Mr Uniacke said ratepayers were not receiving "greater bang for our buck" from rates spent on services including infrastructure, kerb and channeling, road maintenance, general services offered by staff and sport ground maintenance compared with his previous experience as a business owner in other council areas across regional Victoria.
“Our footprint in square kilometres is not double to other municipalities, as to why we need greater rates; we haven't got longer roads or kerb and channeling when compared to Bendigo, Ballarat or even Wodonga,” Mr Uniacke said.
“You can't say we need more money for infrastructure because we've got more roads.
“That's a valid argument in a municipality that has a small number of people and industry but a large area; they have lots of roads to fix all of the time, we don't have that in Shepparton."
Mr Uniacke said the new SAM, Freight Logistic Centre in Mooroopna and McEwen Reserve upgrade projects going over budget were an example of why rates were high.
Mr Uniacke is "experienced" in paying commercial rates, having owned up to 70 Video Ezy and Blockbuster Video stores across the country.
He said focusing on stores he owned in Victoria, Shepparton rates were high when compared to other municipalities.
“We've had stores across all of regional Victoria,” he said.
“When you compare the rates of what we pay in Shepparton — for the same or similar services — we don't get greater bang for our buck because our rates are higher.
“So it's not something that's new to me.”
Mr Uniacke said he was on a council-run rating review committee about seven years ago and one recommendation was reducing the commercial and industrial rate by 100 per cent.
“But the problem was the pie (budget) didn't change . . . that means residential rates went up more,” he said.
“Effectively the cloth never shrunk so that meant some paid more. So here we are down the track and the rates in Shepparton are too high.
“The issue is the cloth needs to be cut. We were told to provide the services, we cannot drop the rates that's why they're going up.”
Looking forward to this October's election, Mr Uniacke said the new council must be prepared to act on behalf of the community.
In a statement, Council said it would be "inappropriate to comment on what are clearly election issues".
“Council sets the budget and reviews rates annually, and conducts a general review every four years.”