The Loddon Shire has endorsed a plan to try and boost its population in an effort to keep businesses strong and increase the available rate base.
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At its latest council meeting on March 26 the councillors voted unanimously to endorse an action plan which highlighted nine key areas needed to boost the viability of developing residential land.
The plan included developing council owned sites and undertaking market research into residential demand opportunities.
Councillor Linda Jungwirth said increasing the population would have positive knock-on effects for the local area.
Cr Jungwirth said two of those benefits included supporting small business and having a larger rate-paying base.
Great place to live
"We all know Loddon is a great place to live and as a group of councillors we talk a lot about increasing our population and how that might be done," she said.
"This particular work really addressed a lot of the issues and it has given us a really good way forward.
"We want to increase our population because we would like to keep our businesses strong, we'd like to increase our rate base so that we can manage our core council business and offer services which benefit our community."
The action plan was a follow-on from the 'unlocking Loddon's growth potential' report put together by Villawood Properties.
The initial report outlined that the Loddon Shire was attractive for development in terms of affordability and lifestyle.
Potential problems
However, the report highlighted problems which may stymie development of potential residential land.
The cost of installing infrastructure such as water, sewerage, gas, the difficulty in obtaining finances for development, the low volume of building opportunities and increased remote location building costs were all cited as issues for population growth.
Councillor Dan Straub said the want to increase the Loddon Shire's population is something most people in the community support.
"It has been fairly well laid out that this is being driven by the community and it is a sense of viability to the regions and living in a great place and being part of a great community," he said.
"I encourage anyone looking to undertake developments to really look at Loddon's potential and look at our strategic planning around the growth of our main towns."
