Veteran Hunter developer Hilton Grugeon is pursuing court action against the Hunter's two largest councils in order to progress plans for new housing projects.
With more than half a century of development experience to draw on, Mr Grugeon says the inability of local government planners and their managers to assess and determine housing projects has reached an all-time low.
As a result, he says, the region's targets for new houses are falling further behind where they need to be.
"Our local councils have no hope of producing the number of homes we need for this area because of their inability to process development applications," he said.
Mr Grugeon's comments come after the Urban Development Institute of Australia last week warned that key targets for the supply of new housing in the Hunter and elsewhere would be missed unless the rollout of new housing was accelerated.
Mr Grugeon, a founder and director of Hunter Land, presently has Land and Environment Court cases afoot against Newcastle and Lake Macquarie councils.
A number of other cases are expected to be launched in the near future.
The Newcastle case relates to a 16-townhouse development at Elemore Vale and the Lake Macquarie case relates to a 12-townhouse development at Whitebridge.
Both councils have defended their handling of the applications.
But Mr Grugeon says the councils' inability to to determine the projects within the statutory 40-day period has left him with no option but to seek the court's intervention.
"It's the only way to get certainty of timing in any way. It [the court outcome] is an uncertain thing but it's much more certain than giving it to the council and waiting forever," he said.
Mr Grugeon said an exodus of experienced planners from the local government sector in recent years had seen a breakdown in efficiency and direction.
"When management fails, the whole system fails. [Planning] staff need direction and confidence in doing their job, but that's not happening," he said.
"I liken it to a driver who comes to a roundabout and takes five or six attempts to enter the roundabout. Before you know it the whole thing has ground to a halt."
"It's definitely more of a problem with multi-dwelling developments, which is what we need more of to stop the incessant urban sprawl."
A City of Newcastle spokeswoman said ABS data showed the Newcastle LGA had the third highest number of new dwellings in the state.
This included 920 dwellings, worth more than $476 million, which were approved for construction in Newcastle in the five months to the end of November 2023.
Based on the supply pipeline within the Newcastle Local Government Area, City of Newcastle met the new dwelling demand by 2021 early and is on track to meet its demand for 2026 and 2041.
The council's "award winning" accelerated development application system had also resulted in reduced determination times for low-impact developments for less than 10 days.
Development applications were allocated to staff based on their experience and the complexity of the application.
"The townhouse proposal in Elermore Vale is being assessed by a Principal Development Planner who has extensive experience, and a review of the application has confirmed it has been appropriately progressed," she said.
"The application was lodged in June 2023. It's an extremely complex development site, which is constrained by watercourses, riparian corridors, bushfire, and complex engineering issues. Since lodgement, several meetings and discussions have occurred with the applicant, with all requests anticipated to be addressed by the applicant during the normal course of the assessment. However, rather than address our concerns, the applicant chose Friday to take the DA to the Land and Environment Court."
Lake Macquarie Council's manager, development assessment and certification, Michael Corrigan, said processing times of development applications in Lake Macquarie had been trending downwards for a sustained period of time and there had been significant improvement in recent years.
The median development assessment processing time is currently 15 days, down from 29 days in 2020.
"While not commenting specifically on the Whitebridge development application, which is before the court, we can say that each development application presents its own unique opportunities and challenges. Occasionally, matters like ecology or traffic generation can prove harder to resolve, but Council's Development Assessment and Certification team works hard to ensure efficient processing of appropriate development across Lake Macquarie," he said.
In the 2023 calendar year, the council released 1241 additional housing lots. This is the highest number for a calendar year on record. The previous maximum was 865 in 2019.
