Shelley Wyatt

Businesswoman Shelley Wyatt believes her skills to network with others would be valuable if elected to council.

A Drouin resident for 24 years Ms Wyatt regards forward planning, giving ratepayers value for money, supporting actions that help create jobs that enable young people to stay in the area and common sense decision making as some key objectives if elected.

Describing herself as a team player she said she would listen to and consult with people, research options to form her views and would represent majority opinion.

Ms Wyatt said she’d been involved with the community on many levels over many years, often in support of sporting clubs and groups her children joined, and believed now was the right time to take the next step.

She is also a member of Drouin Rotary, a former treasurer of Drouin’s Ficifolia Festival and is currently a member of the West Gippsland Healthcare Group’s consumer advisory council.

Those involvements gave her a good idea of what many people wanted for their communities, she said.

“Nobody’s opinion should be discounted”.

Ms Wyatt said council needed to be more accommodating to attract business and employment stating she was aware of some potentially new retail, manufacturing and services businesses that had looked at locating in Baw Baw but eventually went elsewhere.

She said she would question recommendations put to council “if they didn’t sound right” and take positions based on common sense, background research and community views.

Ms Wyatt wants action to improve safety for people using Princes Way in Drouin shopping centre, especially pedestrians crossing the road that is carrying an increasing amount of vehicle traffic.

The shire’s youth is also a key priority for her.

As well as putting things in place to help generate employment opportunities and keep young people in the area, Ms Wyatt said council should also look at what it could do for children that don’t play sport.

We need to talk with them and find out what they want, she said.