A look back at the year that was – 2020 in review

Summer sunburn – January

Right off the bat things were looking challenging for 2020 as huge bushfires scorched many parts of Australia, including the Victoria’s Alpine and east Gippsland regions.

That led to several fundraising events including at the Ballaarat Mechanic’s Institute where Ballarat’s Best for Bushfire Relief ran on 17 January.

Featuring acts like Mick Trembath, Zara Jarvis, The Dead Salesman Duo, and Sophie Livitsanis and the BCMA Choir, the event raised more than $15,000.

Across in Buninyong, a car and bike show also passed the hat around, raising a further $33,000 for the cause.

While we didn’t know it at the time, the last 26 January fireworks at Lake Wendouree went off with a bang, and also served as a bushfire relief event.

One thing that will endure by the lake in 2021 is the Survival Day Dawn Service. The inaugural event organised by Ballarat’s Koorie Engagement Group was hailed as a moving and important occasion.

Other events around 26 January saw Nick Locandro and Aleasha Kelly crowned Ballarat’s Citizen and Young Citizen of the Year respectively, while Roller Skate Fit Club 3350 picked up the Community Event award.

 

Park it – February

Remember when there weren’t bushfires and COVID-19 wasn’t a full-on thing yet? Well, that was February.

At a street level the second month of the year saw the City of Ballarat roll out its Smarter Parking Plan.

The implementation wasn’t without issues as paid parking was quickly removed from the Little Bridge Street carpark and people adjusted to the new smartphone app and lack of coin parking meters.

All the issues caused the now deputy-mayor Cr Amy Johnson to speak out against the system.

“First and foremost, we need to admit we’ve got this wrong,” she said. “The app is confusing, the new meters are confusing, and it’s discouraging people from frequenting the CBD.

“It’s clear now that the confusion and difficulty it’s causing for our residents far outweighs the benefits.”

A few weeks later Ballarat got a new centenarian as Wendouree’s Reg Henman turned 100 years old.

The farming themed birthday bash at the Cooinda Centre reflected Mr Henman’s life on the land but also tipped a hat to his days on the football field and World War II service.

“I’ve had a really wonderful life,” he said.

 

March into COVID – March

We didn’t know it at the time, but the 2020 Begonia Festival was the last major event Ballarat would see for the year as 60,000 people flocked to the Botanic Gardens for the celebration.

Some big green thumbs were in town for the long weekend, with Costa Georgiadis and Sophie Thomson from Gardening Australia joined by Dirtgirl, Bluey and Bingo.

On the cooking side of things local toastie tzar Tim Bone was joined by fellow Master Chef alumnus Poh Ling Yeow to add a touch of flavour.

Cr Taylor said the long weekend was “buzzing,” full of “amazing” autumn weather, impressive plants, expert people and great ideas.

“All ages were involved and we’ve had one of the best begonia displays in decades with over 1000 plants,” he said.

A few days later, Cr Taylor would be saying something completely different as restrictions aimed at fighting the state’s first wave of COVID outbreaks took hold.

The City of Ballarat moved quickly to shutdown all non-essential services, while activating the municipal emergency management plan.

“Ballarat is a resilient city,” he said. “Right now are extraordinary times… This is something that’s really uncharted waters for us as community.

“As a city we’ve got to make some changes… and we’ll work though what’s needed to be done making sure that we look after the most vulnerable in our community.”

 

Stuck at home – April

Things started to get a bit dark in April as lockdown measures aimed at flattening the curve of COVID-19 infections started to take hold.

Businesses and schools closed, and there were only four reasons to leave the home. A lot of people lost their jobs.

Yet there were still bright sports as the community rallied around in support, from Anzac Day in our driveways, to sporting clubs finding ways to keep members active and engaged.

Commerce Ballarat launched the Shout! Out! Ballarat campaign, aimed at championing business through the first wave.

