Mayor's Message 11 August
Hello everyone,
On Wednesday, the Victorian Electoral Commission conducted a countback to elect a new Councillor following the resignation of Larry Goldsworthy at the end of June.
Eleven candidates were eligible to participate in the countback and Beechworth resident, Sue Gold was successful and has accepted the position. She will be sworn in at a ceremony in the Council Chambers on Monday morning.
On behalf of all Councillors, I want to take this opportunity to congratulate Ms Gold and welcome her to Indigo Shire, where I am sure she will make a valuable contribution and I look forward to a productive working relationship.
With only 13 months left in this Council term, we still have much to achieve and while we’ve made significant progress on implementing the many actions in our Council Plan, there’s more to do.
While the Council Plan helps guide service delivery and our annual budget, there are many actions that require us to advocate on behalf of our community to relevant government agencies. These include issues such as ambulance response times which has been our number one advocacy priority for a number of years.
I am pleased to report that the most recent data from Ambulance Victoria on Code One response times shows a slight improvement, with Indigo Shire moving from the bottom of the list in terms of response rates.
The Quarter 4 data shows that 26.9% of Code One incidents in the Shire were responded to in under 15 minutes and the average response time to the 212 calls received was 24.43 minutes.
We know our wonderful first responders are doing an incredible job, but more resources are urgently needed and we will continue to advocate to the State Government for a better deal for our community.
We will also not let up on our advocacy efforts to government about the state of our roads, not just those under our management but the many Regional Roads Victoria roads that are in a dreadful state.
We heard a collective groan yesterday when news broke that the Beechworth-Wodonga Road will again close next week and traffic diverted back on to Reids Way so that repairs can be made to the recently installed Bailey Bridge over rising Sun Creek.
We understand that modifications are required and many concerns were raised by motorists. We know it’s an inconvenience but safety must come first.
Please be patient and take care.
Sophie Price