View along historic Ford Street in the goldrush town of Beechworth.

New: Assistance for flood-affected councils

Learn about the additional support for flood-affected councils


Planning support for rural and regional councils

The Regional Planning Hub is a program established in 2020 to support rural and regional councils plan and develop their municipalities and shires.

The program provides statutory and strategic planning support and resources that:

  • assist councils with peak workloads and priority developments
  • build land use planning capacity and capability within councils
  • improve planning schemes to streamline and simplify processes and approvals
  • assist with significant regional planning projects

The program is managed by Regional Planning Partnerships. This team works with rural and regional councils to grow and realise economic development.

As part of the program, assistance is available for:

  • statutory planning
  • strategic planning
  • professional development

Rural and regional councils can submit a request through the Regional Planning Hub portal linked below.

Priority will go to requests that meet all or most of the Regional Planning Hub criteria.

Requests will be assessed and prioritised against the 4 criteria set out below.

Eligibility criteria

Must demonstrate:

  • A need for surge support in statutory or strategic planning that will deliver outcomes on the ground
  • The need to improve the council’s planning and economic development capacity

Assistance will support a matter of demonstrated sound planning need.

Assistance will:

  • contribute to regional Victoria’s liveability.
  • support economic development and recovery in regional Victoria.

Assistance will deliver an improvement to a planning scheme or process.

Please see below for more information on the eligibility criteria.


Regional Planning Hub application portal

If your council meets the eligibility criteria and would like assistance:

Start your application

Please note: Council users must first gain initial access to the portal. Please contact the Regional Planning Partnerships team for any queries regarding access.

Portal guidance

For help in using the portal, see the following guide:

For answers to your Frequently Asked Questions, please see the below document:

Contact us

For all enquiries please contact:

Regional Planning Hub

Page last updated: 17/11/22