The territory government says the almost $850,000 being spent promoting the Ginninderry housing development was "necessary and important", given the large scale of the land release.
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The Canberra Times yesterday reported the government had approved the campaign advertising spending in February this year, months before the first stage of the development had been approved.
The government has since confirmed the cost of the $849,638 would be shared 60:40 between the government and its joint venture partner Riverview Developments.
Part of the proposed development sits on land the now-defunct Land Development Agency bought from the Corkhill family in December last year, one of several rural LDA purchases the ACT Auditor-General is investigating.
A spokesman for the Suburban Land Agency said the joint venture had funded the "necessary and important advertising and promotional material".
He said the development, comprising 11,500 houses over four suburbs, and the cost of the advertising campaign was competitive when compared to the cost of marketing a single suburb, and would be amortised across the life of the 30-year project.
"The investment on establishing brand awareness of this significant long term development is appropriate," he said.
"This has included providing important information to people on the development, its location, objectives and future sales opportunities."
The government said the campaign included funding the 'brand launch' including a new website, signage, advertising and events; signage at the Ginninderry sales centre The Link and promoting the first sales release including information on affordable housing options.
Riverview Developments' marketing manager Niva Pryor also said some of the funds went towards three "large-scale VIP" events and two community information days, but did not respond to questions on the cost and nature of the spending on the 'VIP' events.
She said the overall marketing spend for the project was about 1.75 per cent of expected revenue, including GST, which was within the industry standard greenfield benchmark of between 1.5 and 2.5 per cent.
Ms Pryor also said a 'master plan video' originally submitted at an expected cost of $25,000 plus GST, with an incorrectly budgeted amount of $28,600, the video had ultimately cost only $15,920 plus GST.
She also said the land the Corkhill family had sold to the LDA late last year was actually sold for $4.1 million, not the $4.5 million the company and the LDA had previously reported.
