Clarence Valley Orchestra Medical Student Scholarship

The Clarence Valley Orchestra (CVO) is proud to announce their first scholarship candidate for their new Rural Medical Student Scholarship worth $5,000 to Mattea Lazarou in Grafton.

Mattea says, “I have been fortunate enough to complete the beginnings of my medical education as part of the Graduate School of Medicine at University of Wollongong. With a strong focus in contributing to the health and wellbeing of rural Australia, the program sees students undertake a year-long placement within a rural community. With personal connections to the local community, I was thrilled to be placed in the Clarence Valley to complete this stage of my training. It is through my placement in Grafton and surrounds, that my own passion for practising rural health and contributing to the wellbeing of rural communities was encouraged. It was a privilege not only to be surrounded by enthusiastic mentors and teachers within the hospital setting, but to connect with and hear the stories of community members, both within the hospital and beyond. I was fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to return to the Clarence Valley in this latter half of the year and undertake additional experience in both Grafton and Maclean hospitals. I am grateful to complete this final stage of training with the support of the Clarence Valley Orchestra’s generous scholarship. I look forward to returning to Grafton to work as a doctor throughout my career to give back to the community that has showed me so much kindness and opportunity”.

The University of Wollongong’s Dean of the Graduate School of Medicine, Professor Zsuzsoka Kecskes has commented that “we are very excited about the recent awarding of the first Clarence Valley Orchestra Medical Scholarship and would like to once again congratulate Mattea on her successful application. In times when living costs continue to rise, it’s vital for our students to have external support and encouragement to stay on track toward their dream careers and to feel the impact their efforts can have on our communities. We want to express our gratitude to the Clarence Valley Orchestra for their incredible support – our partnership is a fantastic example of how community efforts can uplift and empower future generations.”

The idea of Artistic Director and Conductor of the CVO Dr Greg Butcher, says “the Orchestra is thrilled and has agreed to keep the $5,000 scholarship going over the next 2 years (3 years in total) as a way of ‘thinking outside the box’, hopefully attracting GPs to the Clarence Valley and wider area in the future. These scholarships along with other major community donations are funded from tickets sales from the orchestra’s major concerts. CVO’s next concert, An Afternoon at The Pops, will be their 10^th anniversary and will be on Sunday 27^th October at the Saraton Theatre Grafton, performing with the Comedy Trio the Kransky Sisters, with compere comedian Anthony Ackroyd”.

For more local Clarence Valley news, click here.

Preferences will be vital in Clarence poll

By Tim Howard

Some of your candidates don’t want anything to do with them, others wish they could ignore them and some will live and die for them.

They’re preferences and they are what are troubling the minds of a good number of candidates as time ticks away toward Saturday’s Clarence Valley Council election.

We talked with former Clarence Valley Council deputy mayor and election tragic Craig Howe about how preferences could play out in this year’s vote.

Mr Howe, who served two terms on council and finished as deputy mayor in 2016, has been happy to step away from local government, but he maintains a fascination with the electoral process.

At each local government election since 2016 he’s created and moderated a Facebook pages, Clarence Valley meet the candidates, where people can ask candidates pertinent questions about their reasons for running.

The page also runs mock poll where people can “vote” for their candidate of choice. But more on that later.

Mr Howe said the 2024 poll differs from any of the elections he has contested or witnessed since 2008.

“I can’t see there being a ‘Richie vote’,” he said, referring to the wildly popular vote the current Clarence MP Richie Williamson attracted when he stood for council from 2005 to 2021.

“When Richie left in 2021, people wondered who was going to pull those big numbers and it was Jeff Smith.”

He said the crucial thing was candidates reaching their quota.

The quota is determined by first dividing the aggregate number of formal first preferences by one more than the number of candidates to be elected. The quotient (disregarding the fraction) is increased by 1 to give the quota.

The NSW Electoral Commission has the number of electors in Clarence standing at 41,890.

In the voting system used in local elections once a candidate reach his or her quota the preferences were distributed to other candidates. Continued candidates also received the preferences of candidates who were eliminated during counting.

Former Clarence Valley Council deputy Mayor Craig Howe has cast his eyes over the field for the 2024 Clarence Valley Council elections and thinks preferences will play a bigger than usual part in deciding who will be on the next council.

Mr Howe said it anyone was going to poll big numbers this year it would most likely be someone well known in Grafton.

“Jeff Smith got it, and that’s because he owned the ice cream shop in Prince Street,” he said.

“You got a lot of votes from Grafton, and Grafton the big voter base, you know. So that that’s why I think Ray Smith might be a chance to pull in those sort of numbers.”

But Mr Howe said while this year Ray Smith and shared a surname, the recognition factor might not be the same.

“He hasn’t been around for a while, either, so maybe, you know, the younger people don’t necessarily know him,” he said.

He said Greg Clancy might be a chance to poll well, but he doubted if the numbers would as high as Williamson’s or Smith’s in previous elections.

But he said a new candidate might consider joining a ticket with someone like Dr Clancy, who has served two terms on the council.

Mr Howe said if you looked at the how to vote choice of candidate Mellissa Hellwig and Lynne Cairns you could see that pattern.

