At council's first "Fit for the Future" consultation in Geurie, Mayor Rod Buhr said sacrifices would need to be made if Wellington was to survive as a standalone council and be financially sustainable over the next 10 years.

During the past 10 years from 2003 to 2013, Wellington has been at a deficit for seven, breaking even for three.

Cr Buhr said that council had a big issue with the rate of depreciation being applied to assets such as roads to ensure they were kept in good condition.

He said they had been looking at putting property on the market, had sold some plant equipment and unfortunately had to make redundancies.

With their Business Sustainability Action Plan, council was also able to make a 5 per cent reduction of expenditure across the board which would result in the saving of $1 million for this financial year.

Cr Buhr said that council was giving its best shot to make changes and while the interim report had clearly stated Wellington should merge, the report now suggested a potential merge.

Council previously resolved not to support a merger with Dubbo and Narromine to retain local representation because there was no guarantee the new structure would ensure such representation.

Another major concern was that there would be a significant loss of council jobs which would have a bad effect on the economy.

He said the public needed to consider its options as council looked to leaner times and that better services would mean a rate rise.

"We might need to bring the income up to match the level of service or bring that level of service down to match that income," Mayor Buhr said.

"This will be a decision the community has to make. "And if we merge the rates probably won't go down."

In September of 2016 the local government elections will be followed by the New Local Government Act.

Then Regional Joint Organisations will be established to share services (Wellington would be part of the Orana Joint Organisation with Dubbo, Narromine, Warren, Gilgandra, Bogan and Coonamble).

Amalgamations will then commence as well as the establishment of rural councils.

Council must prepare a submission by June 30 next year for the Office of Local Government, providing evidence of the steps needed to be undertaken to place Wellington Council in a sustainable position.

General manager Michael Tolhurst will be staying on until June.

Councils which are unfit will not get part of the $1 billion state government package.

"This will effectively reduce the level of support to unfit councils, the inevitable outcome being they will be forced to merge," Cr Buhr said.

Council also discussed their recent on-site sewerage management system, and their recent procedure to ensure that all septic systems were registered.

The next community consultation is at 6pm this evening at the Wellington Civic Centre followed by Mumbil at 6pm Thursday evening.