Surf Coast Shire

Template:Use Australian English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox Australian place

File:Aerial views of the Otways region of Victoria, Australia.webm

Aerial views of the Barwon South West region of Victoria, Australia.

The Surf Coast Shire is a local government area in the Barwon South West region of Victoria, Australia, located in the south-western part of the state. It covers an area of Template:Convert. It had a population of 32,251 in June 2018.<ref name=ABSLGA/> It includes the towns of Aireys Inlet, Anglesea, Lorne, Moriac, Torquay and Winchelsea. It was formed in 1994 from the amalgamation of the Shire of Winchelsea, Shire of Barrabool and part of the former City of South Barwon, which was, at that point, part of the City of Greater Geelong.<ref name=Gazette /><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The Shire is governed and administered by the Surf Coast Shire Council; its seat of local government and administrative centre is located at the council headquarters in Torquay. The Shire is named after its location on the popular surf coast of Victoria.

Post-2008, following an electoral representation review, the decision was made to re-subdivide the municipality into four wards, the current wards are Torquay, Anglesea, Winchelsea and Lorne. Between 2004 and 2008, the Shire was an unsubdivided municipality and as a result, the entire municipality voted to elect nine councillors. Between 1996 and 2004, the municipality was subdivided into six wards, where three councillors per ward were elected from the Torquay and Anglesea wards, and one councillor per ward was elected from the Lorne, Winchelsea, Moriac and Aireys Inlet wards. A position of Deputy Mayor was created in 2004, but it was abolished for the 2005 mayoral election.

CouncilEdit

Current compositionEdit

The council is composed of four wards and nine councillors, with four councillors elected to represent the Torquay Ward, two councillors per ward elected to represent each of the Anglesea and Winchelsea wards, and one councillor elected to represent the Lorne Ward.<ref name=Council>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Ward	Councillor		Affiliation	Notes
Anglesea	Template:Australian party style\|	Libby Stapleton	Independent
Anglesea	Template:Australian party style\|	Mike Bodsworth	Independent	Deputy Mayor
Lorne	Template:Australian party style\|	Gary Allen	Independent
Torquay	Template:Australian party style\|	Liz Pattison	Independent	Mayor
	Template:Australian party style\|	Paul Barker	Libertarian
	Template:Australian party style\|	Rose Hodge	Independent Labor
	Template:Australian party style\|	Kate Gazzard	Greens
Winchelsea	Template:Australian party style\|	Adrian Schonfelder	Independent Labor
Winchelsea	Template:Australian party style\|	Heather Wellington	Independent

List of former and current mayorsEdit

Cr Noel Bates (1995–1997)
Cr Henry Love (1997–1998)
Cr Julie Hansen (1998–2000)
Cr Mike Barrow (2000–2001)
Cr Beth Davidson (2001–2004)
Cr Keith Grossman (2004–2005)
Cr Libby Mears (2005–2006)
Cr Rose Hodge (2006–2007)
Cr Dean Webster (2007–2008)
Cr Libby Mears (2008–2009)
Cr Libby Coker (2009–2010)
Cr Dean Webster (2010–2011)
Cr Brian McKiterick (2011–2012)
Cr Libby Coker (2012–2013)
Cr Rose Hodge (2013–2014)
Cr Margot Smith (2014–2015)
Cr Rose Hodge (2015–2016)
Cr Brian McKiterick (2016-2017)
Cr David Bell (2017-2018)
Cr Rose Hodge (2018–2020)
Cr Libby Stapleton (2020–2022)
Cr Liz Pattison (2022–Present)

Administration and GovernanceEdit

The council meets in the council chambers at the council headquarters in the Torquay Municipal Offices, which is also the location of the council's administrative activities. It also provides customer services at its Municipal Office in Torquay.

Election resultsEdit

2024Edit

Template:Excerpt

2016Edit

Template:Election box turnout

Surf Coast Shire: Anglesea Ward
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
Template:Australian party style \|	Labor	Libby Coker	2,504	48.50
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent	Margot Ann Smith	1,393	27.00
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent	Jenna Robinson	1,268	24.6
Template:Australian party style \|	Labor hold		Swing
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent hold		Swing

Template:Election box turnout

Surf Coast Shire: Torquay Ward
Party		Candidate	Votes	%
Template:Australian party style \|	Labor	Rose Hodge	2,866	27.20
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent	David Bell	1,962	18.60
Template:Australian party style \|	Liberal	Brian McKiterick	1,268	16.00
Template:Australian party style \|	Greens	Marian Smedley	1,529	14.50
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent	Martin Paul Duke	1,522	14.20
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent	Joe Remenyi	993	9.40
Template:Australian party style \|	Labor hold		Swing
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent hold		Swing
Template:Australian party style \|	Liberal hold		Swing
Template:Australian party style \|	Independent gain from Greens		Swing

Townships and localitiesEdit

According to the 2021 census, the shire had a population of 37,694, up from 29,397 in the 2016 census.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Template:Columns-start

Population
Locality	2016	2021
Template:VICcity	802	979
Template:VICcity	2,545	3,208
Template:VICcity	101	115
Template:VICcity	235	247
Template:VICcity	865	1,346
Template:VICcity	130	151
Template:VICcity	5	9
Big Hill	261	281
Template:VICcity^	828	942

Template:Column

Population
Locality	2016	2021
Template:VICcity	21	18
Template:VICcity^	162	151
Template:VICcity	211	228
Template:VICcity^	788	953
Template:VICcity	269	368
Template:VICcity	35	47
Template:VICcity	296	390
Template:VICcity	414	454
Template:VICcity	370	391

Template:Column

Population
Locality	2016	2021
Template:VICcity	267	297
Template:VICcity^	1,474	1,746
Template:VICcity	3,683	4,151
Template:VICcity	1,114	1,327
Template:VICcity	276	277
Template:VICcity	89	120
Template:VICcity	782	852
Template:VICcity^	1,578	6,182
Template:VICcity	240	251

Template:Column

Population
Locality	2016	2021
Template:VICcity^	97	93
Template:VICcity	151	167
Template:VICcity^	86	110
Template:VICcity	13,258	18,534
Template:VICcity	107	95
Template:VICcity^	1,954	2,456
Template:VICcity	179	171
Template:VICcity	138	147