“We want everyone to be buying local at every opportunity they get,” said CB chair Nick Thurlbeck. “Commerce Ballarat really encourages people to get behind and support the Shout! Out! Because we want to find the businesses doing incredible things and give them a leg up.”

While the Easter Bunny was mostly immune to coronavirus, Power FM’s Easter Egg Hunt changed things up, deciding to deliver 12,000 chocolate eggs to 2000 homes across the city in lieu of the annual search for chocolate.

 

Rates and reports – May

While community resilience and support continued to flow in May though initiatives like a contactless food drop-off site in the Ballarat library’s loading dock, the biggest news stories for the month were all about local government.

When it came time to set the municipal budget, councilors opted for a zero per cent rate rise along with other measures aimed at lessening the blow of the pandemic.

Yet any political benefit that could have come from the decision was soon blown away as the biggest local news story of the year broke.

A damning report from the State Ombudsman’s found significant issues with hiring practices at the City of Ballarat that quickly led to the sacking of CEO Justine Linley, while director of infrastructure and environment Terry Demeo resigned.

The report found systemic issues with not just recruitment of council staff by Ms Linley and Mr Demeo but also claims of favourable treatment, purchase order splitting and misuse of a municipal credit card.

“What’s happened with this report, it’s about senior staff, it then affects the organisation of over 1000 people, and then it affects the community of 100,000 people of Ballarat,” Cr Taylor said.

“We had to be very measured in doing what we’ve done, but I think the community can be happy that we’ve acted and terminated the CEO’s contract.”

While that was a metaphorical train wreck, there was an actual train wreck on the offing when on Saturday, 30 May the 10.16pm Melbourne to Wendouree V/Line service hit the rail gates on Lydiard Street North, destroying them, sending one person to hospital, and scattering debris all over the intersection.

Over six months later the crossing is still closed to traffic and there’s no timeframe to return the gates.

 

Winter warm up – June

By the time winter officially got started it looked a bit like we were going to get through the pandemic okay.

In-store dining was returning, State and local government services were starting to open up again, as were tourist attractions, and kids were back in school. It was a time of real optimism.

A couple of the City’s best-known icons reached major milestones, with the Arch of Victory celebrating 100 years, and the Art Gallery of Ballarat making 130 years as the cultural heart of the city.

“It’s a space that enhances one’s life,” said Pamela Foulkes, vice-president of the Gallery Association.

“You can come in to the Gallery escape from what’s happening outside and really enjoy experiencing works of beauty and skill.”

Speaking of birthdays, five locals were on the Queen’s Birthday honours list including Beverley Horwood, Bill McArthur, Brian Hassett, Desmond Watts and Sandy Anderson.

Fallout from the State Ombudsman’s report continued with former CEO Janet Dore returning to lead the municipality on an interim basis while directors within the executive management team from the old regime continued to exit.

 

Open and closed – July

While July saw many businesses and organisations across the region continue to reopen after first wave restrictions were relaxed, others made the call to end things.

The Ballarat Football Netball League and the Central Highlands Football Netball League both made the decision to abandon their seasons without a game played, although the CHFL would later try to restart junior footy.

“Once we got our okays and had our seniors decide not to run we looked toward our junior competition,” said league president Doug Hobson. “Virtually everybody in the league was in favour of doing something with juniors.”

However, it wouldn’t last long as the second wave of COVID-19 that many had been fearing emerged, causing even greater levels of lockdown than the first.

By the end of July face coverings had become both mandatory and the must have fashion item of 2020.

That in turn led to businesses, both established and start ups, turning their hands to crafting masks.

“I started making these masks on Tuesday, and now we already have 50 orders for anywhere between three to 21 masks each,” said Charlotte Sapwell from Brown Hill based boutique kids clothing label Our Rabbit. “It’s just been crazy.”

 

Lockdown 2.0 – August

As the second wave of COVID-19 saw cases spiral in Melbourne and jump in Ballarat, we we’re reminded about why we were making the sacrifice of lockdown again.

