South Burnet Regional Council (SBRC) had developed Business Continuity Plans at a relatively high level for the Council organisation with sub-plans for identified branches of Council’s operation. However, with the outbreak of COVID-19, they identified the requirement to prepare business continuity plans for their essential functions based on divisions and departments. These functions included:
- Corporate
- Fleet
- Infrastructure works
- IT
- Water and Sewerage
- Libraries
- Waste
Each plan was developed through GenEng facilitating discussions with relevant divisions and departments and finalising the plans.
The challenge at the time was the significant uncertainty of the impacts of COVID-19 in the community, region and nation and the swiftly changing responses to the pandemic by all levels of Government and industry.
Collation of contemporary examples of mitigating actions was key to the development of effective plans. Options for Pandemic response were rapidly being developed at the time and research identifying available guidance from both within and outside of the Local Government Sector were sought as reference material for Council’s plans.
As each manager was empowered as the authorised author of each Business Plan, they had a high level of personal ownership of the planning. This contributed significantly to the appropriateness of mitigating actions and precautions identified, greatly assisting timely implementation.