b'APRIL 2025CASE STUDY 1:NSW HOUSING DELIVERY AUTHORITYA BIG CHANGE FOR THE BETTERA big change in zoning restrictions and the constraints of local planning controls has come from the new Housing Delivery Authority (HDA), which removes the assessment role of councils and fast tracks larger high yield, high value housing projects through the State Significant Development assessment pathway. Importantly, the HDA is made up of a triumvirate of powerful and highly regarded public servants: Simon Draper, the Secretary of the Premiers Department; Kiersten Fishburn, the Secretary of the Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure; and Tom Gellibrand, the CEO of Infrastructure NSW. This gravitas gives the new authority the cut-through to deliver results.Rather than desktop economists guessing yield and cost of delivery, then applying their assessment of levy or tax opportunity, the new HDA calls for expressions of interest from the private sector. This EOI process is assessed against published criteria. If accepted, recommendations are made by the HDA to the Minister to declare those projects state significant for the purposes of the planning assessment and determination pathway.Further, the local planning controls are assessed according to merit, not the tick-a-box approach the council staff typically use to frustrate development with minor non-compliance. Rezonings will be assessed concurrently (this alone is a big change) and the entire process will produce a decision within 270 calendar days of the application being lodged, including third party government agency concurrences.The new process has been very popular with over 250 expressions of interest being lodged in the first three months. The Minister has already approved State Significant Development status for 44 projects with a further 16 in the EOI HDA pipeline. If all these progress through assessment successfully, that would mean new dwelling approvals would jump by 27,353 (given the annual new dwelling approvals in NSW are hovering 46,000, that is a massive result for a policy shift announced only last December). 16'