On Tuesday, May 7, the draft budget passed unanimously at a council meeting.
Crs Seema Abdullah, Geoff Dobson and Greg James were absent from the meeting, which was an additional council meeting outside the regular schedule of monthly meetings.
Speaking after the meeting, Mayor Shane Sali expressed great pride in the way council had navigated the financial difficulties of the past few years and said the current group of councillors had faced more challenges than “any other council of the modern era”.
The budget proposes a 2.75 per cent rate increase, the maximum allowed by the Victorian Government, down from 3.5 per cent last year.
“And that’s off the back of two zero per cent rate increases the preview two years,” Cr Sali said.
“We’ve done our best to just hold it, because we did acknowledge that a lot of the community did raise and continue to raise that they see our rates as higher than most others.
“It’s very hard to do direct comparisons.
“But we did our best at the early part of our term to hold it back with the two zeros, then obviously coming out of two difficult financial years we had to go with the 3.5 and we weren’t too sure what it was going to look like this year.
“Coming off of 3.5 last year, we expected something similar, so 2.75 was pleasing for everyone.”
This will generate $82.4 million in total rate revenue, up from $72.4 last year.
A further $823,601 in supplementary rates, $533,000 in penalty interest and $12.1 million in service charges is budgeted, taking the total rates and charges figure to $95.8 million.
Council’s waste charge revenue will be $12.24 million, and Cr Sali said some households would see a minor increase in their waste rates and others would see a decrease.
You can calculate your waste collection cost on council’s website at https://greatershepparton.com.au/council/rates-finance-property/rates/rating-details
Council has set aside $64.824 million for total capital works funding, with $9675 made up of borrowings.
Council’s actual spend on capital works last budget was $47.416 million.
Cr Sali said the state and federal budgets wouldn’t affect council’s budget, and that announcements relating to those budgets would inform council’s approach to key infrastructure projects that would “just be bonuses”.
The full council draft budget can be accessed at https://greatershepparton.com.au/assets/files/documents/governance/meetings/2024/05/7.1_2024-2025_draft_budget__.pdf
Council will now enter a feedback process, with community members encouraged to open a dialogue with council or submit applications for projects.
The feedback process will start on May 10 and finish on May 31.
The budget will then be finalised at a council meeting in late June.
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