Hope everyone had a safe and wonderful Christmas and New Year period with family and friends. It seems so long ago now as we are fast approaching the end of January.
Australia Day in Nyngan this year will be celebrated at Davidson Park kicking off at 8.00am with a free community breakfast. At 9.00am the Australia Day Ceremony will start and include the Citizenship Ceremony, Australia Day Awards and our Australia Day Ambassador for 2023 Cr HY William Chan. William was born in Hong Kong in 1989 soon after his family fled to Australia as migrants. William was a finalist in 2020 for Young Australian of Year Nominations, he is a young Australian architect with global recognition for his urban regeneration, sustainability developments and helping structure and build inclusive cities. William is also an award-winning Surf Life Saver, teaching migrants and refugees much needed skills to reduce and prevent drownings. The Australia Day Celebrations will also include, family activities, free entry to Nyngan Memorial Pool all day and a Movie Night at the Pool starting at 8.00pm, I hope to see lots of the community there to help us celebrate.
Council had a visit from The Honourable Sam Farraway MLC last Sunday. Sam was here to inspect and hand over successful grant projects for the town. These projects included, the museum air conditioning, a pool shade shelter for the water slide tower, fixing up tennis courts, youth and community centre additional funding, Larkin Oval canteen upgrade, Junior League Oval lighting and seating. Nyngan Golf Club will receive $135,000 in funding to deliver safer access to the facility, including construction of bridges over the storm water drains and construction of pathways at the entrance to the golf club and also offer services such as coaching sessions and game days securing a brighter future and provide more mobility for vulnerable people in the community. The old fire station will also have building restorations along with the Garfield Fire Engine. There has also been funding allocated for murals to be painted on community infrastructure. All of these projects received State Government funding and this gives Bogan Shire Council the opportunity to complete these projects that would not have been possible without the funding and we are very grateful for that.
The Shire was informed by Dr Daniel last week that his last day at the Bogan Shire Medical Centre sadly will be the 24th of February, he will be returning to Korea for a family matter. I would like to take this opportunity to, on behalf of our Shire and its community, thank you for all you have done for Nyngan since your arrival. You have been a treasured asset to Bogan Shire Medical Centre and its patients, we wish you the very best for the future.
It appears the bed situation at the Nyngan Multi Purpose Health Service is still to remain the same for some time yet. Council will continue to lobby to Western Area Health and Government Ministers on this to change the situation, which they seem to be very good at telling us they’re working on resolving, but not much seems to have changed. We have a great hospital facility and the staff do a wonderful a job but they don’t seem to be getting the support they need for improvements. Council will be pushing until it is resolved sooner rather than later.
Currently the Shire has 8 grader crews repairing flood damage and undertaking maintenance grading. With roads slowly drying out, hopefully crews will be able to complete sealed flood damage on the Tottenham and Pangee Roads, which can only be patched until specialised paving equipment becomes available to restore the road back to the standard it needs to be.
Pangee Street resurfacing will start again on Tuesday 24th of January, pending weather, and this will be done during the night and is expected to last about 8 days.
Council staff have been working on access ramps to the levee bank and various points as part of the grant funded levee bank walking project. There are new ramps at the end of Jubilee and Flashman Ave, Canonbar Street and the Nyngan Golf Club, all of these will add greatly to the walking trails.
Hope to see you all on Australia Day.
Mayor Glen Neill