News

Yarra City Council reaffirms its commitment to public health and community wellbeing

21 October 2025

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Project background:

The Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan for 2025–2029 is informed by the best available evidence on the health and wellbeing of our local community. This is compiled in the recently published Yarra Health and Wellbeing Profile, available as an Executive Summary and as a series of 10 health and wellbeing snapshots.

The draft Plan is also aligned with the requirements of the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008, and the relevant priorities of the Victorian Public Health and Wellbeing Plan 2023–27.

Priority areas within the new draft Plan have also been informed by the feedback and ideas shared with us via extensive community engagement conducted for our 2025–29 Council Plan. This included engaging with a Community Working Group through a deliberative engagement process. You can read more about this process here.

We also convened two workshops with our Health and Wellbeing Expert Reference Group, which included 20 stakeholders from Yarra’s local health and social support organisations.

The final stage took place from Friday 11 July to 9am on Monday 11 August 2025. Within this stage, the draft Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan was available for community feedback to comment on. This consultation happened concurrently with the consultation on the draft Asset Plan and draft Community Infrastructure Plan that underwent similar engagement processes to inform their development.

The information below provides details relating to the final stage of engagement.

What did we ask?

Do you have any comments on the draft Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan?

Who did we hear from?

What we heard and how it influenced the final plan?

There were 40 pieces of feedback received overall:

8 were supportive of the Plan
18 suggestions were directly relevant to the Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan (MPHWP)
14 were relevant suggestions better directed to other areas of Council’s work or provided general commentary on Council as a whole.

The themes of the feedback from the 18 comments relevant to the MPHWP are presented below. There were 31 specific suggestions classified into 8 key themes with some feedback including multiple themes.

Theme Category	Sub-Themes	No.	%
General Feedback	Clarification of wording or meaning General support for Plan (x5) Particularly supportive of the healthy housing priority (x2) Early childhood and families are important	9	29
Equity, inclusion, priority populations & connection	Importance of priority populations (CALD, low income) Consider women over 50 who are at greater risk of homelessness Importance of intersectionality Recognise a seniors card for Yarra Leisure memberships Need more small group programs for social connection	5	16
Environmental health & clean air	Stronger action on supporting climate resilience Address air pollution from wood-fired heaters More smoke and vape-free areas needed (x2)	4	13
Community gardens and access to healthy food	More community gardens are needed (x3) Food relief should cater for all dietary requirements	4	13
Safety & community infrastructure	Yarra River: safety for pedestrians (lighting, paths, separation from cyclists) Lights shining up from pavements are dangerous for people with vision impairments Greater support for family violence not-for-profit organisations	3	10
Alcohol, other drugs and harm minimisation	Stronger efforts needed on AOD harm minimisation Targeted regulation of alcohol venues	2	6
Physical activity & accessibility	More accessible sports Accessible active/public transport	2	6
Birrarung importance	Inclusion of the importance of the Birrarung River for the wellbeing of the community (x2)	2	6

The details of the feedback and the officer responses are available within the Community Engagement Report.

Read the Community Engagement Report

What happens next?

At the Council Meeting on Tuesday 14 October 2025, Council endorsed their 4-year Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing, a document shaped by evidence and our community’s priorities. This document will guide how we support our community through programs, services, infrastructure and facilities to ensure Yarra is a place that encourages health and wellbeing for everyone.

Visit the project page

To read more about this consultation please visit the Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plan project page on Your Say Yarra.