In what has been described as an outstanding milestone for the Coalfield’s community, Cessnock council cleared $576.6 million in developments, $168.4 million of that sum spent during the last financial year, one of the highest ever recorded in the local government area.

The council’s general manager Stephen Glen said this is an outstanding milestone for the community.

“This investment in our local area will provide long term benefits to the local economy and help create jobs in the region,” Mr Glen said.

Most recently last quarter more than $48.5 million worth of developments were approved with major developments including:

.  15 dwellings at North Rothbury.

. Expansion of Hunter Valley Gardens.

. A restaurant, function centre and chapel in Pokolbin.

. 248 residential  lots in Greta.

The timely consideration of applications was also highlighted with Cessnock City Council again achieving under a 50-day average processing time for development applications.

The council’s planning and environment director Gareth Curtis said the result comes at the end of the current council term and is a result of implementing the outcomes of the council’s planning review adopted in 2012.

“The community should have more confidence in council being able to process applications a lot quicker and applicants can get on with their jobs,” Mr Curtis said.

“Pokolbin is the hub of tourism for us and there are a lot of very different developments going on out there, particularly at Hunter Valley Gardens,” he said.

In the Maitland Local Government area a total of $960million worth of developments have been processed. The council’s Development and Environment manager David Simm said the average processing time is 35 days and the median processing time is 26 days.

“There have been a total of 4280 development applications processed over the last four years, at an average of 1070 per year,” Mr Simm said.