Mayor Jess Jennings wants an Aboriginal Medical Service for Bathurst

If you ask Jess Jennings, it is long overdue, and that's why he is pursuing the project with the goal of delivering the service within his first year as the city's mayor.

"A lot of places have got Aboriginal Medical Services and it's sorely lacking, something we don't have in Bathurst," he said.

"For whatever reason, it just hasn't come to pass here, but there's so many suburbs around Sydney and regional towns that have them, and we've got a great Aboriginal population in Bathurst, and we need to seriously look at making this happen."

He said discussions around an AMS began during the previous mayor, Robert Taylor's, tenure in the city's top job, and he has picked up from where he left off.

Cr Jennings has had informal discussions with some councillors about an AMS, and has already met with several key stakeholders who he believes could help to get this facility off the ground in Bathurst.

He said he is working with them to see how council could support the service, which would be of benefit to the whole community.

"It's important to note that the AMS aren't exclusively Aboriginal," Cr Jennings said.

"They're actually open to the broader community as well, so those health benefits are applicable to the whole community."

The service would be privately run, but ideally receive financial support from the state government.

Cr Jennings is taking a lot of inspiration from the AMS in Orange.

The facility started its work in 2005 as a self determined Aboriginal organisation with a vision to be a leader in health and in the community.

It offers a range of services, including health checks, dentistry, podiatry, mental health support, and services specific to men, women and children.

Orange AMS is a not-for-profit organisation, governed by an independent skill-based board of directors consisting of seven local people. Five of those positions, including four executive positions, are Aboriginal identified positions.

The Orange facility is not exclusively for Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people.

Cr Jennings said one system of getting a new AMS up and running is for it to be auspiced by another one, and that is something he wants to look into.

His goal is to have a Bathurst AMS operating by mid 2024.

The service will need its own space, but Cr Jennings doesn't believe it would need to be a purpose-built building. It would just have to be "fit for purpose and located for purpose".

"We'd have to look at locations, and I do have some ideas about where it should go, but I won't foreshadow that just yet," he said.

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