It was for the most vulnerable in our community, those at risk from the deadly and pernicious disease. We were doing it for our grandparents, our mums and dads, the people in our community who are immunocompromised. Those we love.

We also asked the question, for a city like Ballarat that relies a lot on the events and the visitor economy, what could our future look like?

“We still want to do something at each of our scheduled events so we are developing different scenarios and will monitor where we are in terms of restrictions at the time,” said City of Ballarat events manager Jeff Johnson.

“If the city stops community events then a lot of other activities will stop as well so that’s why it’s important we stay committed.”

 

Light at the end of the tunnel – September

Early in September came the news we’d all been working so hard for, the State Government had a plan to get us out of lockdown and it involved a multi-step, two-pronged approach.

With COVID cases low in the regions, places like Ballarat would have restrictions dialled back progressively and ahead of metro-Melbourne.

Yet CEO of Ballarat Health Service Dale Fraser sought to temper expectations of a rush back to life before the pandemic.

“The Premier released a road map to COVID-normal and it does highlight a very long tail,” he said.

“That’s the nature of this virus. Until a vaccine is discovered… we’re going to have to have a heightened sense of awareness and preparedness for its ongoing management.”

Meanwhile another, and much better, global phenomenon swept the city, Spoonvilles!

The delightful creations popped up all over the place and brought much needed joy to those who needed something to do and people out iso walking.

Late September also saw a 90-minuate snow flurry that covered the city in up to five-centimetres of fluffy wet stuff.

 

Vote of note – October

The rubber hit the road after, in some cases after months of campaigning, as voting got underway in the City of Ballarat council elections.

Twenty-four candidates stood across three words, evenly split at eight each. Both the Labor Party and the Greens ran endorsed tickets in the hopes of getting more party members elected to council, but spoiler alert: it didn’t work out that way.

After a State election in 2018 and Federal vote in 2019, thankfully, there are no elections currently scheduled for 2021!

In Lydiard rail gates news, an interim report into May’s crash was released and found that the train had breaking problems after leaving Ballan Station, and that a group of people had crossed the tracks just 30 seconds before the VLocity 3VL70 train smashed into the gates. A full report is yet to be released.

 

Results are in – November

Following three weeks of postal voting and two more of counting, the decision on who would represent the people of Ballarat at a local government level for the next four years was announced.

In the end, not much changed. First term representatives Grant Tillett and Jim Rinaldi were swapped out for Cr Tracy Hargraves and Cr Peter Eddy and otherwise, the status quo remained.

What did change was the leadership within the elected officials as Cr Daniel Moloney and Cr Amy Johnson took on the mayor and deputy-mayor roles respectively, and publicly unopposed.

As COVID-19 restrictions began to lift, again, visitors started to return to the city, first from other parts of regional Victoria, and then when the “Ring of Steel” dropped, from metro-Melbourne. Optimism was high.

“Everyone’s happy and excited to be back and being able to sit down and drink out of real glass and have food not on paper has been really good,” said Kath Hotchin, owner of Europa Café.

“We’re really excited to have tourists and people from Melbourne back because that’s major for Ballarat.”

 

COVID-normal Christmas – December

On its 50th birthday, Ballarat stalwart Sovereign Hill gave itself a birthday card of some meaning, unveiling a 20-year master plan for the living museum.

The first phase of the far-reaching document includes a Centre for Rare Arts and Forgotten Trades, or CRAFT, and the Federal Government came to the party with a $10.1 million grant from the Tourism Icons program to pay for the centre.

“CRAFT is an important opportunity to collaborate with more makers from our local community, across Australia and the world to share these important skills and ensure their continuation,” said Sovereign Hill CEO Sara Quon.

As polies were back in town handing out cash, it showed that life was returning to a level of normality, and all the pain of lockdown and isolation had been worth it.

All going well, Christmas will be meaningful, and we are able to spend it with our loved ones.

Having said that, this is 2020, and this year has proved that things can change fast, so who knows what will happen by 25 December.