They want Bendigo developers to set aside affordable housing units on future projects to help solve crippling shortages across the city.

The council is expected to accept the petition when it sits on Monday, though a formal response could be two months away.

It was submitted by the Bendigo Uniting Churches' Social Justice Group.

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Convener Geoff Scott said the community needed to have a long, hard look at how it approached affordable housing.

"We would love it if the council really pushed hard to include them in some of these developments," he said.

"Not over the top stuff, but just allowing for social housing there."

Bendigo is currently grappling with severe housing shortages.

Homeless people sheltering in a Huntly camping ground recently reacted with exasperation over a council idea to remove them from the land.

"There's nowhere else to go, you can't get a rental property," one said.

Housing agency Haven; Home, Safe has been struggling to find people housing in a region with a rental vacancy rate of less than one per cent.

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Intense shortages are spilling over to other parts of the housing market.

Almost half of all renters in the federal Bendigo electorate are experiencing financial stress, according to a new report by advocacy group Everybody's Home.

The council has been working on a slew of policies and projects to deal with the city's affordable housing problems in recent years, including an action plan adopted in 2021.

"If we want to create a sustainable and prosperous community in Greater Bendigo this must be for all our residents, and affordable housing must be considered essential infrastructure," the council said in that document.

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The state government has promised to spend $85 million on affordable housing builds in coming years.

It is largely aimed at addressing decades of underfunding.

The government recently scrapped a separate plan to create a new tax on developers, which would have helped fund maintenance of the state's affordable housing stock.

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