“$15.4-million in the next financial year is going into maintaining those assets.”
The total amount raised by general rates and charges in 2026-2027 is $10.630-million, an increase of $285,000 from the 2025-26 financial year, however, Mrs Revell said the council was spending $1.6-million more in 2026-27 than it was receiving.
“We have made some savings over the last few years that we can buffer the additional expenditure in 26-27,” Mrs Revell said.
“But it’s not sustainable. Over the coming 12 months, we’ll be working closely with councillors, looking at our service levels, looking at where we’re spending money and looking at how we’re going to remain sustainable going forward.
“We have also developed another advocacy document, which is around a dedicated fund just for rural councils. We know that rural councils have significant assets, they’ve got significant roads – what we need is some funding that is untied.
“That means funding can be spent as required on our roads or our footpaths, to just maintain the assets we have.
“Generally, with a grant you have to upgrade or it’s for a new item, but what we need as a rural council is funding that just enables us to maintain the assets we already have.”
Hindmarsh’s value of assets per head of population is relatively high – $52,000 compared with $32,000 for Horsham Rural City Council, for example, with average rates of $1660 and $2228 respectively.
“What that is telling us is that we have a lower population, but a higher value of assets we need to maintain, and that’s where it clearly shows the discrepancy in the funding models,” Mrs Revell said.
“Which is why we’re calling for a dedicated rural fund.”
The Budget’s $6.435-million capital works expenditure includes: $430,000 on the Dimboola pool; unsealed road construction, $602,000; shoulder re-sheets, $363,000; sealed road construction, $2,416,000; re-seals, $572,000; drainage, $134,000; and kerb and channel, $225,000.
The council has also grouped its buildings depreciation, enabling a prioritisation process like that of roads.
“This year in our Budget, rather than a few thousand dollars for a maternal child health building, $50,000 for maintenance, and then a few thousand dollars for a toilet block, we’ve grouped them into one amount, which now sits in the building area of our Budget,” Mrs Revell said.
“We had a condition assessment undertaken on all of our buildings in the last financial year, which has given us thorough detail on what high priority, medium priority, low priority works need to be undertaken, and our team is working through that document and prioritising based on the condition assessment.
“We may have had $5000, but to fix the item might have been $15,000. They’re now working within the pool of funds we’ve got available and will be prioritising based on that condition assessment.”
People can view the Budget on the council’s website, at www.hindmarsh.vic.gov.au/budget.
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