Macedon Ranges residents hope to see some “fresh blood” in their new council as they await the latest election results.
Seventy-two councils held postal elections, while another six had residents going to the polls last Saturday.
Macedon Ranges Residents Association secretary Christine Pruneau said the community had high expectations of the new council.
“It’s about getting some commonality of purpose while having diversity as well,” Ms Pruneau said. “We’ve had councillors who all thought the same way and most of the community don’t like the direction they’ve taken us. We would like to see the new council connect back to the community … defer to the community in everything it does and improve governance by being more transparent.
“The new council has to be a reflection of the community, not a bunch of people that do whatever they want. The exciting part is that there seems to be sufficient people who are running and working together.”
Municipal Association of Victoria chief executive Rob Spence said early results statewide showed a strong vote for incumbents, indicating people were happy with their councillors’ performance. However, he said, voter turnout seemed low with “election fatigue” thought to play a part.
A high number of candidates – 27 in Macedon Ranges for nine vacancies – could also affect the outcome.
Mr Spence said it would be interesting to see whether the long list would confuse voters and result in more informal votes.
Hume and Macedon Ranges attracted big fields of candidates for last weekend’s elections. There were 14 nominations for three vacancies in Hume’s Jacksons Creek ward this year – up from 10 candidates in 2012. Incumbents Jack Medcraft and Ann Potter stood again, while veteran councillor Jack Ogilvie stepped down after 26 years because of poor health.
Current mayor Helen Patsikatheodorou (Meadow Valley) also stepped down after eight years on council.
Final results will be declared at 10am Monday, October 31. “We have to wait for five working days for all postal votes to be received by midday Friday, October 28,” Victorian Electoral Commission spokesman Mike Lagastes said.
