OPINION: Reflecting on Greater Shepparton City Council's year

Of course, most civic programs, project planning and execution cannot be pigeon-holed into a 12-month timeslot — and some don’t ever leave an indelible visual presence.

One that does make a striking statement, a huge sign of Greater Shepparton's “cultural coming of age”, is the whopping, impressive new SAM Museum, so strategically highway-planted at our iconic Victoria Park, complementarily nestled into the southern lake foreshore — anticipated to be structurally completed by the end of this year.

Now the new SAM didn’t come easily — not being high in the community-acceptance stakes. That’s perfectly okay, dissent is a right and views can change as the project rolls out. That seems to be the case with SAM although on social media some punters think government money for that project can be used for expenditure well outside local government’s responsibility, such as cheap housing.

Now into a municipal election year, what can we expect to be planned or executed? There are government projects advocated by council — Stage 1 Shepparton Freeway Bypass (part northern crossing — dependent on $52 million from the state government); GV Link (sitting in never-never land), Pine Rd upgrade (controversial); continuing rail service upgrade; pedestrian rail station bridge (fairy-land possibility); Mall upgrade (“waist (sic) of money" — social media philosopher). Then there’s Sports Stadium and lots of others.

Oops, nearly forgot. It’s about at least 15 years since an extension to our great shared path network, from Mooroopna’s KidsTown through to Gemmill Swamp Wildlife Reserve, was mooted. Not a spade full has been turned except to discover embedded lead bullets from the former rifle range, Damn it, project on hold!

Any suggestions for future consideration? Form a queue.

● We are halfway through the festive season “free CBD parking” (whatever that may be) council munificence splurge — with the costly “junk your junk” bonanza about to fire up this month. Two perfect examples of cost-shifting from actual users directly to all hapless ratepayers.

Council, on its website, has a “simple” (you can say that again) parking survey:

Are you shopping in the CBD today because you didn’t have to pay for parking?

Do you know about the complimentary timed parking for the months of December 2019 and January 2020?

What is your postcard (sic)?

What type of industry do you do business within the CBD (sic)? Check any that apply: Retail, Professional, Health and wellbeing, Entertainment, Hospitality or Other.

End of survey. We’ll learn a lot from that won’t we — especially taking the two applicable months into account? I liked the postcard bit.

● A petition, normally as useful as an ashtray on a Harley-Davidson, was tabled at last month’s council meeting.

What about you ask? 1446 petitioners object to fluoridation of Tatura’s urban reticulated water supply and have said so by signing up. Not that there’s any immediate proposal for such.

What’s that got to do with local government? Sweet bother all is the answer to that query and I’m puzzled why it landed on the council table in lieu of a polite response: “Sorry, not in our bag of tricks. Try the state minister for water supply or your local region urban water authority.”

It seems there’s a mob under the moniker of the Regional Anti-Fluoridation Group who work under this mantra. “Our Group was set up to bring awareness to the towns in Victoria that are about to be fluoridated — Also making aware those that are already fluoridated and hoping to obtain support from all, so we have a stronger voice as a whole. We are a group of strong-willed people with the energy to take this to a valuable level.”

There’s a theory that groups like this often pay a “canvasser/petitioner” on a signature-collected basis to do the legwork involved in door-knocking.

Wish them luck? Your choice.

Shepparton’s John Gray has vast experience in local government, urban water reform and natural resource management.