Council
27 February, 2026
Strong focus on health
CORANGAMITE Shire Council has been working towards a healthier shire through its Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan 2021-2025, with a final evaluation put before council on Tuesday.
The report noted 63 actions in total, with 51 completed or in progress, 12 commenced and one yet to begin.
Each action follows one of the four priorities of the plan, which include a community which prevents family violence, a socially and emotionally well community, an active community and a community which promotes healthy food options.
Coordinator community programs Keri James said the plan was delivered in partnership with Healthy Well Corangamite group stakeholders.
“Thirty thousand dollars was contributed by council to each of the health s ervices in the shire (Beaufort Skipton Health Service, Timboon Health Service and Terang Mortlake Health Service) to assist in program delivery that met the aims of the plan,” she said.
“Plan development and implementation costs were funded through annual budget cycles, and some funding for health service activities supported by council was provided by VicHealth.”
Under the first priority – a community which prevents family violence – council established four Orange Door Virtual Outpost access points in Camperdown, Skipton, Timboon and Terang and provided gendered ageism guided workshops at the Camperdown and Simpson Community Houses.
Activities under a socially and emotionally well community included 34 youth engagement sessions being conducted – with a total of 1079 attendees and seven successful grants aimed at increasing the social and emotional wellbeing of the community and regular events held to encourage social inclusion and ties to community, including concerts, painting events, well-attended movie events and an increased focus on intergenerational events which have been well attended throughout the shire.
Priority area three – an active community – saw council continuing the Young Active Kids (YAK) program with 2418 children participating, as well as all early years services meeting the physical activity and movement health domain for the Victorian Achievements program for Healthy Early Childhood Services.
Corangamite Shire Council also continued to hold INFANT (Infant Feeding, Active play and Nutrition) program sessions in Camperdown, Terang, Timboon and Cobden, which are designed help parents and families with feeding and active play to give their baby the best start to life, and leading a grant application to VicHealth on increasing food security in the south west region.
Councillor Geraldine Conheady said she felt proud reading the report and seeing the success achieved over the past four years.
“There have been 63 wide-ranging actions, which 62 have been achieved or are in progress, across our four community goals for the whole spectrum of age groups,” she said.
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“It’s been taking care of everyone in our community.
“I notice the review identifies some challenge in the data collection that I understand is being addressed in other sources, but again that’s just another indicator of how connected our team is in ensuring this plan is delivered in the best possible way to our community.
“They’re so invested in making sure we get everything right, and data collection is a very important element because we learn a lot from that and it certainly is an important element in developing a plan.
“I just think this has been a great success and completely impressive – there’s so many actions here and I was really impressed with the breadth of them.”
Councillor Jo Beard seconded the motion, saying she was pleased with the opportunity to reflect on how much had been achieved.
“It’s also around how we align with not just what’s happening here in Corangamite, but also what’s happening at a state level and how we can partner on so many levels,” she said.
“A significant one that we know, and it’s an unfortunate one, is around a community that prevents family violence and our stance and commitment to what we can do as a council and as an organisation to play our part in that.
“The fact that we had multiple stakeholders partner with us and we had engagement through many layers within our community to achieve so many activities across the life of this plan, particularly within that space is great.
“It’s become the normal now in anything we do as an organisation that we’ve always got that in the back of our minds about that, particularly around prevention of family violence.”
Cr Beard said the amount of work completed had been significant, with only 12 actions which have started but have not yet been completed.
“It’s a shout out not only to the team that oversees the implementation of the plan and we review the actions from year-to-year, but it’s the entire organisation which backs that plan because there’s so many crossovers between departments,” she said.
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