Wodonga Council shows rates restraint

WODONGA ratepayers will be hit with a lower than forecast rate rise of 4.25 per cent while the city’s debt is tipped to drop to its lowest point in over a decade.

Councillors lauded land sales at the Logic industrial hub at Barnawartha North, and efficiencies found within council for the figures, as they endorsed the city’s draft budget for 2015-16 last night.

It will see $40.7 million raised in rates revenue; $47.43 million spent on council services; and $11.7 million in capital works including cash to upgrade LaTrobe University’s soccer fields, and readying the old Wodonga saleyards site for sale.

Unexpectedly, the council has started paying down its $31 million debt, which previous forecasts had not expected to happen until 2018.

Debt is expected to hover between $27 million and $28 million by June 30 this year, and is projected to drop to about $25 million by June next year. No new borrowings are planned in the next 12 months.

There remains $3 million, deferred from last year, which hasn’t been spent and will again be carried forward for potential use in 2016-17, when the council anticipates borrowing $6.9 million — unless it receives state and federal grants that have already been applied for.

New borrowings however, would bring debt back up to $29.5 million ahead of consistent reductions in debt each year thereafter.

Wodonga mayor Rodney Wangman said the city’s borrowings were half that of a decade ago and “shows the legacy in investing in Logic”.

Cr Michael Fraser noted $500,000 in land sales in the past year — including the council’s deal with SCT Logistics at Logic, the price of which has not been disclosed — contributed to paying off this debt.

Cr Wangman said the council would continue paying its debt in predetermined installments, and that any further land sales would go toward paying it off sooner.

Those same land sales, as well as efficiencies in the council’s operations and Wodonga’s growing population has also led to the lower than expected rate rise, Cr Wangman said.

A rate rise of 4.75 per cent had been predicted.

Rate rises of 4 per cent are forecast into the future — but that will depend on the Victorian government’s introduction of rate capping.

Cr Wangman said the government’s plan was still yet to be defined but that he was confident the council had “justification” to seek rate rises above CPI.

The council will next year also introduce the three-bin system now in operation in Albury. Waste collection charges will increase from $428 to $488.