — both reflect an operating deficit that year (the debt-cover ratio measures operating funds available to service debt, so it turns negative when the operating result is negative), rather than weak infrastructure spending: its three infrastructure ratios all met the benchmark. We present the numbers and their benchmarks; whether that's good value is for you to judge from the sources below.
Sources — check it yourself
Figures are current as at the dates shown and may change — always confirm with the linked source. See the notice at the bottom of the page for full details and how to report a correction.