A Hobsons Bay residents group has rejected calls for its council to merge with Maribyrnong, suggesting instead the annexation of Yarraville.
The Weekly recently reported Maribyrnong mayor Grant Miles’s personal view that Hobsons Bay and Maribyrnong should merge to create one ‘super council’ as a way of cutting costs and reducing rates.
But Cameron McCurley, co-convener of the Hobsons Bay Residents Association, said the suggestion had been made in the past and would be unacceptable.
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“Maribyrnong’s issues of ageing infrastructure and difficulty in generating a viable income, combined with an overall reduction in council funding by state and federal governments, would no doubt result in increased rates for existing Hobsons Bay ratepayers in the unlikely event of a merger taking place,” Mr McCurley said.
“Further, such a merger would almost certainly see an overall reduction in the number of councillors, which would impact greatly on councillors’ ability to provide sufficient representation and support to ratepayers.”
Mr McCurley said that while Cr Miles had residents’ best interests at heart, a better option would be annexing Yarraville to Hobsons Bay council and the other parts of Maribyrnong to Brimbank and Moonee Ponds.
His comments follow a call by the Maribyrnong Residents Action Group (MRAG) to consider merging Maribyrnong with neighbouring councils. The group criticised comments by Maribyrnong councillor Michael Clarke in the
Weekly last week in which he defended the status quo.
MRAG member Robert Wiatrowski said Cr Clarke appeared to ignore key objectives of a council, which included ensuring rates and charges were equitable and resources used efficiently.
“[We] would argue that Maribyrnong council fails to meet these basic, critical objectives of local government,” he said. “Cr Clarke’s claim about ‘reducing the infrastructure gap’ is outrageous and not supported by the council’s own published financial data.”
He said a council sitting on more than $50 million in cash accumulated by overtaxing residents was “symptomatic of an overweight, fiscally lazy organisation that is not utilising . . . cash resources efficiently or effectively.”
The action group is circulating a petition calling for the amalgamation of Maribyrnong council with neighbouring councils.
