General News
7 December, 2025
Region’s top cop calls time on 40 years of service
THE regions top police officer officially ended a 40 year career on Friday, saying her move to the country three years ago was one of the best decisions of her life. Superintendent Sharon McCrory has been in charge of policing in Westen Region Division 4 since 2023, but her impressive policing career stretches back to 1985.
As a fresh recruit from the police academy, Superintendent McCrory held numerous postings at police stations across metropolitan Melbourne, before moving to Stawell in 2022.
Her patch covers a wide area from Ararat, Stawell and Horsham through to the South Australian border.
She said her decision to leave the city for a country life was one of the best decisions she’s ever made.
“I like to think I have no regrets in the job, but if I had my time over again, I would have done this sooner. I think everyone should do it,” she said.
Superintendent McCrory said country policing is very different to what she had been used to.
“The distance is obviously a factor. A division in Melbourne can be 20 kilometres, here I’ve got just under 40,000 square kilometres of area to cover and 26 police stations. It can take me three hours to drive from one end to the other.
“From my point of view it is a constant battle for me battling the organisational view of applying a metropolitan lens to all our policing issues and going, no, no, that doesn’t work here.
She said with great distances between individual police stations, she’s always aware that backup for police members in an emergency isn’t always immediately available.
“The (local) members have to be very self sufficient and self reliant and we ask a lot of them bearing in mind their safety must be paramount and it always worries me about that lack of backup for them.
Superintendent McCrory said from a policing perspective, western Victoria was a very safe place to live.
“We live in a very safe part of Victoria here and I think people need to understand that and need to understand how lucky they are living here,” she said.
The Grampians bushfires were a low point for local police with homes and lives under threat.
She said local police saw the devastation first hand, but also the positive community spirit.
“A low and a high point working up here was the devastation of the fires. On one side of the coin I see the impact it has on the community but then I see the good side as well.
“I can tell you the night the fire ripped through Pomonal, I was here until goodness knows what hour and for a number of hours we had one resident missing and we were really concerned and it made me feel sick. Luckily we found her and she was safe and well.
“You still see the impact (of the fires) now, you hear the stories of the business owners,” she said.
Superintendent McCrory is full of praise for the police men and women serving the region.
“They are an amazing group of people and really it is them I’ll miss.
“They make my life easy, I rely on them to do so much and they do it generally without complaints or questions, they just do the job.”
As for the future, Superintendent McCrory is staying put.
“We live in Stawell and we have no plans moving anytime soon,” she said.