Council well placed for the introduction of rate capping

Published on 07 October 2015

Mildura Rural City Council is well placed to cope with the introduction of rate capping and is calling on the State and Federal Governments to give additional financial support to ensure the future of services in regional areas.

Council’s Mayor Glenn Milne is confident the hard yards already crossed over the past few years to reduce the rate burden on residents, will ensure most services will remain.  Service productivity reviews and benchmarking have been instrumental in making sure Council is utilising its resources to the best of its ability.

“Per capita our rates are some of the highest in the state, but on a dollar per square kilometre basis, we’re at the lower end of the scale,” Cr Milne said.  “It’s a fact that we have a small population spread out over a large area, with over 100 services to provide.  It means that less people have to pay more just to keep up with our city counterparts.”

Council has been steadily working to reduce rate increases, with this year’s increase of 3.9% the lowest in over 10 years. Council’s CEO Gerard José said ongoing service reviews had been instrumental in lowering costs.

“Council is constantly reviewing the way we do things and working hard to find the balance between what is socially, economically and environmentally responsible,” Mr José said.  “At the moment it looks like next year there will be a cap of around 3% and we’re confident we can continue to provide most of the infrastructure maintenance and services the community expects from a modern Council.”

Cr Milne said it’s important that as a community, we lobby State and Federal Governments for more support to provide services rural and regional communities need to survive.

“Too many services have been pushed on to local governments, on too many occasions local government has been called upon to pick up the slack when a service is cut.  We want to see rates reduced but need help to do this,” said Cr Milne.

“We want to continue to grow our region, however in the future the only new projects we’ll be able to deliver will most likely be ones similar to the Riverfront Redevelopment, where almost all the funding has come from the State and Federal Government.   We won’t have money to invest heavily in our own new projects."

The Essential Services Commission visited Mildura recently and their report into Rate Capping is due to be presented to the State Government by 31 October 2015.  More information about the project is available from their website at www.esc.vic.gov.au/Local-government

ENDS

Media enquiries 
Angela Umback
p) (03) 5018 8689
e) angela.umback@mildura.vic.gov.au