2015
Shire cleaned up
Residents across the district donned their gloves, put on their hats and picked up their trash bag to take part in this year’s Clean-Up Australia Day on Sunday.
This year marked 25 years since the introduction of Clean Up Australia Day, with last year seeing more than 570,000 people across Australia collecting 17,000 tonnes of garbage across 7140 sites.
In Campaspe Shire, events took place across the district including at Kyabram, Tongala and Wyuna.
In Kyabram, volunteers worked their magic along McEwen Rd, with the Kyabram Landcare Group hosting 55 participants, including from the Scouts and Girl Guides,
They managed to fill four 240-litre waste bins, and three 240-litre recycle bins.
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Win half a million
A $20 ticket for a $500,000 prize.
Kyabram Phoenix Soccer Club will this year hold what maybe the biggest prize draw in Kyabram history, giving residents the chance to win half a million dollars.
But there’s a simple catch: You have to be in it to win it.
Phoenix Soccer Club president and recent contestant on Channel 10 investment program Shark Tank Simon Fiske announced the $500,000 lottery this week after months of planning.
“We looked into the insurance needed to hold such a lottery and found there wasn’t a big different between, say, $50,000 and $500,000,” Mr Fiske said.
“We thought stuff it, let’s give someone the chance to win half a million.”
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Helping hand for Peru
St Augustine’s College students heard an inspirational story from an international guest speaker last week as part of Lenten celebrations.
Luis “lucho” Castillo from Peru spoke to Years 8 to 11 students about the positive work done by Caritas, the Catholic agency for international aid.
The visit aligned with Caritas’ annual Project Compassion Appeal of which the college community is a proud supporter.
Lucho spoke about the work of Caritas in the area of Huacho, Preu, where programs are run in three separate communities from Peru’s dry costal zone to high in the Andrean mountains.
Students gained a great deal from the talk and saw how positive actions can change the world for the better.
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2005
$200,000 boost for town centre
Kyabram’s town centre is set for a major overhaul with the Bracks Government providing $200,000 towards developing a new outdoor community precinct.
Victorian Minister for State and Regional Development John Brumby said the project was the culmination of eight years of planning and would beautify the Union and Allan Sts intersection, creating a safe and appealing place to shop and gather with family and friends.
It follows the government’s 2003 decision to provide over $94,000 towards the Church St beautification project.
This new-look precinct will benefit the local community, encourage new developments and give existing traders an opportunity to revitalise and extend their businesses.
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Caritas says thank-you
Today, a month after the earthquake which devastated South Asia, Caritas Australia wishes to thank all those who have donated to the relief effort.
Ten-and-a-half million dollars in donations has been received so far and further donations are still expected.
The amount raised to date through the parish churches of Kyabram, Tongala and Merrigum is over $7500 in cash donations alone.
This includes over $500 given in donations by attendees at the Tongala Traders’ Market Day.
In 2005, Caritas Australia will be supporting a total of 83 ongoing projects as well as responding to the needs of tsunami-affected communities in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and India.
Project Compassion will be launched next week in Kyabram with a Pancake Cook-out to be held jointly between the St Augustine’s Parish and St Augustine’s School on Tuesday, February 8 between 8am and 9am.
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Stock killed in freak cold snap
Hundreds of cattle throughout Kyabram and district were killed last week in the extreme cold snap.
Elders VP Kyabram livestock manager Greg Caldwell reported widespread stock losses after the temperature plummeted from around 38℃ to 12°C in one day.
He said most affected farmers he knew of had lost between 15 to 40 cattle.
Kyabram dairy farmer Harold Montgomery lost 35 head of cattle in the storm which battered the district last Thursday night.
Mr Mongomery said he was unsure how he would overcome the financial setback caused by the loss of the cattle.
1995
School numbers rise
The majority of schools in the Kyabram area have experienced increases in enrolment for the 1995 school year, which started on Wednesday.
Each of the five-year-olds were off for their first day of school and most were excited to meet the challenge.
Most schools in the Kyabram district are now part of the Schools of the Future program and are busily working towards their goals and their curriculum standards framework.
Programs such as LOTE (Language other than English) are in full swing with children learning different languages at their schools including Japanese, Indonesian, Italian and French.
Many schools such as Stanhope and Girgarre have been given grants and so 1995 will be a year of expansion and updating equipment.
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John Atkinson gives National Day views
Guest speakers at the Australia Day celebrations for the former Rodney Shire area were a leading district Aboriginal resident, John Atkinson, and Jacqui Wood, representing the younger people of the area,
Australia Day Committee chairperson Phyl Mactier introduced Mr Atkinson as being born at Cummeragunga Mission, one of a family of 10 boys and one girl.
Referring to the loss of so much Aboriginal culture in the last 200 years, he said that from 200 languages and 800 dialects, there were now only about 100 Aboriginal languages left.
Mr Atkinson said Australia Day should be a time for Indigenous Peoples, migrants and the general community to get together.
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Tomato processing starts at GCF
Girgarre Country Foods (Heinz) started tomato production last week and is expecting to process 60,000 tonnes for the season.
The tomatoes are used for food service and industrial tomato paste in bulk packaging.
Girgarre has 15 permanent staff members throughout the year, and numbers are steadily increased during the year, so that by the time of harvest 100 people are employed with the company.
Work carried out during the year includes research into operations, selection and extraction of seeds research.
The recent deluge of rain with storms last weekend is not expected to cause any significant interruption to processing, although there may be some delay of harvest.