Annual Report 2016 Contents About This Report 2 Highlights 4 Bridge Housing Profile 6 Spotlight 1: Orbit 10 Chairman’s Report 12 Chief Executive Officer’s Report 14 Our Performance 18 Housing Affordability 28 Spotlight 2: Ashfield – a new model of housing and support for older women 32 Operating Environment 2015–16 34 How We Operate 38 Strategic Plan 2015–18 18 Our Board of Directors 40 Our Executive Team 42 Spotlight 3: The Community Team 44 Our People 46 Our Governance 52 Spotlight 4: Community building and tenant engagement at South Coogee Estate 58 Operations Report 60 Spotlight 5: New Maintenance Contracts 68 Development Report 70 Spotlight 6: Affordable housing developments – Bunya 74 Finance and Corporate Services Report 76 Financial Summary 2015-16 84 Bridge Housing in the Community 90 Facts and Figures 92 Acknowledging Our Partners 95 Spotlight 7: Caretakers Cottage – Options Youth 96 Glossary and Abbreviations 98 Index 100 About This Report To assess how well we are performing, we measured our outcomes for 2015–16 against the targets set in our Strategic Plan 2015–18, which are The Bridge Housing Limited detailed further in our Business Plan 2015–16. Annual Report for 2016 Our Audience provides a summary of our This report is primarily prepared for the following stakeholders: operational and financial residents, applicants and recipients of our housing management services performance during the 2015– members of Bridge Housing Limited 16 financial year. We wish to federal and state government partners tell the story of what we do, private sector partners who work with us to deliver more affordable housing why we do it, and how our support partners that provide services to our most vulnerable tenants Bridge Housing staff members who deliver our services. work affects the residents and communities we serve. Acknowledgement of Country Bridge Housing acknowledges the Gadigal and Darug people as the traditional custodians of the lands on which we operate and wishes to pay respects to their Elders both past and present. Our Vision To be a leading not-for-profit provider of quality affordable housing. Our Mission To improve lives and strengthen communities by providing housing and services for low-to-moderate income households. Bridge Housing Limited Street address: Level 9, Tower 1, Lawson Square, Redfern NSW 2016 Postal address: PO Box 1835, Strawberry Hills, NSW 2012 Telephone: (02) 8324 0800 BRIDGE HOUSING LIMITED 2016 REPORT ANNUAL Follow us Website: www.bridgehousing.org.au 2 Email: [email protected] ABN: 55 760 055 094 ACN: 135 570 955 ISBN: 978-0-9874433-8-0 Our Values Socially responsible We are committed to encouraging social inclusion and improving the lives of the people and communities we support. The needs of our applicants and residents are at the core of all our activities People-focused and decisions. We empathise with them and deliver our services with fairness, respect and sensitivity. We value and support our employees to enable them to perform at their best and achieve their full potential. Committed and passionate We put our hearts and minds into our work. We value and encourage innovation and continually seek to improve our performance. Build relationships We build relationships based on trust and respect to create positive outcomes for the people and communities we serve. We take responsibility for our decisions and actions and provide a consistent Professionalism and integrity high-quality service. Our decisions are based on sound judgement and our culture engenders good governance, transparency and honesty. Our Strategic Plan Our Services To help achieve our mission, we develop a strategic We provide long-term accommodation for people plan every three years to identify the critical on low-to-moderate incomes using our property factors for success for Bridge Housing. These are portfolio. Bridge Housing: implemented through our annual business plans. In owns 251 properties our Strategic Plan 2015–18 these factors were: manages 725 properties owned by the NSW Meeting affordable housing need by increasing Land and Housing Corporation (LAHC), our property portfolio which is the NSW Government public housing Delivering quality homes and housing services authority and part of the Department of Governing effectively Family and Community Services (FACS) Managing the business sustainably leases 638 properties from the private rental market Supporting our people and improving our workplace manages 126 properties on behalf of other organisations and individuals Enhancing our communications and increasing our profile. acquires and develops properties provides responsive and planned In this report, we detail our performance against maintenance services on a property our business plan objectives for 2015–16, which portfolio valued at $392 million1. are aligned with and progress the Strategic Plan 2015–18. The Strategic Plan 2015–18 was approved Our services encompass the provision of social by the Bridge Housing Board in June 2015 and is and affordable housing. We meet the needs of detailed in our Annual Report 2015. the