A federal MP has heaped pressure on the embattled Geelong council accusing it of financial mismanagement as the city seeks to balance its books.
Council’s draft budget has prompted outrage for funding shortfalls to libraries, pools and other services prompting Corangamite MP Libby Coker to detail her “utmost disappointment” in a letter to councillors and the acting CEO.
“It is unacceptable that significant cuts are occurring across a range of council services and facilities with little or no consultation with the community it serves,” she said.
The Geelong Regional Library Corporation says it will have “no choice” but to shutter libraries at Geelong West, Highton and Barwon Heads because council has not allocated sufficient funding to run two new libraries in the city.
Council responded by saying it has increased funding to the corporation, won’t allow the closures and is considering resuming management control of the libraries.
“We’ll be fighting this,” Mayor Trent Sullivan said.
“If it comes to the stage where we have to bring libraries in house to ensure they remain open, then that we will consider.”
Ms Coker listed a series of concerns about the city’s management in her letter and said she’ll be making a formal submission to the draft 2023-24 budget.
“The potential closure of libraries in the Geelong region is just the tip of the iceberg, there are substantial cuts and closures proposed under the council’s draft budget.”
“Reduced access to aquatic facilities; withdrawal of council funding for sporting facility upgrades and the anxiety this is causing local clubs; withdrawal from the G21 Alliance and the uncertain future of the Geelong Regional Libraries Corporation (GRLC); job losses; cancellation of local transport services; and withdrawal of funding for Lifeguards.”
Council recently announced it had completed a restructure of the organisation to improve how it serves the community and remain financially sustainable. The shakeup included 19 redundancies.
Geelong MP Christine Couzens said the restructure should not have gone ahead while the city is managed by an acting CEO.
Premier Daniel Andrews was also critical of council when he was in Geelong last week, saying there is a “confidence issue” with the city.
“That’s why the inspector is in their doing an important investigation,” he said referring to his government’s appointment of Monitors to oversea council’s CEO recruitment process.
“There’s been problems for a long time and that’s not good for anybody.”
Image: City of Greater Geelong