COVID grants not enough for Falls Creek business and sporting clubs

Victorian businesses can apply for $4200 in support through the licensed hospitality venue fund and $2800 through the business cost assistance program, after 86,000 businesses received similar support payments last week.

Alpine businesses can receive an additional $3000 grant and community sporting groups can apply for up to $2000 to help them cover cancelled events.

President of the Falls Creek Chamber of Commerce and Alpine lodge operator Lisa Logan said the money wouldn't go very far.

"On average for me it costs about $3000 a day to operate each day during winter," she said.

"If we're only getting support, which only covers the cost for one day, you can see that it's not going to make much of a difference to us.

"The grant that has been offered, like every other support that we have actually received, is always welcome and appreciated, but it doesn't have a lot of impact when you still have the same amount of running costs."

High Country businesses and communities decimated and destabilised by 2020 were still trying to recoup any losses because of the seasonality of mountain trading.

Wodonga Raiders Sporting Club said it would apply for the up to $2000 grant to help cover losses from three cancelled events during this lockdown.

But president Mark Johnston said the cancelled functions set the club back by up to $20,000, so the grant wouldn't cover the club's losses.

"It's not enough, but what can you do?" he said.

"I'm happy that they're at least considering that people are hurting and that they need some assistance, even if it is a small amount.

"And any small amount over a period of time helps."

Mr Johnston said many other sporting clubs in the North East would be having a similar experience.

"All of the clubs that have function centres and book them out would be in the same situation," he said.

"I imagine nearly every club in the Ovens and Murray on the Victorian side of the border would be affected the same."

He hoped other fundraisers would still go ahead.

"We should be given some consideration to regional Victoria coming out of lockdown earlier than Melbourne," he said.

"That is obviously something the government has to look at."

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Ms Logan said her business, and many others in Falls Creek, would have significant running costs, even without guests throughout the lockdown and the financial support wasn't enough.

"It's not like we just turn everything off and walk away, we still have to meet all our commitments," she said.

"We still have to feed staff, we still have to pay wages, it's not like we can just shut up.

"We still have to pay for the phone calls, we still have to pay for the internet, at the moment most of those costs are actually being spent on refunding all the clients that can't stay over this two-week period."

Another Alpine business, which opened for just four days in 2020, was expected to pay close to $100,000 to the Victorian government in service fees for the year.

Ms Logan said the winter industries in Falls Creek usually considered themselves resilient and adaptable to the financial challenges that came with running a business that was reliant on the weather, but at the moment operators were "devastated" to face another year of loss.

She said if the lockdown was extended, some businesses might not be able to survive another failed season.

"Thank you, Dan, for supporting us through another lockdown, but I hope you will consider a little bit more if things continue," she said.

Ms Logan said good snowfall this winter had made businesses optimistic, but now that was threatened.

"We didn't anticipate having to require any financial support for this winter, because the bookings have been really, really strong," she said.

"But as soon as the NSW market was cut off to us, we noticed a big dent in our bookings."

Services Australia has said from Friday Victorians can start to apply for the COVID-19 Disaster support payments for the period of Friday July 16 to Tuesday 20 July.

Victorian residents who were unable to earn their usual income, because they were in the COVID-19 hotspot and had restricted movement are eligible to apply.

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