Have your say on our Revenue and Rating Plan Review

Published on 17 February 2023

Mildura Rural City Council residents are being asked to provide their feedback on potential changes to Council’s Revenue and Rating Plan.

The Revenue and Rating Plan determines the percentage of rates collected through each of the different property types in our municipality, taking in residential, farming and business properties.

Mildura Mayor Liam Wood said Council was required to review its Revenue and Rating Plan every four years, stressing that any changes to come out of the review wouldn’t alter the total value of rates collected.

“This isn’t about changing how much funding is generated through rates, which pays for the numerous services, facilities, public spaces, roads and other assets our community relies on daily,” Cr Wood said.

“It’s about potentially changing how the ‘rating pie’ is divided up across the different property types.”

Under the current Revenue and Rating Plan, residential properties contribute 64.7% of general rates, farming properties 17.3% and business properties 17.9%.

Mayor Wood said 14 different scenarios were initially considered during the Revenue and Rating Plan Review, ultimately resulting in two options for the community to consider:

• leaving differential rates unchanged
• reducing the share residential properties contribute to general rates by 4.5% (an average decrease of $80 per property), while increasing the share of income raised from business and farming differential rates by 3.5% and 13.1% respectively (an average increase of $170 and $463 respectively per property)

The community can provide their feedback from now until 5pm on Friday 3 March by completing a short survey at yoursay.mildura.vic.gov.au/RatingPlan

Cr Wood encouraged the community to provide their feedback.

"We want as many people as possible to provide their feedback, as the more opinions and feedback we receive, the more accurately the final outcome of this review will be in terms of reflecting what our rate-paying community wants," he said.

As part of the review process, an updated, comprehensive socio-economic profile of the region was developed to analyse indicators of wealth and capacity to pay for the three property types, ensuring the full impact of each of the various scenarios could be analysed.

Once public feedback has been received it will be collated and used to determine a preferred option, which Councillors will consider at an upcoming Council meeting. A Draft Revenue and Rating Plan will then be released for further public feedback.

For more information contact Acting General Manager Corporate Mark McMillan on 03 5018 8100.

ENDS