Allan St in Kyabram closed for the inaugural staging of the Tastes and Tunes Festival, after the October 2022 scheduled event was delayed due to the major flood event that occurred only days before it was due to happen. Kyabram lawn bowlers continued an amazing representative season that saw the Cartwright family name up in lights, and the Hurley’s Hotel Hounds finally won a Goulburn Valley Bush Bash League title. Duck hunting continued to come under attack from the Victorian Government, there was a push to have Campaspe Shire turned into an unsubdivided local government area and Tongala was recognised for its street art with a gold medal in the national awards.
First day of school
Sixty-one Prep students started in three classrooms at Kyabram P-12 College on Monday, but they weren’t the only ones experiencing their first day at the school.
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There were 15 new members of staff also suffering from first-day jitters as they stepped on to the primary and secondary campuses of the college.
New acting college principal Marina Walsh was also on her “official’’ first day and was there to welcome the 950 students and 120 staff.
Kyabram ‘tunes in’
Four thousand people crammed into Kyabram’s Allan St for the inaugural staging of Kyabram Tastes and Tunes on Saturday — creating what many long-time Kyabram residents believe to be the largest ever single event in the town.
Food and drink vendors based on the street were forced to call for volunteer reinforcements and several had to re-stock at different stages to ensure they could keep up with the demand of those at the music and food spectacular.
Kyabram Development Committee’s Carman Nicholson said planning for the event was based on a crowd of between 500 to 1000 people.
“Our gate counters finished up with over 4000. To say we are overwhelmed with the turn-out on the night is a massive understatement,” she said.
Kyabram bowls champions
An all-Kyabram final in the Goulburn Valley state triples event is further evidence of the club’s domination of the 2022-23 pennant season.
David and Josh Cartwright combined with Brett Reiner to claim the regional title in a one-sided match against Connor Trewren, David Townsend and the youngest member of the Cartwright clan, Jacob.
They went on to represent the Goulburn Valley in Champions Week.
Street art award
Tongala Street Art Trail was named the gold winner of the Best Street Art Trail at the 2022 Australian Street Art Award.
“Words cannot describe how proud and excited we are to win gold for the best Australian Street Art Trail,” Murray Ross, on behalf of the Tongala Lions Club Street Art Project, said.
“Our volunteer artists have worked so hard over the past few years to give visitors a reason to come to Tongala, and this is the icing on the cake.
“We’re expecting a positive result for our local economy with now even more reasons to come and visit our little mural town.”
Tongala now has more than 50 volunteer-produced works, which showcase stories of the town’s early settlers, their meeting places, as well as the joys and tribulations they experienced.
Additional pieces shed light on Tongala in the modern era, as industry, such as the Nestlé factory, shaped the town and its community.
Tongala nudged out the Maryborough Mural Project on Queensland’s Fraser Coast, which won the Silver Award, and a trail of quirky artworks in Kalgoorlie-Boulder called Little Finds, which snagged the Bronze Award.
Duck hunting under threat
State Member for Murray Plains Peter Walsh criticised the Victorian Government for its announcement of a shortened duck hunting season.
The Nationals leader said once again the government had elected to move its own duck-hunting goalposts by announcing a reduced five-week slot for the state’s hunting season — and a daily bag limit of just four birds.
Mr Walsh said the government had abandoned its commitments repeated in its Sustainable Hunting Action Plan 1 and SHAP 2 to rely on robust science to inform season-setting arrangements.
He said a full-length season was recommended, based on harvest modelling by waterfowl ecology and population dynamics experts, professors Marcel Klaassen and Richard Kingsford.
“The arrangements for the 2023 Victorian duck season are based on analysis and the modelling of habitat and waterbird abundance surveys conducted across eastern Australia and other data relating to game duck abundance, habitat distribution and climate,” Mr Walsh said.
“This isn’t policy, this isn’t even planning.
“This is all about pandering to inner city greenies and hoping to earn Brownie points to cash in for flawed legislation it can no longer ram through the Legislative Council without the crossbenchers.’’
Hancock champ of champs
Stanhope’s Tim Hancock was named Goulburn Valley Playing Area’s Champion of Champions after winning the men’s lawn bowls singles title for 2023.
Hancock produced a dominant five matches to come away with what he described as the best achievement of his career
“It is an unreal feeling (to be the Champion of Champions),” Hancock said.
Heading into the first day’s competition at Shepparton Golf Bowls Club, Hancock was considered an outsider.
So much so, that he was one of just six players who had to play a round one match, with the top fancies all given a bye.
“I am very much a one-game-at-a-time person, so I didn’t look too much into the draw,” Hancock said.
“That first Sunday was very windy and everyone was struggling with it, so it was a little bit of a luck-of-the-draw, to be honest, they were drawing really wide and running on long, so there was certainly a lot of havoc out on the green.
“Playing the first round probably worked out well for me in the end because I got a better feel for the green, so I just got on a bit of a roll and played some great bowls.”
Shire boundaries campaign
Kyabram community leaders launched a campaign to have the Campaspe Shire electoral structure changed to an unsubdivided shire.
A change to the Local Government Act of 2020 will force a change to the current electoral structure of Campaspe Shire, with an unsubdivided shire among three options.
In 2019, a Kyabram-based submission to the review process, which decided to retain the status quo (with minor alterations to ward boundaries), suggested an unsubdivided council would “increase the sense of responsibility and accountability among councillors and afford the opportunity for voters to elect the best candidates — regardless of their address in the municipality — in the knowledge councillors will represent them (not just one ward)”.
It also said “an unsubdivided structure will ensure a broader approach by councillors in contrast to councillors governing in the best interests of their ward”.
The submission said the “big business” nature of modern-day regional councils needed councillors to be “responsible for and answerable to the whole population of the municipality and not just their ward”.
In 2019, the Campaspe Shire becoming an unsubdivided shire was revealed as ‘Option B’ in the review process, but the decision was made to adopt Option A (which involved only minor changes to boundaries in the Waranga and Echuca wards).
Thirty-nine Victorian councils underwent electoral structure reviews, Campaspe Shire among a dozen involved in the first round.
The outcome has still not been revealed, with the shire elections due for October.
Hounds’ Bush Bash title
Home-town hero Paul Newman led Hurley’s Hotel Hounds into their third successive Goulburn Valley Bush Bash final on Sunday at Kyabram.
The veteran left-handed opener made an unbeaten 87 off 49 balls to guide the Hounds to 6/154 in the match reduced to 16 overs after a late start due to rain.
Newman clouted 12 fours and three sixes in another batting master class.
The Hounds went on to win the title, and owner Brenton Sheppard said he considered the win a “blessing”.
“Paulo (Newman) has been in some rare form with the bat, averaging around 250, so having him at the top of the order has been very handy.
“Our bowling attack has been fantastic; everyone played their part from the top down all season to make this possible.”
As for what the future holds for the Hounds, Sheppard said he was keen to see the franchise and the competition continue to evolve.
“There will always be a side from Kyabram, that’s for sure,” he said.
“What it looks like in terms of ownership and sponsorship, I’m not sure, but we will always represent. It (the Bush Bash) is such a great concept and I can’t wait to see it continue to grow.”