“Sustainability and growth for our area is best achieved through sound planning and linking in with essential key stakeholders to start conversations and gain input early,” she said.
“This is exactly what the masterclass was designed to do.” Facilitated by Spark Strategy, the community place-making program began at the start of this year with a series of online sessions and concluded with a two-day in-person immersion event in Haven and Horsham.
It provided representatives from across north-west Victoria with the opportunity to learn the fundamentals of strategic positioning and planning.
Haven Community Enterprise secretary Sue Exell, who attended the masterclass, said Horsham Rural City Council’s Draft Horsham South Structure Plan, released for feedback this week, allowed for developing Haven in order to accommodate more families.
The draft outlines a vision for the co-ordinated development of a 4540-hectare area, which encompasses residential, industrial and commercial land south of the Wimmera River in Horsham and aims to remedy challenges related to planning for growth and associated infrastructure.
“We would like to make sure a kindergarten is part of the planning,” Mrs Exell said.
“We have so many young families at Haven, and we’ve got the space.
“A kindergarten at Haven will take pressure off the other kindergartens, and will feed into the Haven school.”
Mrs Exell said there was a petition to implement a kindergarten at Haven.
“We have a 150-signature petition. We know there’s no guarantee that we’ll get a kindergarten, but we are asking the question,” she said.
“We also have a childcare shortage – we have one mum who’s travelling back to Melbourne to work and has two small children here in Horsham.
“We have people moving here for one parent’s work, and if they haven’t got childcare support, the other parent can’t work.
“We need people like that – builders, police, nurses – to come and live in our area, and we need to support them to do that.”
Spark Strategy founder George Liacos, during the two-day workshop in Haven and Horsham, said there was a lot of ‘good heart’ in the Haven community regarding the project.
“There’s a lot of potential in the community and there’s a lot of goodwill,” he said.
“But the challenge can be getting straight what you want to do as a community.
“It can be communicating that to other people, or it can be finding the right partner organisations to work with to achieve what it is you want.”
Mr Liacos said he understood community organisations could feel alone or under-resourced when addressing a development strategy.
“If they could just pull together a strategic plan, which is what we’re doing at the workshop, it helps them identify what they are going to try and do, by when, and what they need to do to make it happen,” he said.
“We’re giving people those skills, that’s what it’s about.”
Mr Liacos said he had been working with community groups for 25 years and had about 650 clients across Australia and internationally.
“I find it really powerful and fun. I love country people’s hearts,” he said.
The West Vic Business project is supported by Foundation of Rural and Regional Renewal, FRRR, through funding from the Australian Government’s Future Drought Fund, and is key in helping largely agricultural- dependent towns and precincts to start formulating strategic plans that can assist in building spaces that people want to be in and visit.
The program concluded with a two- day in-person immersion event, where Mr Liacos guided participants and stakeholders to form community alliances and create plans that could be used as a platform to take in their ideas, wants and needs, and make connections.
People can access the Draft Horsham South plan via Horsham Rural City Council’s website.
The entire October 30, 2024 edition of The Weekly Advertiser is available online. READ IT HERE!
The entire October, 30, 2024 edition of AgLife is available online. READ IT HERE!