School students from across the region were on hand to hear mayor Monica Morse speak about how all council staff play their part in caring for the Bathurst region.

Cr Morse said that compared to state and federal governments, local government is hands on. 

She said that while the councillors make some decisions for the city, the staff take care of it.

Cr Morse introduced each of the staff members present to the children, explaining their job.

She mentioned Russell Deans “because we can’t have a city without water”, Stephen Champion “who looks after BMEC”, Annabell Miller who is “responsible for the fossil museum and the library”, Peter Navin who cares for the parks and sporting fields and Doug Patterson who “has a big team of people who look after the graders and bulldozers”.

Cr Morse also referred to Victoria Erskine who handles the media, Brian Dwyer who takes care of the paperwork, Trish Hayes who looks after the visitor information centre and David Sherley who oversees all of them.

Mayor Morse said councillors make the decisions and the staff make sure the work gets done.

“They are experts in all these things,” Cr Morse said.

“We have wonderful staff members and we hope you learn a lot more about what we do and how we care about Bathurst over the coming week,” she said.

During the launch, photographer Frank Colzato gave a slide show of historical photos of the construction of the Chifley Dam.

Entries in council’s ‘What I love about living in Bathurst’ video competition were also screened with Cr Morse presenting prizes to the winning schools. 

Bathurst South Public School took out the first prize of $400, Sofala Public School came second and the Assumption School was highly commended.

Throughout the week school children from the region will go behind the scenes of some of council’s facilities in special tours and will meet the mayor in the council chamber. 

On Thursday the public is welcome to meet councillors and staff at a stall at the Bathurst City Centre between 11am-2pm.