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The Victorian government will take responsibility for maintaining its roads in some inner Melbourne suburbs after a council vowed to stop mowing and picking up litter along them in a protest aimed at pressuring the state to cough up more money for the work.
City of Yarra councillors on Tuesday night voted unanimously in favour of pushing ahead with a strike on maintaining 20 roads and government land.
Brunswick Street in Fitzroy is one of 20 roads Yarra council says it will no longer provide maintenance for if the state doesn’t increase funding.Credit: Eddie Jim
The move blindsided the state government, with a spokeswoman saying late on Wednesday that the council had made its decision without consultation.
“We’re disappointed City of Yarra made its decision without consultation, leaving us with no choice but to re-assume responsibility for maintaining these roads so that residents aren’t left to live with deteriorated roads because of the council’s decision,” she said.
It’s an escalation of the wider stoush between the state and councils over what the latter say is cost-shifting – when the Commonwealth and state governments transfer costly responsibilities to local governments without an increase in funding to pay for it.
Under the Yarra plan, government-owned roads including Alexandra Parade, Johnston and Brunswick streets in Fitzroy and Swan Street and Bridge and Punt roads in Richmond – as well as rail authority VicTrack land – could be left untended.
The council threatened to cease all maintenance services at those sites unless the Department of Transport and Planning committed to increasing funding.
At the same meeting, the council voted to reduce speed limits to 30 km per hour in two suburbs, a decision that needs departmental approval.
Services under threat include pruning, mowing, litter management, weed management, graffiti removal and street sweeping.
The state government spokeswoman said it had allocated $770 million to road maintenance on top of the $6.6 billion invested into roads over the next decade.
Yarra Residents Collective founder Adam Promnitz on Swan St in Cremorne on Wednesday.Credit: Penny Stephens
Cost analysis by the City of Yarra found the Victorian government had paid about $88,000 in the last financial year to maintain the roads despite estimates the costs exceeded $1 million annually.
The council said the government was using a street maintenance agreement better suited to a rural municipality, not a busy inner-city Melbourne area and that the shortfall was being passed onto ratepayers as part of its waste charge.
Yarra Residents Collective founder Adam Promnitz said people living near the roads where services were being paused were being unfairly punished – and potentially put at risk – if maintenance fell away.
“The Yarra resident is like the child who has been caught in the middle when mum and dad are fighting, and they have to suffer the consequences, through no fault of their own,” he said.
Yarra Councillor Michael Glynatsis said cost shifting by the state government was “one hell of a burden” and the council was fed-up.
“We are being given absolute peanuts to run these services,” Glynatsis said. “We need to make a stand.”
Asked if councillors were prepared for a backlash from people living in areas targeted for strike action, Glynatsis said residents were already being negatively affected by cost-cutting in a situation only set to worsen.
“We have already had to cut vital service including in our swimming pools,” he said. “There was a big cut recently for our swimming programs for the elderly.”
Local councils are increasingly accusing the state government of offloading hundreds of millions of dollars worth of costs each year, jeopardising key services such as libraries, kinders and roads.
Brunswick Street in Fitzroy is one of the roads that could be impacted. Credit: Wayne Taylor
The situation has become so dire that Infrastructure Victoria called on the government to pour cash into the construction of new libraries and aquatic centres in burgeoning suburbs last year.
A City of Yarra Council spokeswoman said maintaining a median strip on a major state government road costs the council about $209,000 a year.
“Not only is cost recovery from the Victorian Government insufficient, but it also comes at a time when grants and service funding agreements are declining, placing further financial stress on councils,” she said.
Councils say to recoup costs they are being forced to slug ratepayers by increasing annual rates or fees and charges, or withdraw from providing services altogether.
The state government’s rate cap on councils constrains them to a 3.5 per increase in rates for the current financial year.
Yarra Council is not the first to raise concerns over cost-shifting. Port Phillip Council in 2020 ceased maintenance services on state-owned land, before reaching a new agreement with the government this year after community backlash over the state of the spaces.
In the city’s east, Glen Eira Mayor Jim Magee – a critic of cost-shifting – threw his support behind Yarra councillors.
“Both state and federal government have cost shifted $19 million a year onto the City of Glen Eira while [the state government] collects $332 million a year in stamp duty and land tax, so I welcome any opportunity to shift some of our costs onto them,” he said.
“The rates in Glen Eira could be 10 per cent cheaper if the governments weren’t cost shifting.”
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