Overview

Our annual budget sets out how we’ll generate revenue over the coming 12 months (including fees and charges and your rates), and how we’ll invest that revenue to support the Surf Coast community.

Our draft 2026-27 Budget aims to help us meet our purpose of ‘helping our community and environment to thrive.’

It has been shaped by the strategic directions in our Council Plan 2025-29 and focuses on delivering the things that we know matter to our community.

We invite you to read the information on this page, and our Budget in full, and give us your feedback by making a submission by 10am Monday 25 May.

All submissions will be considered prior to the Council meeting on 23 June, where endorsement of the final budget will be considered.

Impact of the Middle East conflict on our budget

It is important to note that the budget has been created using ‘business as usual’ scenarios.

As the global fuel crisis develops and the impacts become clearer, we may have to adjust our final budget accordingly.

Any changes will be communicated with the community.

The budget has been developed in a challenging economic environment, as Council seeks to maintain service levels and valued community facilities in the face of continued rising costs.

It is a financially responsible budget featuring a strong focus on maintenance and renewal of public assets such as roads, pathways and public open spaces.

Funding has also been included in the budget to help us meet our aims of being an environmental leader and adapting to the changing climate, generating economic activity, and supporting community wellbeing through valued cultural and community services.

Reflecting the need to deliver value for our ratepayers by operating efficiently in this challenging environment, the draft budget has found $331,000 in new savings within our operations.

This takes Council’s accumulated ongoing operational savings for the past three financial years to $3.67 million.

The budget aims to help us meet our organisation’s purpose of ‘helping our community and environment to thrive.’

It is the first budget developed under our Council Plan 2025-29, and has been shaped by the actions in the plan, which were developed on the back of the ‘Our Focus, Our Future’ community engagement process during 2025, featuring:

• A community-wide survey that generated more than 1000 total responses; and
• A deliberative community panel featuring a representative sample of 43 community members.

Funding in the draft budget has been aligned with the Council Plan Year 2 Action Plan, which will be considered by Council alongside the budget in June.

The budget and year two action plan will aim to help achieve the goals in each of the strategic directions in the Council Plan:

• Assets and Infrastructure
• Climate and Environmental Leadership
• Community Wellbeing
• High Performing Council
• Sustainable Communities

Other important strategic documents that have shaped the development of this budget include the:

• 10-year Financial Plan 2025-2035
• Asset Plan 2025-2035
• Social Infrastructure Plan 2026-2036

Each of these documents was adopted by Council during 2025.

Rates are our largest revenue source and enable us to fund the many projects and services we provide for the community.

This year we are proposing an average total rate rise of 2.75 per cent.

This is in line with the cap set by the Victorian Government and will help us meet our rising costs.

We understand households are facing cost of living pressures.

In making a decision about where to set rates, we need to balance community affordability with the financial pressures affecting our operations.

Last year, in recognition of the drought and difficult business environment, we lowered the rating differential for farmland and commercial property, as a temporary relief measure.

We have decided to maintain those lowered differentials for another year, providing savings for these ratepayers.

(The ‘rating differential’ is the percentage used to calculate how much each property type contributes to overall rates.)

The Farm Rate Land differential will remain at 64% (down from 75% in 2024-25) and Commercial/Industrial Rate Land will remain at 165% (down from 190% in 2024-25).

The aim of continuing these reductions is to help ease financial pressure on commercial, industrial, and farming ratepayers for a further year.

This recognises the ongoing financial pressures these sectors continue to face from drought and the impacts of reduced visitation caused by floods and fires in the region during summer.

This charge does not sit within the Victorian Government’s rate cap.

The recycling and waste collection service charge is calculated to cover the rising costs of collection, recycling and landfill disposal. These include direct, indirect and overhead costs.

The charges for 2026-27 have been set at:

• Rural $519 (up 6.1 per cent)
• Urban $533 (up 3.5 per cent)

In setting these charges, we need to accommodate:

• The significant upcoming cost of the closure and rehabilitation of the Anglesea landfill (estimated at $12.6 million); and
• Continued annual increases in the Victorian Government’s EPA waste levy, charged to Councils, which has risen more than 163 per cent since 2019-20.

All fees and charges have been listed in the draft budget for the community’s review. (See Appendix A, starting on page 100 of the Budget report.)

Increases to fees and charges have been minimised wherever possible, but there are some new fees and increases to help us recover operating costs.

Main proposed new fees and charges:

• Commercial hire of new Torquay hockey pitch – ranging from $56 to $90 depending on type of group and use of lights.
• New categories for hire of sportsgrounds with use of lights – $59 or $79.50 depending on type of group.
• Hire of Connewarre Oval transitioning from the Community Asset Committee to Council – hire fees from $44.50 to $79.50 depending on group type and use of lights.
• New waste disposal fees specific to caravans, couches and lounge chairs, and solar panels.
• New $15 fee for late pick-up at our occasional care services.
• Place of Public Entertainment permits for commercial events – up between 25% and 50% depending on size of event. Remains a heavily subsidised service based on benchmarking.
• Cat and dog registrations – up 8.9% from $79 to $86 for a desexed animal and up 5.3% from $237 to $249.50 for a non-desexed animal. These increases are due to a doubling in the Victorian Government’s mandatory Animal Levy.

Main fee increases:

• Place of Public Entertainment permits for commercial events – up between 25% and 50% depending on size of event. Remains a heavily subsidised service based on benchmarking.
• Cat and dog registrations – up 8.9% from $79 to $86 for a desexed animal and up 5.3% from $237 to $249.50 for a non-desexed animal. These increases are due to a doubling in the Victorian Government’s mandatory Animal Levy.

We understand many people in our community are struggling under cost of living pressures.

Our Hardship Policy is in place to support ratepayers experiencing financial duress.

For a confidential discussion about your circumstances and potential options available, please email info@surfcoast.vic.gov.au or call 03 5261 0600 and ask to speak with a member of Council's Revenue department.

How every $100 will be spent