Budget on the run: Delayed council elections will leave new members scrambling
By DANIEL CLARKE
18/06/26
Newly elected councillors will have mere weeks to understand Kangaroo Island Council’s fragile financial position before signing off on next year’s budget because of delayed local government elections.
The State Government this week introduced legislation to parliament to delay South Australia’s council elections from November to April next year.
The move comes after the March state election was plagued with operational problems, including inadequate polling booth staff, computer glitches and - most worryingly - misplaced ballots that were later discovered by Electoral Commission of South Australian (ECSA) staff.
Commissioner Mick Sherry resigned on Tuesday as an independent review of the management and oversight of the March polls takes place.
The five-month delay of the elections was requested by the acting SA Electoral Commissioner Leah McLay, saying there would be “insufficient” time to implement any recommended changes before they were held on November 11.
A number of current Kangaroo Island councillors have expressed concern at the short timeframe between new members being elected and the sign-off of the 2027/28 budget, fearing a heavy workload of induction programs could hinder their full understanding of the organisation’s financial position.
The Island Independent understands three sitting councillors are unlikley to stand for re-election as KI Council embarks on a major cost-cutting strategy aimed at saving at least $4 million over four years.
It comes after the Essential Services Commission of South Australia earlier this year labelled KI Council’s historic, current and forecast financial performance unsustainable.
Kangaroo Island Mayor Michael Pengilly, who said he remained “open minded” about his own re-election bid, revealed he had discussed the budget timing with CEO Daryl Buckingham and warned the current council would need to start 2027 financial planning work early.
“If we get a newly elected council arrive in April and they need to have a budget done by June/July we will need to do a lot of work early,” Mayor Pengilly said.
“The current council will be in caretaker mode and will not be able to make decisions but they can do all the work and the adjudication and get it sorted out from February next year. Then the new council can be appointed and put the budget through.”
When asked if he was concerned that freshly elected councillors might not feel informed or confident enough in Council's strategy to endorse the 2027/28 budget, Mayor Pengilly said “yes I would be”.
“There might be one or two that come in and think like that but majority rules in the end,” he said. “That's how democracy works. We could have a couple of One Nation people who want to change the world.
“One of the weaknesses of local government is that you can just put your name on the board and if you get elected then you’re in, there's no sort of training or any understanding.
“I think what we're seeing with One Nation is that they had no real party structure to go through on their pre-selection of candidates and you've got all sorts of people being elected in South Australia, so where that falls I don't know.”
Mayor Pengilly said he initially feared more than three councillor resignations in November would result in council not reaching it’s minimum requirements of six sitting members to reach quorum but he now believes most, if not all, will see out the extra months.
“There might be a couple of councillors that want to go and that's up to them but it's only four or five months extra,” he said.
“I'm not too fussed about it at all because I think we've got a very stable council and have had for the last two or three years, which has worked well.”
He believed it was “the right move" to delay the local government elections to ensure trust in the process.
“Clearly a lot of things went wrong in the state election. It was a bit of a debacle.
"There's been a push for local government elections to be pushed back a year so that they weren’t being held on the same year as the state elections. I think it's probably a good idea because we get electioned-out.
“A lot of people don’t realise that council elections are far more complex than a state election because you've got 67 councils and you can have scores of candidates per council. The preferential voting system takes a long time to work out. It’s better that they get it right.”
The Local Government Association (LGA) on Tuesday said it had not endorsed the Electoral Commission's request for a delay but that it would carefully review the legislation.
“Feedback from across the local government sector has been mixed, with many councils and elected members holding strong views on the proposal,” LGA South Australia President, Mayor Heather Holmes-Ross said.
“We recognise that all councils have been planning and preparing for November 2026 elections for a considerable period and have already invested significant time, resources and funding into election readiness.
"Integrity in elections underpins our democracy, and councils, candidates and communities must be able to have confidence that local government elections can be delivered properly."