Surf Coast Shire

Surf Coast Shire is a Local Government Area in Victoria, Australia. It is located in the southern part of the state, near Geelong. It includes the towns of Aireys Inlet, Anglesea, Lorne, Moriac, Torquay and Winchelsea. It has an area of 1,553 square kilometres. It had a population of 19,700 in 2001. The mayor is Aireys Inlet councillor and health promotion officer Libby Mears.

The shire was formed in 1994, as part of the local government amalgamations that occurred under then-Premier Jeff Kennett. Most of the former Winchelsea Shire, the Barrabool Shire, and the Torquay section of the former South Barwon Council, which was, at that point, part of the City of Greater Geelong, was merged into the new shire. Its first elections were held in 1995.

It is currently one of only a handful of municipalities in Victoria to be unsubdivided. As a result, the entire municipality votes to elect the nine councillors. This was preceded by a ward system where three councillors were elected from Torquay, three from Anglesea and one from Lorne, Winchelsea, Moriac and Aireys Inlet respectively, which was abolished before the 2004 council elections. A position of Deputy Mayor briefly existed from 2004 to 2005, but was abolished for the 2005 mayoral election.

The operation of the shire has been controversial in recent years. In the late 1990s, it set up a business arm, SurfLink, in an attempt to supplement its funding. The effort failed, and the business closed some years afterwards. There were inconsistencies in the accounting, and a large sum of money was missing. However, two state government inquiries failed to come to any conclusions. In addition to the SurfLink saga, the shire is also deeply in debt, which they have only recently begun to address.

While the council is effectively non-partisan, as only the Australian Greens run endorsed candidates in the shire, it has been wracked by significant divisions for most of its history. Under the ward system, the town of Anglesea had three councillors; the same as much larger Torquay. This allowed a group of Anglesea councillors, led by former mayors Julie Hansen and Beth Davidson, to effectively control the council by running an additional candidate in the one-member Aireys Inlet ward. This inter-town rivalry caused a bitter split among the council, particularly on development issues, where the Anglesea bloc pursued a policy of supporting mass development in Torquay in order to preserve the village character of Anglesea. It came to an end, however, with the adoption of an unsubdivided council; with Torquay voters now having an equal vote, the Anglesea bloc was reduced to two and had minimal influence over affairs of council, with Davidson being dumped as mayor.

However, the dominance of the new bloc was relatively short-lived, as it soon split, with several members allying with the shire's rural councillors. This came to a head at the 2005 mayoral election, when Mayor Keith Grossman was challenged by Winchelsea councillor Roland Livingstone, backed by the new bloc. When Grossman was forced to withdraw two days before the vote after a minor scandal concerning zoning of his property, Grossman and his remaining allies, putting old rivalries aside, backed Libby Mears, Davidson's running mate from Anglesea, as an alternative candidate in a last-minute deal. They ultimately managed to gain the numbers to install her as Mayor and defeat the Livingstone group.

It has for some years been speculated that parts of the shire may fragment. There has been a movement in the town of Winchelsea to secede from the shire and join the neighbouring Colac Otway Shire. It had also been suggested for some years that Torquay, the largest town, may also secede. However, this now seems unlikely, due to the creation of the unsubdivided municipality, which allowed a ticket of Torquay councillors to seize majority control of the council in 2004.

Current council

Mayors

External links