Rates revolt

By Bridget Brady
Endeavour Hills resident Tricia Clarke said a responsible council would put some capital works projects on hold and cut back on non-essentials while it asked its residents to fork out for the methane gas clean-up bill at the Stevensons Road landfill.
Ms Clarke said the council needed to take a leaf out of the average residents’ book, and realise not all material things were attainable when times were tough.
“Not everyone in their household can buy all the new furniture or plasmas. It’s a gradual thing, and when you’ve got money problems you have to realise you’ll get it next year or the year after,” she said.
Ms Clarke said she would be willing to see capital works projects put on the backburner for a few years until the council was in a better position to pay for them.
The current proposed rate rise is 11.69 per cent, but it is likely to be reduced to about 8.3 per cent when the council meets again to adopt the budget on 13 July after the council said the State Government confirmed the maximum it would contribute to the clean-up was $20.5 million.
Narre Warren resident Heather Kruger is a full-time carer for her husband, who is on a disability pension, and said their budget was tight as it was.
“Our finances are stretched to the limit and particularly at the moment we’ve got the gas and electricity all going up so anything else is always going to make things tough,” Ms Kruger said.
She said the council didn’t need to cease capital works projects, just “put them on hold for a while”.
“You do the same at home … you wait until you pay off whatever you’ve already committed for.”
Ms Clarke also agreed with councillor Sam Aziz, who has called for a freeze on all civic dinners for the remainder of the council term.
Ms Clarke said civic dinners were “a waste of public money”.
Casey mayor Lorraine Wreford said cutting capital works projects would leave some people disappointed, and could create a flow on affect of delayed projects.
“However at the end of the day we want to keep the rate rise to a minimum. People are struggling in the community. Council is very aware of that.”
Cr Wreford said an altered rate rise of about 8.3 per cent was better than the previous proposal, but she was still disappointed more help was not offered by the State Government.
“It’s not where we wanted to be as a council.”
The council is due to adopt the budget on 13 July at a meeting at the council chambers in Narre Warren at 7.30pm.
Ms Clarke encouraged residents to come along. “Even if you have objected before, do it again and again, until they listen, because so far there is still no result.”