All Case Studies, Government
September 4, 2026

Yarra Ranges Council: Turning building permits into accessible digital assets

The background

Yarra Ranges Council has a long-standing relationship with Grace Information Management, using secure records storage, Scan on Demand and backscanning services to manage and progressively digitise its physical information.

Among the Council’s extensive archive was a sizeable collection of building permits held in physical storage. These records provide important historical property information for Council teams, residents, builders and developers, making timely access essential.

When funding became available just two days before the end of the financial year, the Information Management team saw an opportunity to accelerate the digitisation of this valuable collection.

The challenge

The scale and physical nature of the building permit collection made accessing information a time-consuming process.

Thousands of permits were held in archive boxes, with locating an individual record potentially requiring staff to search across multiple systems, archives and record repositories.

As Marissa Gardiner, Executive Officer – Information Management, describes it:

“Finding a single permit often required a journey that rivalled an archaeological expedition.”

For Council, the challenge wasn’t simply managing a physical archive. It was about making the information contained within it easier to find and use.

Faster access would mean less time spent searching for records, quicker responses to customers and greater efficiency for teams across Council.

The solution

Building on its long-standing relationship with Yarra Ranges Council, Grace is supporting the gradual transformation of the Council’s hard copy collection into accessible digital assets.

Grace’s solution includes:

Secure offsite records storage for physical Council records.
Backscanning of building permits to convert high-value physical information into digital records.
Scan on Demand to provide digital access to individual records when required.
Secure offsite management and processing of records.
Ongoing support as Council progressively transitions its physical archive into digital assets.
Efficient and effective communication throughout service delivery.

The digitisation of the building permit collection is helping create improved search functionality, allowing information that previously required extensive manual searching to be accessed much more efficiently.

The results

The progressive digitisation of Council’s physical records is changing the way information can be accessed and used across the organisation.

Key benefits include:

Faster access to corporate information.
A 24–28 hour turnaround for internal customers.
Reduced reliance on searching through physical archives and multiple record repositories.
Improved access to historical building information for Council teams and the community.
Greater efficiency when responding to requests from residents, builders and developers.
Continued conversion of hard copy information into accessible digital assets.
Economic and operational benefits from a more efficient approach to information access.

For Yarra Ranges Council, digitisation isn’t simply about removing paper. It’s about making valuable corporate information easier to find and helping staff provide a faster, more efficient service to the community.

“The gradual conversion of the hard copy collection into digital assets serves the agency and the community well from an economic and efficiency perspective. We’ve seen faster access to corporate information, with a 24–28 hour turnaround for internal customers, and communications with Grace are always efficient and effective. For organisations considering Grace: be curious, and trust the multitude of repeat customers.”

Marissa Gardiner, Executive Officer – Information Management, Yarra Ranges Council

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