Bookaar's Laurie Hickey stands for Corangamite Shire Council

The former farmer's family has been in Bookaar, near Camperdown for three generations, and he wants to see more opportunities for young people in the region.

"I have a vision of having a shire so well resourced that people just want to live here," Mr Hickey said.

"We have excellent facilities as far as childcare, early learning, healthcare and welfare, which I well and truly want to make sure are looked after.

"I also want to see on the road to recovery from COVID-19 some sort of stimulus so we can support small businesses and our farming sector because they're the ones who generate so much employment within the shire.

"Our family is the third generation in this area, my wife and I brought up our three kids here who are all adults now, and I would like to have a shire they didn't need to move away from for employment."

Mr Hickey was a dairy farmer for 25 years.

He now works for WestVic Dairy and has been part of a number of community groups and organisations including Camperdown Turf Club, the CFA and local theatre company.

"Being connected to the community is a real advantage when representing them on local government," he said.

Mr Hickey has been vocal on a number of community issues in the past, and objected to a solar farm being built near Camperdown in 2018.

He said he was supportive of renewable energy.

"I am absolutely in support of renewable energy, I love solar and wind power, I think it is amazing, the reason I opposed it is because I believed it was a massive project going to impact on very productive farm land," Mr Hickey said.

"It was going to be 668 hectares, that's about three times the size of Camperdown and would have been half a kilometre from my place.

"The whole community made enough noise to have it moved."

Mr Hickey hopes more people consider a tree change post-pandemic.

"I hope there are opportunities for people working from home and see some decentralisation," he said.

"I can see in the coming years government grants are going to be a little harder to achieve so I want to contribute strong advocacy for roads and facilities. I've been so involved in the community in a wide range of areas and I think I understand lot of what the community feels and needs."

Three council positions have already been decided by default according to the Victorian Electoral Commission.

Current councillors Ruth Gstrein, Jo Beard and Geraldine Conheady are hoping to keep their places on council as mayor Neil Trotter, Simon Illingworth, Lesley Brown and Helen Durant depart.

In ballot order; Ms Conheady, Ms Gstrein, Catherine O'Flynn, Lance Robilliard and Mr Hickey are putting their hands up for one of three central ward positions.

Catherine Forsayeth and Nicholas Cole have nominated for the single north ward seat.

Meanwhile current councillor Jo Beard and Jamie Vogels and Kate Makin have been elected for the south-central, coastal and south-west wards respectively as they ran uncontested.

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