“Greg’s in one, Hellwig two, and Lynne Cairns three.” He said. “But then, if you look at Hellwig, she’s gone her one, and then Lynne Cairns at two, which what they’re hoping will happen is Greg’s preferences will flow from him to Hellwig, and then she’ll get her quota, and then the rest of them will find Greg’s will flow down to them.”

But Mr Howe said these ideas were conditional on candidates reaching their quotas, which might not happen.

He said there a lot of candidates from down river, who would be contesting a smaller voter base.

“It might not shape up this way at all,” Mr Howe said. “Voters might decide they want a balanced council and decide to pick someone from the conservative side and some from the not-so-conservative side.

“So then you have someone like Cristie Yager or Amanda Brien. Where do they fit into that.

“It could be the preferences don’t follow the how to vote cards and go everywhere.”

Mr Howe said his Facebook poll had been disappointing so far, with about 35 votes cast.

“It’s too small to be a really good sample at the moment,” he said.

“But even in 35 votes you can see a trend and at the moment some of those trends are very interesting and might worry a few candidates.”

Pushed to tip who he thought might make the council this year, Mr Howe said Ulmarra’s Cristie Yager was his bolter.

“She’s done very well getting recognition on social media and I like what she’s saying’ he said.

“She seems to be a person who cares about people and that’s what people want.”

Of the incumbents he thinks the Mayor Peter Johnstone would be re-elected, despite his rocky start to the leadership role.

He thought Steve Pickering and Debrah Novak were also likely to be re-elected but thought some of the incumbents might struggle.

“With the ones that retired this time, there could be five maybe even six new faces on council when the counting’s down,” he said.

For more local elections and Clarence preferences news, click here.

Fears of Grafton airport snub for $6m centre

By Tim Howard

Fears the NSW Government could snub Grafton Regional Airport for a $6 million emergency services co-ordination centre for the Northern Rivers has stung the Mayor into last-minute action.

At the final council meeting ahead of the September 14 Local Government election, Clarence Mayor Peter Johnstone rushed in a mayoral minute to lobby Emergency Services Minister Jihad Dib to “strongly consider” Grafton as the preferred site for the centre.

Cr Johnstone said in early 2023 the government announced an $8.5 million investment in the new Fire Control Centre and Emergency Operations Centre at the airport.

It would include a facility for co-location of emergency personnel from the RFS, SES Fire and Rescue at NSW and police to be able to respond to fires, floods, storms and a range of other emergencies, and was to include an operations and logistics centre, administration offices, training rooms, storage base and vehicle base.

He said the Reconstruction Authority has confirmed funds of $6 million have been secured to construct an Emergency Services Coordination Centre to service the Northern Rivers, and that a consultant would soon be engaged to undertake a site feasibility study.

Cr Johnson said discussions so far have favoured Lismore as the site for the proposed centre.

He said the evidence would suggest Grafton Regional Airport was an ideal site for the proposed centre.

“We are considered one of the very worst places, if not the worst place, for potential floods in the future,” he said.

But Grafton Regional Airport is a dry airport. We are on the main highway, Pacific Highway.

We have transport links in terms of railway.”

Cr Johnstone said that while the Clarence was at the top of flood risk areas in the State Disaster Mitigation Plan, its bushfire risk had been downplayed.

“I look at that chart and we’re right down there in terms of bushfire, and that, to me, makes no sense at all, when 60% of our local government area was burnt in the last in the last fires,” he said.

“And I consider that when they put us right down there in terms of the average annual loss, they put us down as having an average annual loss of $3 million It’s ignoring several bits that they should be considered.”

The mayor said the region had suffered heavily in the 2019-20 fires and was at risk from future fire.

“Farms and industries in areas are affected by bushfires will not only potentially lose infrastructure, which is all its report is considering, but also affect production for several years, I’m not convinced that that’s been put into these figures,” he said.

“And finally, habitat and species loss. The wilderness areas of the Clarence contain rare and uncommon habitats that date back to different climatic conditions in the Australian subcontinent, plants and wildlife that are rare and endangered, some may not even be known to science.”

Cr Debrah Novak backed the Mayor, pointing out that the proposed site for the centre in Lismore was at risk in emergencies.

“The Grafton Regional Airport is the no brainer for the Northern Rivers, simply because it was the only airport that didn’t go under,” she said.

“It’s a project that is ready to go, it doesn’t need a whole lot of funding to get it ready to be the Northern Rivers Emergency Management Centre, whereas, if Lismore is the airport chosen to be the central point for emergency management, there’s a lot of work that needs to be done there.

“There’s still planes sitting in their paddock up there that were destroyed on the back of the 2022 floods.”

There was unanimous support from councillors.

Cr Steve Pickering said the centre would be a boost for the area, providing jobs and infrastructure

The council could also use the presence of the centre to lobby the government to take control of the site and take the expense of running the airport away from the council, said Cr Greg Clancy.

Cr Karen Toms said it was crazy the government was thinking of replicating what was happening in Grafton in Lismore.

“It’s a huge efficiency savings and it just makes sense, so let’s hope we can get them to change their mind,” she said.

Councillors voted unanimously to support the mayor’s minute.

For more local Grafton news, click here.