Carevan moves in
“Making room for others” is the theme for St Matthews Crisis Care Christmas Appeal for the homeless and it kicks off with giving the Carevan a permanent home in St Matthews garden on Tuesday evenings.
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Working together to help the homeless is a feature of the great Border community where agencies, individuals, service clubs and businesses link arms to meet the challenge of homelessness and isolation.
Carevan was looking for a new site in central Albury after being made ‘homeless’ and it has sparked a new partnership which we intend to grow into the future.
In the Crisis Care Christmas stocking we offer showers every morning and muffins thanks to Muffin Break with tea and coffee and a chat. We also provide advocacy and emergency help.
Our Christmas Appeal asks individuals, service clubs and schools for donations of festive non-perishable foods for hampers, packed by local schools and volunteers in December and distributed to hundreds of people who are doing it tough on the Border.
Donations of sleeping bags and towels and toiletries ensure that rough sleepers get treated like human beings. Donations are invited to help out.
Peter MacLeod-Miller, Archdeacon of Albury and the Hume St Matthew's Anglican Church Albury
Efficiency key for council
To clarify recent reports and commentary surrounding Wodonga Council’s employment data, the council has the same number of FTE staff as it did in 2003-2004, despite an increasing demand for services, and has seen a 16 per cent reduction in real terms in administrative salaries.
Wodonga Council has a total workforce of 384 people with a full-time equivalent of 239. Less than 10 per cent are in director or management roles.
The average cost per employee for 2015-2016 was $92,900. Wages as a percentage of gross revenue is 35.7 per cent and as a percentage of rates revenue is 54 per cent.
Efficiencies have seen the capital works program delivered on time and on budget and planning permits determined in 30 days, well below the state average of 66 days.
Wodonga Council has budgeted to not increase the full-time equivalent number of employees over the 10-year long term financial plan. As demands on council’s services increase with expected growth, the additional workload will be met through efficiencies and productivity improvements.
Patience Harrington, CEO, Wodonga Council
Standing up on trains
Geoffrey Butt (‘Trainload of Irony’, The Border Mail, October 26) neglected to mention a few important facts.
The Victorian Liberals and Nationals have always stood up for V/Line statewide.
In government from 2011, the Liberals and Nationals promptly returned V/Line trains north of Seymour after Labor had left North East residents with no V/Line trains for two and a half years.
Prior to the last election, the Coalition released a detailed, fully funded ‘extra country train trips’ policy that the country train idea-free Daniel Andrews and Labor are belatedly endeavouring to copy.
Thanks to the advocacy of MPs including Bill Tilley and Tim McCurdy, the Liberals and Nationals committed to this $170.8 million package to ensure lines including Wangaratta/Albury, Shepparton and, since Mr Butt mentioned it, Warrnambool, benefited from extra return V/Line train trips. On the Albury line, we fully funded an extra weekday return train.
Despite Labor’s mismanagement that led to taxpayers incurring $50 million to $60 million in extra costs due to VLocity railcars’ excessive wheel wear and their failure to adequately trigger level-crossing boom barriers, and the resultant decline in passenger satisfaction, the Liberals and Nationals will continue to press for tangible enhancements to Wodonga and Albury’s V/Line trains.