Understand your rates and charges

Understanding the City of Whittlesea's rates

We collect rates from property owners in the City of Whittlesea to fund local services. These include children's services, waste collection, library services, recreation and leisure facilities, road and footpath maintenance, and much more.

Rates are important to ensure a healthy, connected, well-resourced community. However, they might sometimes seem a bit difficult to understand.

On this page you'll find information to help you understand rates and your obligations as a ratepayer, such as:

the services your rates help to fund
the valuation process and how that determines the rates you owe
other costs that appear on your rates notice, such as waste charges.

What do your rates pay for?

Rates are important. Your rates contribution provides revenue that funds essential services for residents, businesses and the wider community.

In 2025-26, rates revenue helped to fund the following areas:

Budget area, 2025-26	Funding
Capital works: including new community facilities, new parks and upgraded sporting facilities	$116 million
Waste, recycling and environment: including kerbside rubbish collection	$35 million
Families, children, youth and seniors: including ageing-well services, maternal and child health, kindergarten and youth services	$27 million
Parks and open space	$31 million
Roads and footpaths	$24 million
Local business and communities	$2 million
Leisure, recreation and community facilities	$11 million
Public health, safety and emergency management: including immunisation services	$8 million
Libraries	$6 million

For more information, read our summary of the Key highlights of the Budget 2025-26.

Our Budget 2025-26(PDF, 11MB) has more information.

How rates are calculated

We use property valuations to calculate the amount that you pay in rates, to ensure that rates are shared fairly among property owners in the City of Whittlesea.

Every year:

we work out how much rates revenue we need to fund services and programs
your property is revalued by the Valuer-General. This figure helps us to calculate the amount you will pay in rates.

About the valuation process

Learn more about the valuation process, how the valuation helps us calculate the cost of your rates, and how you can object to a valuation.

Property valuations

What is rate capping?

Under the State Government's Fair Go System, our rate increases were capped at 3% for the 2025-26 financial year.

This cap applies to our total rate income, not individual rates notices.

How much you pay above or below the 3% increase depends on the market value of your property, which in turn dictates your property valuation.

The Municipal Association of Victoria (MAV) has produced a short video explaining rate capping in simple terms. You can watch it on the MAV website.

Other items included on your rates notice

In addition to showing the rates payable (based on the Net Annual Value method (NAV)), your rates notice will also include charges for waste and emergency services. Find out more below.

Emergency Services and Volunteers Fund (ESVF)

About the levy

From 1 July 2025, the Fire Services Property Levy (FSPL) will be replaced with the Emergency Services and Volunteers Fund (ESVF). It is a State Government charge that helps to pay for the fire services provided by the Metropolitan Fire Brigade (MFB) and Country Fire Authority (CFA).

While we collect this property levy through your council rates notice, the ESVF Levy goes direct to the State Government, not to Council.

Why the levy was introduced

From 1 July 2013, councils in Victoria became responsible for collecting the levy through Council rates notices.

The Victorian Government introduced this levy in response to the Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission's recommendation to replace the old insurance-based levy with a new property-based levy.

This means that all property owners contribute to the cost of fire brigade services, not just those who have insurance.

Who pays the levy

All property owners pay the property-based ESFV levy, whether or not they have insurance.

Some properties that are exempt from paying council rates like schools, churches and some charities also have to pay the levy.

How you pay the levy

The levy will be clearly shown on your rates notice and you can pay it either annually or in instalments.

How the levy is calculated

To find out more about how the levy is calculated visit the State Revenue Office's webpage.

Waste services and Landfill Levy

Waste services

Your rates notice now lists separate charges for standard roadside rubbish and recycling collection.

You can find out more about Council's waste collection services here.

About the Landfill Levy

The Landfill Levy is a State Government mandated levy.

Historically, the City of Whittlesea has subsidised waste management charges for our residents but for 2025-26 the Victorian Government’s landfill levy will further rise by 28% per tonne and Council can no longer continue to subsidise this charge.

Cost for waste services and Landfill Levy, 2025-26

Service	Cost	Extra for landfill levy
Residential/Rural	$208.80	$105.85
Commercial/Industrial	$271.35	$166.60
Garden waste bin service	$95.30
Landfill levy general (where no waste service exists)		$15.45

Contact us

Phone: 03 9217 2170

Email: info@whittlesea.vic.gov.au