Airport upgrades, rural road maintenance and planning for improving the city’s vital, but ageing assets such as the tip and Albany Leisure and Aquatic Centre are among the items to be funded by an average 5.5 per cent rate rise.

Passed by the council at its meeting on Tuesday, the City of Albany’s 2026-27 budget is a “forward-looking” one that balances the need for asset maintenance with rising costs of construction, living and development, according to mayor Greg Stocks.

“This budget strikes an important balance between delivering the services and infrastructure our community relies on today while making strategic investments that will benefit future generations,” he said.

“With significant investment in transport infrastructure, community facilities, waste planning and major grant-funded projects, we’re continuing to build a strong, connected and liveable Albany.”

Key projects included are the $44 million Albany Regional Airport runway upgrade, $3.2 million to plan for Hanrahan Road Waste Facility’s end of life deadline in 2032, and $1m funnelled into a ALAC upgrade reserve fund.

More than $47m of grant-funded projects are included in the budget, including the Albany artificial fishing reef, Gladville structure plan, stage two of Albany Regional Tennis Centre, and the Albany botanical link walkway set to connect Middleton Beach to the top of Mt Irrerup/Adelaide.

A $15.6m allocation is set aside for the rural road network, specifically upgrading the city’s 800km network of unsealed roads.

This is set to be largely funded by the people that use them, via a 9.95 per cent rise in rates for unimproved value properties.

Mr Stocks said the rise is a joint bid to bring the city’s UV rates, which he says were some of the lowest in WA, in line with the State average, and to continue the four-year program of improving rural roads workshopped with the community.

“The rural community said (the rate rise) is OK as long as you improve our roads, so we’re holding up our end of the bargain with 9.95,” he said.

“We know that’s a big number — it’s an extra 4.5 per cent on top of the 5.5 per cent increase but I’m of the view that we said we were going to do it, we’re doing what we said we would do, and we need to recoup the money to continue that program.

“It won’t be popular in some sectors I understand that, but sometimes you have to bite the bullet if you want to keep the infrastructure and services up.”

Youngs Siding farmer Sarah Taylor was one such dissenter, who said the increase was “unfair and inequitable” and that non-minimum UV ratepayers shouldered more of the rise.

“The average rates could be somewhere around the $2500 mark for a normal residential ratepayer, which means that they’re really bearing the brunt of of the rate burden, and those who are on minimum UV rates have got it pretty cushy because they’re not paying a lot,” she said.

“Just because we live in an absolutely lovely place, doesn’t mean that we should be having an almost 25 per cent increase over the last two years — people just can’t afford that with the current climate.”

Gross rental value property ratepayers will see an increase of 5.5 per cent.

Another bone of contention was the 3.5 per cent boost in elected member fees, which were bumped from $35,480 to $36,722, with Cr Thomas Brough echoing the call he has made for the past five budgets to implement a transparent mechanism in measuring councillor performance and reimbursement.

Cr Robert Sutton said the job of a councillor is often a “thankless” one that involves plenty of behind-the-scenes work and that the KPI measuring method already existed in the form of “turning up” to as many meetings, briefings and events as possible.

Deputy mayor Paul Terry said if Cr Brough wanted such a policy, he should put one forward and “do the work”.