Byron Shire Council hopefuls Mark Swivel and Dr Meredith Wray discuss the issues important to them

These Byron Shire Council candidates want to see a creative approach on big issues.

Meredith Wray and Mark Swivel are running as candidates for Byron Shire Council this September. Picture: Liana Boss

Two Byron Shire Council hopefuls say they would work to drum up more innovation for some key issues, if they are elected in September.

Ratepayers across New South Wales will go to the polls on September 4.

Lawyer and comedian Mark Swivel and long-term sustainable tourism specialist Dr Meredith Wray will be running on the same ticket.

Although he ran for the senate for The Together Party in the last federal election, Mr Swivel said they were not running under a banner this September.

He said running for council was “an extension” of what he and Dr Wray “have both been doing for a long time”.

Meredith Wray is running alongside Mark Swivel for a position on Byron Shire Council this year.

Dr Wray has lived in the area for 35 years, Mr Swivel for nine.

Mr Swivel said pursuing a spot on council flowed naturally from his -admittedly diverse and voluminous – work with Barefoot Law, Enova Energy, Spaghetti Circus, vocal group Dusty Esky and Eureka FC.

Dr Wray has been an academic at Southern Cross University and has worked in consultancy in tourism and planning and is on the Byron Bay Masterplan leadership committee.

“I work a lot with local government so I think I have a lot of knowledge about local government that would contribute to being a councillor,” she said.

“I approached Mark because I wanted to be in a team and we both seemed to have similar views.”

Barefoot Law principal Mark Swivel.

Sustainable tourism and the housing crisis are among their key issues of concern, as well as grassroots problems like the shire’s roads.

“There’s a lot of energy in the community that needs to be harnessed and I think new voices on council will help articulate that energy,” Mr Swivel said.

“There has been a bit of trench warfare and a bit of negativity in some of the local debates and I think we need to move past that, working cooperatively together.”

Mr Swivel said a “more creative approach to housing at every level” was needed.

“Our basic point would be that every policy tool should be directed to creating more homes for more people in the shire,” he said.

Tourists enjoy the sunny weather at Byron Bay.

Dr Wray said she’d like to see the council take “a more serious approach to visitor management”.

“Council has been doing some work in that area but I think we can get a lot more serious and look at the whole of Byron Shire and how its destinations link,” she said.

The pair support the creation of a rail trail, but won’t push for trains to return.

“Discontinuing rail in the region was one of the worst decisions in our economic history,” Mr Swivel said.

“But it’s been made and unwinding it is way too expensive.”

Byron Bay (Photo by Brook Mitchell/Getty Images)

He said this issue was a matter of “accepting realities and working with them”.

They do support the council’s plans for a bioenergy plant.

“I think those sorts of projects are exactly the sorts of projects that the local community and the council should be supporting,” Mr Swivel said.

Mr Swivel said he’d like to see the shire’s organic and regenerative farmers better championed and to have rewilding projects take on a more co-ordinated approach.