News

Council Plan Mir wimbul update

16 June 2025

Thank you to the thousands of community members who helped shape the Council Plan Mir wimbul 2025-2029. The Greater Bendigo Council adopted Council Plan Mir wimbul 2025-2029 on Monday June 16, 2025.

Cr Metcalf has acknowledged the extensive community engagement that helped to shape the Council Plan and Annual Budget.

The Council Plan engagement process included:

  • A wide number of community focus groups and meetings with Traditional Owner organisations, key partners, local groups, and businesses
  • Two community-wide surveys with over 500 responses
  • A 42-person deliberative community panel held over a weekend in March that was selected from over 200 registrants, representing diverse genders, abilities, and cultural backgrounds, including First Nations community members.


You told us about the things you love about Greater Bendigo, such as:

  • Our beautiful parks and natural open spaces

  • Our vibrant festivals, culture and the way our community celebrates together

  • Our country town feel with city amenities

  • Our history and heritage

You also told us about the challenges facing our community, including:

  • The cost of living

  • The cost and availability of housing

  • The quality of our roads and pedestrian crossings

  • The impact of climate change and disasters like drought and flooding

  • Not feeling safe in and around our city, suburbs and towns

  • Our kids needing ways to connect and more local opportunities as they grow

While the Council does not have the resources to tackle some of these challenges, like housing, we’re working hard to advocate for more houses and better facilities to support our expanding population.

We understand that the community needs Council to get the basics right, supporting our community while times are tough. Our new Council Plan focuses on four themes, Responsible, Healthy, Thriving and Welcoming, reflecting what you told us was important to you. We commit to being a responsible local government that supports our municipality to be healthy, thriving, and welcoming.

For the first time, Our Council Plan also includes our Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan, putting the health of our community front-and-centre.

The Plan aims to deliver the Greater Bendigo Community Vision.

In 2021, a Community Panel developed our 10-year Community Vision. In 2025, the Community Panel refreshed the Community Vision. Our refreshed Community Vision is:

The Council Plan and our main financial plans have been developed and planned together, ensuring a strong alignment between strategic goals and the resources required to achieve them.

The Council Plan Annual Actions sit in the Annual Budget. Register on Let’s Talk to be notified each year when Budget consultation opens.