Have your say on Council and Financial Plans

Published on 11 September 2025

“Thriving communities where everyone is welcome and all have the opportunity to live, work and create experiences.”

Those words aren’t just a sentence plucked from thin air – they’re what a Community Reference Group helped come up with to form Loddon Shire Council’s Draft Community Vision 2035.

The Community Vision feeds into the Draft Council Plan 2025-2029, which is now out for public comment.

The Council Plan is the framework within which Council will operate for the next four years and is developed by each incoming Council.

The draft Plan outlines Council’s strategic direction around five themes, in order to deliver the Community Vision: Thriving, Welcome, Live, Work and Experience.

It outlines the steps needed to achieve these goals.

Loddon Shire Mayor Dan Straub said the draft document, which also for the first time incorporates the Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan, had been many months in the making.

“We held community workshops to develop the Community Vision and Plan in April, June and August, and now we would really like to hear what the public think of the draft,” he said.

“This is the key document each incoming Council develops and everything we do in the next four years will be guided by it in some way.”

There are several ways to have a say on the draft plan – through the Connect@Loddon website, by email, post or dropping in a submission at the Council office in Wedderburn.

Submissions close on Tuesday, 30 September 2025.

Following submissions, a final plan will be prepared and tabled for adoption at the October Council meeting.

Meanwhile Council has also released the Draft Financial Plan 2025/26 – 2034/35 for public comment.

Cr Straub said he also encouraged the community to have their say on this plan, which also supports the Community Vision and Council Plan.

“This plan provides the framework for Council’s finances for the next 10 years and will be the guiding document for the annual budget,” Cr Straub said.

“It will steer our long-term decision making and provides us with a long-term view of our financial position from which we can make more informed decisions about how we allocate our resources.

“Council is not immune to the challenge facing local government throughout Australia, that of long-term financial sustainability, and we acknowledge that rates and external grant funding make up a large proportion of our income while costs are rising.

“The Financial Plan provides the foundation for the strategic work needed to strengthen Council’s long-term financial position with a detailed look, based on the facts that we have today, on how we might guide a path through the next 10 years while also providing the services that our community expects.”

Submissions on the Draft Financial Plan will also close on Tuesday, 30 September and can be made through the Connect@Loddon website.