SmartNSW Masterclass: Delivering smart plans, projects and precincts

Peter brings 40 years of private and public sector experience to his role of Executive Director, Bradfield City Centre at Western Parkland City Authority.

Prior to his current role, Peter worked with NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment at the NSW Land and Housing Corporation, overseeing part of the largest urban renewal program for social housing in the country. Prior to that he was at UrbanGrowth NSW and Landcom working on a number on large scale projects including a number in Western Sydney. He has a passion for working on complex large scale projects, such as the Bradfield City Centre, that create incredible opportunities for innovation.

Helen Sloan is CEO of Southern Sydney Regional Organisation of Councils (SSROC).  SSROC is a non-profit organisation owned by its 12 member councils, that provides a range of services to councils. Helen has a background in IT, enterprise transformation and sustainable development before joining SSROC in 2008, with a desire to implement meaningful projects for local benefit. 

Most recently Helen has led the SSROC team working with Ausgrid to replace all main road streetlights in the Ausgrid area with new luminaires that are equipped with smart controls and a port suitable for smart city sensors. This infrastructure will enable 29 councils to have access to a network of powered points to deliver their smart city plans, as well as to efficiently control streetlights. The project is the largest deployment of its type in Australia, and a world-leading initiative. 

Vy is an Executive Director at Property and Development NSW, part of the Department of Planning and Environment. With more than 20 years’ experience in development strategy, in NSW and Canada, Vy is currently guiding partners in the co-creation of exceptional places. Her current portfolio includes Sydney’s heritage bookends, from Macquarie Street East to Parramatta North, the Herbert St Precinct at Royal North Shore Hospital, and Coffs Harbour Jetty Revitalisation.

Vy is a dynamic collaborator, dually skilled in both identifying problems and engineering aspirational solutions. Setting her apart is a capacity for intuitive critical thought, deep experience navigating government, and a talent for attracting and leading a team of highly skilled visionaries. Vy delivers iconic and measurable outcomes for the State. Providing timely, relevant, and strategic advice, informed by commercial creativity and expertise in property, housing and master planning, Vy is an advocate for leading and nurturing strong, collaborative partnerships to achieve excellence, and generational legacy, while maximising community benefit from government property.

Simone Roberts’ career in data and analytics spans over 20 years and across a variety of sectors, including transport, financial services, digital, telecommunications, retail and media, both here in Australia and in the UK. Over this time, Simone has led many teams to build data and analytics capabilities to improve business and customer outcomes. Simone is passionate about exploring new ways of using data to make a difference in people’s lives. She is proud to have established Transport’s first Enterprise Data Office, bringing together many data experts from across the enterprise to help realise the power of data.

Alanna is the Director, Whole of Government Connectivity Leadership at the NSW Telco Authority within the NSW Department of Customer Service. She is responsible for the delivery of the NSW Connectivity Strategy and leads policy, strategy and cross-government partnership functions that seek to ensure everyone has access to meaningful digital connectivity.  
 
With more than 18 years' experience in government policy and strategy across diverse portfolios including energy, water, health and housing, Alanna is passionate about driving innovations that enhance and expand digital equity and makes a tangible difference to people’s lives. 

Wayne is a senior executive in the NSW Public Service, holds a Masters in Public Administration and is the Program Director for the Live NSW program encompassing the NSW Spatial Digital Twin. With 25 plus years’ experience in the spatial industry covering a range of disciplines from Operations to Strategy and Policy development and proven experience in delivering programs advancing the understanding of and use of spatial information across government, industry and the community.

Luke has over 25 years as an expert urban and regional planner and executive leader of both private and public sector organisations. Luke has held CEO and Chief Planner roles in local government and has been a principal of a national urban planning and economics firm. In this time Luke has focused on strategy, policy design and implementation, governance, major project delivery and organisational change management. 

Luke is currently the Director of the Planning Partnership Office for the Western Sydney Planning Partnership. WSPP was established through the City Deal for Western Sydney for delivery of collaborative planning projects between state and local government.

