Back rural councils
It has been a cold reality in local government for many years that they have to continually look to do more with less support.
And it is an extremely challenging situation that just seems to get worse year-after-year.
That is a dilemma not only confined to councils such as those across the Border region. It is something facing government at all levels.
This is especially the case with the ever-growing costs of providing public health care, which has become such an enormous cost to government that political parties of all persuasions are in a constant struggle to find any solution that can be funded appropriately.
But for local government, especially in rural and regional Australia, the situation is more dire than most. In NSW, the former Corowa council regularly drew attention to its acceptance that it was becoming more and more difficult to access any government funding to maintain its local road network.
It just had to find other solutions within its own budgetary process.
That is a scenario shared by councils throughout the southern Riverina and the North East.
This is the catalyst for a push by 38 Victorian councils for an annual $150 million rural communities benefit fund.
The premise of Rural Councils Victoria’s budget submission is simple – its members simply do not get anywhere near enough funding to maintain infrastructure and services to the level required to service its communities in the way they should be.
They just do not have the resources to do the job, thanks to the slow stripping away of government support.
It is especially galling to Indigo Council that this situation has been allowed to deteriorate in the way that it has over recent years. Indeed, mayor Jenny O’Connor has pointed out how rural councils actually get very little from the government. The disappointment inherent in this fact is it is a reality that ignores what Cr O’Connor says is rural Victoria’s considerable contribution to the economy compared with the city.
“Councils now fund some services that were once the province of the state,” she says, “and they have been passed to us without ongoing funding”.
For these reasons, the submission – which also covers other North East councils – warrants serious consideration by the government.
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