Like all organisations and tiers of government across the country, council is facing heavy financial pressure due to rising costs.
As a result, this year’s council budget is about being financially responsible.
Councils need to concentrate on long-term sustainability as much as the short-term, which means that the difficult decisions being made now will help set us up for the future, while allowing us to deliver many wonderful projects and important community services in the year ahead.
Council committed to listening to the community’s feedback on our proposed budget, and we thank the many people and community groups who made submissions.
We have heard that feedback and responded.
Across the region, we have allocated more funding for libraries, reinstated funding for the Kardinia Aquatic Centre to operate during winter, and restored funding towards surf lifesaving at our ocean beaches.
I trust that the Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads communities will welcome these changes, particularly members of the Ocean Grove Surf Lifesaving Club.
There are many other positive stories out of this budget.
We are continuing to strongly invest in new facilities and maintenance of our existing assets and there is a huge range of projects – 254 in total over four years – that have been funded.
We will see many of these make great progress over the next year with funding now reconfirmed.
Some exciting ones that come to mind include the Collendina Reserve pavilion upgrade in Ocean Grove, which will receive $694,000 in 2023-24, the Barwon Heads Bowling Club pavilion, which will receive $200,000 in 2023-24, and the Barwon Heads Tennis Club court resurfacing and pavilion and lighting upgrade, which will receive $239,000 in 2023-24.
The money for Barwon Heads Bowling Club will complete its $1.2 million pavilion, which has been supported by $500,000 from the federal government and $200,000 from the Victorian government and is expected to be completed in the next few months.
On top of this, there is future funding allocated for a significant project at Devlins Road Reserve (Kingston), in Ocean Grove.
This covers the detailed design and construction of a pavilion, sports fields, sports lighting, and other infrastructure.
There is $750,000 allocated for this project in 2023-24, $1.7 million in 2024-25, and $2.565 million in 2025-26, totalling $5.015 million over three years.
With costs rising at a rapid rate, we have been clear that our money won’t stretch as far as it previously did.
We also won’t be making changes to the list of capital projects to be placed on hold, and we understand this will be disappointing for those who made submissions on particular projects.
But it is important to remember that these are still on our agenda, and we will be looking for ways to deliver them, including creating affordability in our own budget as soon as we can as well as seeking external funding.
We aim to be a high performing council providing outstanding value to our community, and this budget will set the platform for us to do so in a sustainable way in the future.
