Carolyn spent most of her formative years living in regional Victoria. After completing her nurse training at the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne, she travelled extensively overseas, from high altitude trekking in the Andes and Nepal to exploring desert tombs in Iran and Jordan. She has nursed in the UK, Melbourne, Adelaide, Maffra and Sale.

Settling in Sale with her husband Mark, she managed Mark’s engineering consultancy business until an offshore accident caused his death in 1986, leaving her widowed with a 2yr old son and a 3-week-old baby girl.

Three years later, at the age of 33, she was elected to the City of Sale, serving a three-year term including a year as Deputy Mayor.

In 1992, she relocated to Cowwarr with her small family, renovated the heritage butter factory and created the innovative Cowwarr Art Space and developed a program that attracted artist from around the world. In 2020 the Cowwarr Art Space sold, and Carolyn moved to Sale.

Carolyn has always been involved in community service with experience in the fields of environment, education, tourism and the arts. She served on various Creative and Regional Arts Victoria Peer Assessment Panels and was a member of the Heyfield & District Community Bank Board. She is currently on the Gippsland Lakes Co-ordinating Committee, Gippsland Climate Change Network, Thomson-Rainbow Creek Waterway Management Plan Project Working Group and the Cowwarr Recreation Reserve Management Committee.  

Carolyn was first elected to Wellington Shire Council in 2012 where she served as Deputy Mayor in 2014 and Mayor in 2015. She was re-elected in 2016 to the new Northern Ward in Wellington Shire and was elected as Mayor for the first two years of the new Wellington Shire Council 2016-18 and received a Mayor Emeritus award from the MAV.

Of all the forms of Government, Carolyn believes Local Government is the most important as it is focused on the place, we’ve all chosen to live, work and call home.