![\"\"](\"https:\/\/static.timesnewsgroup.com.au\/prod\/uploads\/sites\/28\/2025\/12\/BlackwoodWoodchopCar_13069.jpg\")
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During his address, Mr Hehir said he had been involved with the Blackwood event for all of the 36 years he had lived in the township.<\/p>\n
“It’s been staged every year since 1900, bar war or pandemic, so this event celebrates its 120th anniversary next Easter,” Mr Hehir said.<\/p>\n
“It is second only to the Royal Melbourne Show in its longevity.”<\/p>\n
Mr Hehir said the organising committee aimed at maintaining the carnival as an affordable family event and as a showcase for the town.<\/p>\n
“Over the past decade the cost of staging this event has almost trebled,” he said. “Insurance alone has increased tenfold.<\/p>\n
“Recently, increasing compliance demands such as the traffic management, event permits, health and safety, have stretched our budget and volunteer workload.”<\/p>\n
Mr Hehir estimated that it cost about $45,000 to run the festival. An officer earlier said the cost of the most recent Ballan event was $40,345.<\/p>\n
An officer told the meeting that traffic management standards imposed by the Department of Transport and Planning now require qualified contractors to implement traffic management.<\/p>\n
The Shire was not qualified because, in Ballan’s case, the main street is an arterial road \u2013 meaning contractors must do that work at a cost, the officer said.<\/p>\n
Councillors voted to note the report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
REPRESENTATIVES of two of the Moorabool Shire’s most popular community events have called for official council sponsorship as they battle rising costs. Ballan Autumn Festival president Kevin Harper and Blackwood Woodchop and Easter Carnival’s Brendan Hehir both addressed the council’s November meeting pleading their separate cases for formal support. Their appearance was related to an […]<\/p>\n