Politics & Council
1 January, 2026
Gift of giving in our towns every day of the year
Loddon Mayor Dan Straub reflects on 2025
AS WE count down the sleeps un-til the most wonderful time of the year, we often reflect back on the year that has been – and I’m no different.
I’ve been looking both back-wards and forwards to what makes our Loddon communities such great places to live, as well as what we can do to make it even better.
And I think 2025 captures it nicely – if we go back to the start of this year we were working out how to deal with many concerns, the biggest one being the dry weather and drought conditions.
The weather eventually turned and helped us out a little in that respect, but we’re still watchful. And that’s a bit of a theme.
The advocacy of Loddon resi-dents, backed up by your council, has helped us in another battle – that against the unjust Emergen-cy Services and Volunteer Fund, or the tax as we’d prefer to call it, but again, while we’ve managed to get it postponed, it isn’t over yet.
Which brings me back to what makes Loddon great – it’s you, and your dedication to your com-munities. Whether it’s part of a progress association, service or sporting club, community plan-ning group or any other collec-tion of volunteers (and often they are the same people), it’s wonder-ful that we as council get a clear direction of what you need, so we can go about trying to provide it.
But it’s also wonderful for your communities that you are will-ing to put so much time and ef-fort into making Loddon such a great place to live and work. It’s a culture that I believe makes our communities more attractive places to attract new residents, as they discover how great things happen from small beginnings and to celebrate and recognise the contributions of our founding families and the individuals that have played such a roll in this great region.
To steal a famous Christmas quote “for it is in giving that we receive” and so many of you are the living embodiment of that all year round.
So, thank you all for your hard work – and I’d also personally like to thank council staff, head-ed by our CEO Lincoln Fitzgerald, for their dedication and commit-ment to helping you achieve what you need for your communities.
A lot of that work necessarily goes unseen as we often need to navigate other state and federal government agencies and the likes, but it’s what we as council can do for you.
It has been a privilege to work with such great people and I’m sure in 2026 we will all do what we’ve always done, as we contin-ue to strive to make Loddon Shire the best place in the world.
I think we truly live in the most unique a wonderful region.
As we all look forward to the big day with family and friends,
I wish you all have a very Mer-ry Christmas and a Happy New Year and look forward to catch-ing up with you all in 2026.
- Cr Dan Straub
Mayor Loddon Shire.