most disadvantaged people – those who require assistance to maintain a sustainable tenancy – by working with more than 16 support partners under formal agreements and many more services that support individual tenants. (Please see Acknowledging Our Partners on page 95 for more details.) ABOUT THIS REPORT 3 1 This is based on an average value of $356,000 per unit and $670,000 per house (as per recent portfolio valuations) multiplied by the number of Bridge Housing properties and properties managed on behalf of the NSW LAHC – a total of 976 properties. Leasehold and fee-for-service properties are excluded. Highlights Delivering Quality Homes Our arrears fell from 1.9 per cent and Services to Our in 2014–15, to 1.3 per cent this 2015–16 was another successful year, well below the Regulator’s year for Bridge Housing. We Residents benchmark of 2.5 per cent. have continued to improve We completed the second year Voids and vacancies were at of our award-winning Building 27 and 17 days respectively - the business and our service Bridges strategy, which is generally in line with benchmark. delivery, have undertaken our community-building and engagement program. construction of three projects Developing Our People We continued working with We continued to build upon the and grown the number of FACS through the Connect 100 human resources transformation program, a NSW Government developments in the pipeline, program undertaken over the initiative to address the drift previous strategic planning delivered strong community of homeless people from period, through the development their communities towards engagement and customer of a new human resources the inner city as they seek strategy that aligns with Strategic service, and enhanced our better access to services. Plan 2015–18. Management profile by increasing the We completed planned worked to develop cross-team use of social media. maintenance works, valued at collaboration during the year $1.31 million, on 184 dwellings. as well as a number of other The high standard of our areas identified in last year’s properties was also reflected in Staff Engagement Survey. the tenant satisfaction rating We also began the process of 90 per cent for maintenance of obtaining White Ribbon Strategic Portfolio Growth services, achieved in the Asset Workplace Accreditation to Maintenance Survey in 2015–16. address the issue of domestic In 2015–16, we expanded our violence against women – see property portfolio from 1,716 to Our People on page 46. 1,767 dwellings. We continued our Effective Governance development program, which will We executed a smooth transition Increasing Our Profile deliver 112 new affordable homes to a new chairman, Mark during 2016–17 and a further 158 Turner, upon the resignation Bridge Housing significantly by 2018. These projects include: of Vicki Allen from the role increased our use of social media the Bunya development at of chair after six years. platforms over 2015–16, through Bungarribee, which will deliver Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn The General Manager 65 homes. This is due to be and YouTube, and improved Operations and General completed in July 2016 our level of engagement with Manager Finance and Corporate stakeholders and tenants across redevelopment of an apartment Services undertook the Company each of the platforms – see block at Ashfield, which will Directors Course with the the infographic on page 17. deliver nine studio apartments Australian Institute of Company in July 2016 Directors during the year. construction of a 38-unit Challenges The gender balance on the complex in Parramatta, which board is 57 per cent male and The major challenges we faced is scheduled for completion in 43 per cent female, which meets during the year included council November 2016 our target of no less than 40 delays in issuing planning planning work for land per cent of either gender. approvals and completion redevelopment in Cowper certificates. These slowed our Street, Glebe, which will Business Sustainability progress on the Parramatta and provide 158 homes for older Bunya development activities. people by June 2018 We delivered a net operating submission of a tender for surplus, before depreciation Awards and recognition a Communities Plus site at and impairment, of $1.1 We secured national awards Seven Hills in June 2016 to million in 2015–16, compared BRIDGE HOUSING LIMITED 2016 REPORT ANNUAL for annual reporting, earning a deliver 118 units in a mixed- to $0.5 million in 2014–15. fourth consecutive Gold Award tenure development. 4 for our Annual Report 2015 at the Australasian Reporting Awards. Winner of the Winner of the 2015 Australasian 2015 Australasian Leading Tenant Leading Asset Engagement Practice Award Management Award Presented by the Presented by the Australian Housing Institute for Australian Housing Institute for professional excellence in housing professional excellence in housing We also won National Awards for Leading strengthened our balance sheet to establish a strong Tenant Engagement Practice for the Building financial base for future growth.