Scenic Rim Regional Council CEO David Keenan has refused to accept responsibility for the systemic failures found in an independent review into the Gallery Walk carpark project.
The review, carried out by Agile Project Management at a cost of $35,500, examined why the project, initially estimated to cost $4.2 – $4.5 million, experienced a $1.6 million budget blowout.
At the August council meeting Cr Stephen Moriarty asked Mr Keenan if he agreed there was a pattern of systemic failures that resulted in cost blowouts for a number of projects across the Scenic Rim.
Mr Keenan denied there were systemic failures and said they were isolated instances, adding that the recommendations of the report were being put in place.
However, Cr Moriarty said this didn’t “pass muster”.
Mr Keenan again denied that he was responsible for the performance of council and overseeing the operation of council that resulted in the $1.6 million cost blowout.
He said there were good recommendations in the report but agreed there were some things that did not go well” with the Gallery Walk carpark project, including weather and materials.
In an interview following the meeting, Mayor Tom Sharp said the CEO is the highest ranking executive and therefore held the ultimate responsibility for the organisation’s successes and failures.
“While the councillors set the strategic vision and operational plan and budget, it is for the CEO to execute the plan and report back on how well council is meeting the expectations of the people,” Mayor Sharp said.
“The breadth of systemic failings was of greatest concern. The fact that there were failings across Governance, Project Management Framework, Cost Estimating, Risk Management, Procurement Planning and Communication rings alarm bells.
“Most alarming for me was the lack of reporting in the ever escalating $1.6m cost blowout that came progressively over time, as opposed to a single event, without being reported to councillors.”
The review, ordered by Mayor Sharp, concluded the project’s performance was not due to a single point of failure, but rather a combination of systemic, interrelated factors:
- This included a lack of upfront strategy. The report found the decision to use internal council resources was based solely on staff availability, rather than a documented assessment of internal capability, capacity or delivery risks.
- The project lacked a formal schedule baseline and integrated controls which prevented council from reliably measuring progress against a timeline or properly correlating expenditure and completed works.
- The risk management was ineffective as it didn’t proactively track or mitigate for anticipated risks such as weather and resource limitations. The project was heavily impacted by 40 days of delays and $125,000 in costs from wet weather and Cyclone Alfred.
- The extensive staff leave and higher duties arrangements severely disrupted the continuity of the project with crucial roles suffering massive gaps which eventually forced a reactive transition of the remaining $2.5 million in works to an external contractor.
- The manager had 694 days of leave and higher duties, the project manager had 245 days, the coordinator 81 days and the director 42 days leave or higher duties, which occurred during critical phases of delivery.
- Issues and cost overruns were reported as progressing in line with expectations for too long, with material budget and delivery problems only formally escalated once they had fully materialised.
- The reactive move to an external contractor in September 2025, which the review found was appropriate, exposed the project to highly constrained market pricing and introduced significant commercial complexity.
Pavement, electrical and drainage works were the primary drivers of the $1.8 million budget overrun.
The unbound pavement represented the single largest cost escalation, surging by $505,501, 168.50 per cent.
Electrical and lighting exceeded the budget by $310,840 and stormwater and drainage by $270,973.
There was $502,658 in unbudgeted items including noise fencing, sceptic systems, DTMR securities and weather delays.
Traffic management was the only major category to finish under budget at a saving of $48,174.
There were 14 recommendations the review said should be implemented. These included a mandatory requirement proposed by the Audit and Risk Committee that no funding be released for future projects exceeding $1 million unless locked-in scope, cost and schedule baselines are formally established upfront.
The review recommended strengthening the Project Management Framework (PMF), which was only introduced during the project, but was never implemented due to severe resource constraints.
Mayor Sharp said status updates would come back to council, reporting directly on the implementation of the recommendations contained in the Management Action Plan and he would expect full effective scrutiny by the councillors of the implementation of the 14 recommendations of the review.
He said he believed that the governance policies need to be clear and link the PMF directly to executive performance and that councillors interrogate the planning and development of high-risk projects with much higher frequency on the status and for any project that is exceeding budget thresholds.
Cr Moriarty later repeated his view that the CEO was directly responsible for the oversight of the project.
“The buck stops with him. His denial that the root causes for the cost blowout highlighted in the report are a result of systemic failures, and his ongoing refusal to accept responsibility for these failures, is totally unacceptable,” Cr Moriarty said.
“A CEO in any organisation understands that they are ultimately responsible for the performance of the organisation. If this were not the case, why would we have a CEO?”
He pointed to the Local Government Act 2009 which sets out the responsibilities of the CEO, which includes resource management and service delivery.
“Under David Keenan’s watch, there have been cost blow outs in a number of recent projects, including $1M on the Hinchcliffe Bridge upgrade, at least $1.6M on the Gallery Walk Carpark project that is ongoing and remains uncompleted at this time, and $5-10M in remediation works required at the Bromelton landfill due to a leachate issue that had escalated out of control due to indecision and inaction,” Cr Moriarty said.
“The end result of these systemic failures under the CEO is that the Scenic Rim is now the highest rating council in Southeast Queensland.
“At the very least, there needs to be an independent investigation into the performance of the CEO if there are councillors who are unwilling or unable to carry out their role and hold the CEO accountable for the performance of council.”
Cr Moriarty said he stood by comments he made during the special budget meeting in June that councillors are ultimately responsible for the performance of council and make decisions that are in the public interest on behalf of the people they are elected to represent.
Acting director infrastructure services Justin Sinnamon said the project is scheduled for completion in December 2026 subject to weather conditions and site constraints.
