Municipality of Burwood: History
The municipality was established on 27 March 1874. The council chambers are located on Conder Street and were designed and built by architect Jack Hennessy in 1877. Hennessy was later a mayor of Burwood.
A 2015 review of local government boundaries by the NSW Government Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal recommended that the Municipality of Burwood merge with adjoining councils of: Canada Bay and Strathfield Councils to form a new council with an area of 41 square kilometres (16 sq mi) and support a population of approximately 163,000 at the time.
In May 2016, Strathfield Council challenged the proposed merger and commenced proceedings in the New South Wales Land and Environment Court. After the court heard that there were legal flaws in the report from the state government-appointed delegate who examined the proposal for merging the councils, the NSW Government withdrew from the case and the merger proposal stalled. In July 2017, the Berejiklian government decided to abandon the forced merger of the Strathfield, Burwood and Canada Bay local government areas, along with several other proposed forced mergers.