THE THINKING BEHIND OUR INDICATORS

Over the past five years, Landcom has developed a leadership position in social planning for new developments. We have a well developed understanding of the relationship between land use planning/design and community well being. We have now integrated new social planning processes into our business practices, and these are reflected in our second generation of indicators.

Our original indicators concentrated on the specific programs we have implemented in our developments, such as the Welcome Program, which helps build a sense of community. However, measuring individual programs only gives us a limited understanding of how we are influencing projects overall.

Our second generation indicators now measure both the social sustainability due diligence and the social strategic planning that we undertake at the masterplan stage. This work helps us identify social risks and opportunities to help us plan for the community’s long-term social sustainability. We also specifically report on the development of universal housing in new display villages. And since Welcome Programs have become standard Landcom practice in all new projects, we now measure the types and value of all community programs and events throughout the year. This allows us to better identify the value we are adding to community development.

In developing our new indicators, we recognised that simply providing information on the community facilities we create in our projects only gave a crude indication of our contribution. A better reflection of our contribution will come from a new indicator that measures the impact of some of our other initiatives, such as community sponsorships. We now measure the monetary value of both these and our community facilities.

The housing market and home affordability has undergone radical change since we first began reporting against this indicator in 2003. In response, last year we added a relative affordability indicator. By taking into account the percentage of Landcom housing sold at or below the average sales price for new housing in a defined local area, we can moreaccurately assess our impact relative to current market conditions.

Also, we were conscious that the way we were reporting our moderate income housing results failed to capture all of our activities in this area. We now count houses sold to community housing providers which will be rented long term to moderate income households. We also updated our moderate income methodology by increasing loan repayment terms from 25 to 30 years to reflect industry standard.

HOW WE PERFORMED

Two projects had a social sustainability due diligence report and strategic social plan (or equivalent¹) completed before masterplan approval during the reporting period.

Only one project at precinct delivery phase included a display village, but the plans for this village were approved prior to this indicator coming into effect. Therefore, no result was recorded in terms of including universal housing in a display village.

Our Eco-Home display village at The Ponds will include universal housing and is expected to be reported in 2010/2011.

For our Moderate Income Housing indicator, 11.9% (or 142 lots and/or dwellings) of Landcom product (at Oran Park, Parkbridge, Park Central, Greenway Views, Garden Gates, Sanctuary, Ashton Grove and Koala Bay) were sold at prices that fell within this year’s range. Most were standard houses and some were a result of lot diversity design.

The percentage of Landcom’s land and house and land packages at or lower than the average retail price in the defined areas where Landcom operates is shown in the graph below².

The 10% result in the Blacktown/The Hills sub region comprises apartments at the Rouse Hill Town Centre, where the high amenity at this particular location has led to higher than average prices being achieved relative to the rest of this submarket. The zero result for house and land packages within the Campbelltown sub region reflects a similar set of circumstances, where the price of homes at our Park Central and Macarthur Gardens projects was also influenced by their very close proximity to Macarthur Square. There were no house and land packages offered for sale in Camden during the reporting period.

Of our projects this year over 200 lots, 93% had community development programs in place³, while 73% had a structured sustainable living education program in place. Examples of sustainable education programs include the Walking School Bus at The Ponds (where groups of children walk to school, making stops along the way to collect others) and the seminars, workshops and demonstrations provided by the Macarthur Sustainable Living Centre for Garden Gates. Community programs at Parkbridge also offered social sustainability activities to the residents within this project.

Land for the development of two primary schools and one high school was designated and/or sold to the Department of Education and Training. Other community facilities developed during the reporting period include 27 hectares of passive open space, seven hectares of active open space and five playgrounds. The capital value of the construction of open space and community facilities was $9,583,000 (excluding land value), while the value of community programs was $683,980. The value of community support and sponsorship was $79,164.

The one project with significant indigenous heritage issues and heritage listed items and places had a Conservation Management Plan in place at masterplan stage. The other project’s heritage items are under final investigation and will be reported in future years if needed.

^{1 At Caddens, the project needed to demonstrate that social sustainability strategies were in place to get an approval from Penrith City Council and therefore an affordable housing, community infrastructure, social services, open space and recreation needs study was completed. The Council’s blueprint also required the project to address such issues as employment opportunities, affordable housing and open space before the masterplan was approved.
2 Data is from July 2009 - March 2010.
3 Koala Bay was the only exception.}