Michael Whereat has worked in local government on the Sunshine Coast for 24 years and been Smart Cities Lead for the last 8 years.

Today, Michael leads a small team working with half of all Sunshine Coast Council branches to implement the Smart City Framework & Implementation Plan 2022-25. The Innovation Pipeline has consolidated over 550 problem/ideas into 235 unique problems. With 80 operational solutions and 130 moved to watching brief, we have matured the process of validating and facilitating through to an operational status that is ultimately owned and implemented by the organisation. The Smart Infrastructure Manual is the most recent addition to our cache of guiding plans and documents that facilitate Smart Cites outcomes for the Sunshine Coast. Michael has contributed to these smart city projects: – Sunshine Coast submarine Cable and terrestrial networks; Maroochydore City Centre; Telecommunications and associated enabling infrastructure for smart city Internet of Things installations and Testing Tech in Paradise.

Previously Michael was the founding Co-Chair of the Broadband Today Alliance est. 2010 and this role became founding President of the Australian Smart Communities Assn in 2014 when the former group became incorporated as a not for profit. In both of these volunteer roles, Michael sought to help rise the tide of knowledge and capability of local government officers to the benefit of all.

A natural-born leader, and a Western Sydney local, Christopher’s confidence and influence play a key connecting role in an array of areas including but not limited to Community Engagement, Economic Development, Place Making and Activation and Smart Cities. Driven by his passion for learning about how people interact with places, Christopher holds a Bachelor’s in Social Science, Graduate Certificate in Policing, Counter Terrorism and International Security and a Certificate in Smart Cities Infrastructure Management.

Drawing experience from Local and State Government as well as the Non For Profit Sector, Christopher brings a wealth of knowledge on how local government and the community function, as well as having a human-centric approach to rapidly evolving initiatives and provides value add advice and expertise in strategy development and implementation of wider action plans.

Rory is Executive Director, Smart Places and Net Zero Cities, in the Cities and Active Transport Division and has been part of the Smart Places award-winning revolution since its inception in 2019. In this role he drives an agenda to deliver great places and outcomes for people using connected technologies and data solutions, working collaboratively across all tiers of government, with the research and academia sector and industry. His passion lies in combining a data- and technology-first approach with a citizen- or customer-led lens to smart places.

Emily leads policy and strategy development to support the NSW Government’s ambitions to be the #1 Smart state. She also drives government readiness and appetite to use smart technologies to improve service delivery, and create urban centres that are sustainable, inclusive, connected and economically vibrant. She leads the Government’s capability programs, and strategic partnerships to accelerate safe and appropriate technology adoption.

Emily has almost two decades experience working in the public and private sector to deliver excellence in communication and engagement. She is passionate about solving wicked problems, building great relationships and delivering outcomes.

Sandy is a non-executive director, collaborator and technologist, with a passion for transforming how we think about, plan, build and develop smart, sustainable urban places. As a business leader in the telecommunications, research and NFP sector, she is excited to be part of the NSW Government’s, Smart Places team contributing to the delivery of the NSW Government’s Smart Places Strategy, and has a focus precinct development and digital equity and inclusion. As an long term active member of several boards/ advisory groups in the place making and smart cities sector including Place Leaders Asia Pacific and Smart Cities Councils ANZ, she contributes to new ways of thinking about urban policy challenges and is also completing her doctoral studies at the University of Sydney in smart urban governance.

Lizzy Pattinson is the Director Strategic Projects and Innovation in the NSW Government’s Smart Places team, sitting in the Cities & Active Transport Division. Lizzy is passionate about delivering meaningful outcomes for the people of NSW through technology and innovation and is particularly interested in energy, sustainability and infrastructure innovation to achieve net zero. 
 
Lizzy has a background in leading policy and programs across the NSW Government with a broad range of experience across digital, infrastructure and strategic policy initiatives, as well as time in the private sector and academia looking into AI, open data, digital transformation and regulatory frameworks.