The Regional Development Council Action Agenda Funding Scheme will support the Regional Development Council to deliver strategic outcomes to the regions.

A total of $75 million is available for individual projects that assist the development of infrastructure or service projects in regional Western Australia.

Who Can Apply?

Government grant applications can be submitted by any organisation or individual business. This includes all State agencies and community organisations. Eligible applicants may include local governments, voluntary organisations, business groups, educational institutions, philanthropic foundations and community organisations.

West Australian State Government and Federal Government agencies may apply but projects deemed to be funded as part of core business functions will not be supported.

The Regional Development Council Action Agenda Funding Scheme is not intended to provide support to individual businesses or private enterprise unless wider community benefits can de demonstrated or where gaps in delivery capacity of other eligible organisations have been identified. Funding to such organisations will be subject to the intellectual property gained from the funded project being made available to the wider community.

What Can Be Funded?

This government grant provides funds for infrastructure (including headworks) or service projects that align with the Royalties for Regions objectives and address the outcomes of the Action Agenda priority areas.

For the purpose of this government grant, headworks is defined accordingly:

Work designated as headworks by essential service providers such as water, power, gas and telecommunications utilities, or local governments, which is undertaken by those organisations to provide service connection to the boundary of a property.

In circumstances where work that would normally be undertaken by an essential service provider is carried out by a contractor nominated by the essential service provider, the work will be considered as eligible for assistance. In addition, funding assistance for ‘on site’ wastewater treatment systems may be considered in instances where the connection to mains sewerage system is not an available option.

Applicants on the South West Interconnected System (SWIS) grid meeting the cost of the Distribution Headworks Charge may also be eligible for a total subsidy from Western Power if located at remote or edge of grid locations. For further details contact Western Power on 13 10 87 or refer to the website http://westernpower.com.au. Applicants should check the availability of this subsidy prior to costing headworks charges into budgets.

Regional Development Council Action Agenda Funding Scheme Applications must be for projects that are considered regionally significant. For the purpose of this Scheme only, regionally significant is defined accordingly:
Projects deemed to be regionally significant are those that have a strategic impact against the Action Agenda for a community or region(s).

The Council has determined a baseline figure of the total project costs to be considered regionally significant for this funding. RDL will only accept projects over this amount and projects under this amount will be deemed ineligible.

For this round overall project costs must be over $500,000.

Applicants can seek funding for up to a maximum of four years. Resubmission of applications for further funding upon conclusion of Royalties for Regions support will not be encouraged.

The costs of audits required under ‘Reporting Requirements’ may be funded from the Scheme. This amount must be clearly identified in the project budget and included in the total amount of funding sought. The costs of signage required under ‘Acknowledgement of the Funding’ may be funded from the Scheme. This amount must be clearly identified in the project budget and included in the total amount of funding sought.

What Cannot Be Funded?

The following items of expenditure are not eligible for government grant funding:

• Retrospectively funding activities already undertaken
• Cost-shifting
• Retiring debt
• Recurrent operating costs once the project is complete
• Ongoing staff salaries – employment of personnel will only be considered for a project with specific outcomes attached to the funding
• Investment for the sole purpose of return (i.e. interest) – any interest accrued as a result of appropriate fund management for projects will need to be declared in progress reports and will need to be reinvested into the project or another Council approved project of a similar nature

Any asset acquired as a result of this funding cannot be disposed of without the written agreement of Council, unless intentions relating to the asset are clearly stated as part of the application.

All Regional Development Council Action Agenda Funding Scheme projects must be approved and grant agreements signed prior to funded activities commencing to be eligible for a financial contribution. No retrospective payments will be made. For this round, project approval is not likely to be given prior to 31 October 2011.

Any Regional Development Council Action Agenda Funding Scheme funds not spent in accordance with these guidelines or not for the purpose in which they were provided – as per the signed grant agreement – must be refunded. RDL reserves the right to undertake spot audits where appropriate to ensure the correct application of funds. The Office of the Auditor General may also undertake sample audits.

Further Information

The 2011 round for the Regional Development Council Action Agenda Funding Scheme applications is currently open. All applications must be submitted to RDL by COB Friday 22 July 2011.

All applications must be supported by a project business case.  If required, business case templates are available by contacting the Department of Regional Development and Lands at councilfunding@rdl.wa.gov.au.

The state government has committed to a range of initiatives to address climate change in Western Australia. An important part of meeting this challenge will be new, low emission technologies and the development of renewable energy supplies that reduce the state’s carbon footprint. The Low Emissions Energy Development (LEED) Fund supports the technological development required to cut greenhouse gas emissions from the energy sector and contributes to the national target of 20 per cent renewable energy by 2020.

LEED funding

Funding will be awarded under the LEED Fund to support new technologies with the potential to reduce energy sector (including stationary and transport energy) greenhouse gas emissions in WA.

Applications for the forth round of funding under the LEED Fund have been called for in May 2011. Funding allocations are expected to be determined in the second half of 2011. Funding will be for a minimum of $250,000 per project.

Single grants will have an upper limit of the funding determined by the funds available in a given year. For the fourth funding round, this will be $8 million. As a condition of funding, applicants will need to demonstrate that every dollar of LEED funding is matched by three dollars of funding from elsewhere. This can be internal funds or grants from other non-state government sources. Matching funds may be in-kind rather than cash but would need to be acceptable to the LEED Fund’s Independent Expert Advisory Group.

Funds will be disbursed on a staged basis and linked to the achievement of milestones negotiated with successful applicants. While LEED funds do not need to be fully
disbursed in the year they are awarded, milestones for LEED funding for a given project must be structured so that a grant is fully paid within five years of being awarded.

Emissions reduction

A key assessment criterion will be reductions in greenhouse gas emissions attributable to the new technology associated with the project.
In this section, applicants should include:

• the quantity of emissions (expressed in tonnes of CO2e) expected to be abated from the implementation of the project and over what period (including the tonnes of CO2e expected to be abated per dollar of LEED funding)
• the quantity of emissions (expressed in tonnes of CO2e) expected to be abated from the wider uptake of the technology in the WA market and over what period (including the tonnes of CO2e expected to be abated per dollar of LEED funding)
• the estimated effective total cost of abatement per tonne for both categories.

The method(s) or basis used in determining the quantities of emissions should be clearly described. Any references used should be stated
and assumptions made should be justified.

Technological innovation

A key objective of the LEED Fund is the development of new technology and its introduction into WA. It is not essential that the technology is completely new but significant local adaptation should be required to bring the technology to WA.

In this section, applicants should indicate what stage of the technological pathway is proposed to be supported by LEED funding using the methodology below. This section should also include information on the degree of technological innovation in the proposal and whether it is being used elsewhere or in WA. The applicant should also include a discussion on their efforts to retain and apply in WA any intellectual property arising from their project.

For the purposes of the LEED Fund, innovation involves the generation of new knowledge through systematic, investigative and/or experimental activities involving risk, that enable the development of products, processes or services that have commercial merit. The products, processes or services for which support is being sought must be technically or functionally different from comparable products, processes or services and development must involve some degree of technical, commercial or financial risk.

Commercial merit involves the demonstration of a realistic market potential for the product, process or service being developed. The development should be aimed at commercial markets (including prototype development and trialling), as distinct from basic research for curiosity value or non-commercial purposes (such as general public knowledge).

Technology development is often characterised as a pathway from initial concept identification through to research, commercialisation and ultimately adoption as shown in the following graphic.

Applications should be lodged by 5pm (WST), Wednesday 29 June 2011.