On Tuesday 10th December the findings from the previous Community Meeting were presented back to the Community by Caddie Marshall.
The previous workshop had enabled participants to share ideas and concepts and in doing so to address the following: What does success look like, what are our assets, what are the gaps, what are our barriers to success, and what are our biggest opportunities.
It was clear that the vote for what does success look like meant that there were no empty shops and we had a busy main street. It also identified that we wanted people to be happy, for people to remain in town, to have healthy soils, river and ecosystem and a profitable business and community groups.
Our greatest assets are the heritage listed main street, ballooning, Belubula River and river flats, Age of Fishes Museum, Blue Jacket Hill Lookout and Health services including the Hospital.
The gaps identified were the lack of youth opportunities and the lack of infrastructure and entertainment, together with village beautification, central toilets and ensuring that Canowindra has a strategic plan for the future.
The barriers to success were found to be access to funding and difficulty in securing grants. Canowindra being seen to be the bottom of Cabonne’s list, communication between key stakeholders, people and groups not working together and a lack of employment.
With the opportunities it was unanimous that we need to develop the museum and railway precinct into a historic precinct, followed by painting the silo and water tank, shared pathways, art culture and music, establishing a river precinct, heritage funding assistance to maintain buildings and tourism.
The strategy put forward particularly needs to address what was portrayed as the barriers to success and working together as a united group to achieve these recommendations.
Arthur Falconer said, “ The next steps involve identifying the working groups and bringing them together to have representatives on what will become the Canowindra Community Action Plan Workshop Group. We would welcome those people to come forward and particularly to attend the next meeting of the Chamber and Progress Association which will be the AGM to be held on the 22nd January, 2020. We also urge everybody, including individuals, sporting groups, associations and businesses to join the chamber as funding will be required to make this vision a reality.”
By Cheryl Newsom