By Gabriella Payne
The Pakenham Fire Brigade is excited to welcome a few fresh and a few familiar faces to the helm, after a successful leadership changeover saw the new Brigade Management Team (BMT) come into office on Thursday 1 July.
Despite a difficult past 12 months, the new leadership team, headed by Captain Michael Corzelius, are excited to step into their roles and continue giving back to the local community.
The new leadership team were chosen by their fellow members, who voted at the bi-annual election at the brigade’s April meeting, and are now getting settled into their new positions.
Mr Corzelius said that the change in leadership provided the station with “a bit of fresh air” and each member of the new BMT was looking forward to working closely with the community.
“I’m very confident about the new leadership team that we’ve currently got; it’s been a long 12 months and a bit of a change is always good for the brigade and the community,” Mr Corzelius said.
“We always strive to do our best for the community and I think the team we’ve got are all well and truly community based, and we’re trying to do our best and achieve what we can with what we’ve had to deal with in the past 12 months.”
Lead by Mr Corzelius, the new team consists of First Lieutenant Chris Poulton, Second Lieutenant Phil Craig, Third Lieutenant Chris Fry, Fourth Lieutenant Matt Emmerson, Secretary Jeanette Craig, Treasurer Sue Mongelli, Community Safety Brijal Parikh and Occupational Health and Safety, Brendan Brown.
The brigade also recognised the outstanding work of some of their outgoing BMT members, including Brent Pettigrew, Rebecca Deliseo, Steve Leithhead and Greg Overdyk.
Second Lieutenant Phil Craig said that the brigade was always looking for more volunteers to join up, and he encouraged everyone to give it a go and get involved.
“It’s great to be able to give back to the community, and it’s great to be involved in an organisation that does so much good around the place and is such a well respected organisation across Victoria and the country,” he said.
To find out more about what it takes to volunteer with the CFA, head to https://www.cfa.vic.gov.au/volunteers-careers/volunteer-with-cfa
