Big rates blamed on prices, grants

Jessica Benton
The region’s coastal councils have blamed a shortfall in government grants and high property prices for slugging home owners with some of the state’s biggest rates bills.
A Municipal Association of Victoria analysis found that Borough of Queenscliffe and Surf Coast Shire had the second highest average rates in the state at $1614.
City of Greater Geelong was about 21 per cent lower at $1273, while the cheapest municipality, Shire of Loddon charged almost half the rates at an average $906.
City of Melbourne had the highest average rates at $2386.
Surf Coast Mayor Libby Mears blamed higher levels of government.
She said Surf Coast was “heavily penalised” with an unfair share of government grants despite ranking as one of the state’s fastest-growing municipalities.
“When Surf Coast Shire is compared to other like-councils, we miss out badly on grants commission funding,” she said.
“In 2008/2009 we received $90 per rateable property, which is about half of the next lowest council and three times lower than the best-placed council in our competitive group.
“Our rate increase was 5.75 per cent when a five per cent rate increase is needed for us to stand still as far as providing services goes.
“In a rapidly growing shire, it would be irresponsible to stand still.”
Cr Mears said Surf Coast was at a disadvantage when competing for grants because governments calculated funding for councils based on permanent population figures, which failed to account for the shire’s “large numbers of seasonal visitors”.
Borough of Queenscliffe Mayor Bob Merriman blamed the high rates on house valuations in boutique areas such as his municipality.
“It comes back to the value of houses and council can’t control house valuations,” he said.
“Because we live in a such a lovely area the values of houses have significantly increased over recent years.”
Mr Merriman said the borough’s 3.5 per cent rate rise for 2009/2010 was the lowest in the region.
“What we’ve done is to come up with a 3.5 per cent rate rise, which is the lowest in the state, so let’s be fair.”
The Independent reported last month that councils across the region had flagged rate increases up to six per cent.
Surf Coast Shire residents were hit the hardest with rate increases of 5.75 per cent and a separate “municipal charge” of $25, compared to 6.9 per cent in the previous financial year.
City of Greater Geelong councillors last week adopted a 4.9 per cent rate hike, down from previous consecutive increases of 6.9 and 7.4 per cent.