ONE of Swan Hill Rural City Council’s (SHRCC) longest-serving employees last week checked out for the final time.
Warren Snyder was employed in January 1979 taking up a position as a payroll officer with City of Swan Hill.
After 44 years of hard work and dedication to his position, he rose to become the finance manager of SHRCC.
“I started in January 1979, that is a long time ago,” he said.
“I was just eighteen, straight out of school.”
After initially missing out on a position with the Shire Council, he applied for a position at City of Swan Hill as a junior admin officer.
“They interviewed 47 applicants and I was lucky enough to get that job,” Mr Snyder said.
“I was lucky enough to be trained by Jack McDonald who still lives in Swan Hill.
“He taught me a lot and really grounded me.”
One of the biggest changes for Mr Snyder over his career has been how people get paid.
“It changed from cash to cheque,” he said. “Then it went from weekly to fortnightly. Now it is all electronic.”
In a stark contrast to today, everything was recorded with pen and paper.
“There were no PCs when I started, everything was done on spreadsheets,” Mr Snyder said.
“The spreadsheets used to be joining paper together and if you needed another column you would cut it up and add a bit of paper on.
“Now you can just click and insert columns.
“If we had to do what we did back then, we probably would have a team of 20 people.”
When Mr Snyder started his career, the city used to be in charge of the water authority.
“In 1991 when the amalgamation happened, we needed to make a choice to jump to water authority or into council,” he said.
“I loved the water industry, I really did like that the most.”
“But to get the job I wanted I had to move to Mildura and I didn’t want to go at the time.”
With a young family, Mr Snyder decided to stay in Swan Hill and ended up working for the council.
“It has been a really good decision,” he said.
“I have had a lot of good opportunities along the way.”
“Dave Lenton was my manager for 28 years and he left 18 months ago.
“That left a big hole in my work life.
“We are great mates, I spoke to him on the phone for 45 minutes the other day.
“He gave me a lot of opportunities, he believed in me.
“I am what I am today, because of him.”
Mr Snyder said despite the challenges that would arise from time to time he has enjoyed the work.
“It has been hard and I have certainly put in a lot of unpaid hours,” he said.
“But that is just me.”
Last week, council held a farewell for Mr Snyder to celebrate his years of outstanding community service.
“It was very difficult yesterday with the farewells,” he said. “It was like my family had come back to wish me well for my retirement.
“It is great to be able to give staff the opportunity to say goodbye to you.”
