Following struggles dealing with a strong colony at Yetman, the Inverell Council felt local governments lacked the resources to tackle such problems alone. Although the colony has since left, it is likely to return in the future.

The motion was that a single state agency should be the contact point. 

“The State Government has handed responsibility of all that to councils, to say you need to be doing a camp management plan,” Inverell Shire Council mayor Paul Harmon said.

“Some of these areas require expert people to actually go through the process and put in the applications and make the assessments. A lot of rural councils do not have those experts on staff and accessing those experts can be quite difficult.”

The council had to navigate issues surrounding Crown land and vulnerable species in order to manage the bat camp, and said in July that they felt their hands were tied on the issue.

Cr Harmon said councils should be able to contact a single state agency for assistance on a bat camp management plan. He hopes the Inverell Council’s request is heard as the Local Government NSW board lobbies the State Government on the issue.