Making decisions together

Do you know a senior who deserves recognition for the great work they do in the community?

Nominations are now open for the NSW Seniors Local Achievement Awards which are run as part of the 2020 NSW Seniors Festival. The awards provide an opportunity for local MPs and the community to recognise the seniors that help make their community a diverse, active and inspiring place to live.

Nominations must be received by 18 January 2020 and presentation to successful nominees will be made at the Seniors Festival opening ceremony, held on Wednesday 12 February at 10am at the Tweed Heads Civic and Cultural Centre Auditorium.

Everyone is welcome to attend the opening ceremony which will include entertainment, light refreshments and an opportunity to enjoy a fun morning celebrating with your community. Download a nomination form or register your attendance for the opening ceremony at www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/SeniorsFestival

State Member for Tweed, Geoff Provest said the theme of this year's festival is 'Love to Celebrate' and there are plenty of ways to have fun in the Tweed with a range of events to suit every interest.

"The NSW Seniors Festival brings people together, encourages seniors to try something new and fosters a great community spirit," Mr Provest said.

State Member for Lismore, Janelle Saffin said the Tweed Seniors Festival is a great opportunity for local seniors to participate in the community and live active, healthy and social lives.

"The Festival will give seniors the opportunity to get involved in exciting activities with friends and family, meet others, and share their insights and experiences," Ms Saffin said.

The NSW Seniors Festival runs from Wednesday 12 February to Sunday 23 February 2020 and the Tweed will once again be hosting a full program of events for seniors to get involved in.

Council's Acting Manager Community and Cultural Services, Joanne Watters said it is all about creating a fun opportunity for seniors to participate in community events.

"Events will be open to all seniors, and will focus on and celebrate the valuable contribution seniors have made, and continue to make, to the life of our community," Ms Watters said.

"The 12 days of festivities will include activities such as morning teas, concerts, social get-togethers or special film screenings, leisure, health activities, demonstrations, tours, exhibitions, classes and activities," she said.

The program of events will be available on Council's website in early 2020 and locations across the Tweed.

Keep an eye on the Tweed Link in your local free newspaper next year for information about the Tweed Shire Seniors Festival program. You can also subscribe to receive the Tweed Link for free in your inbox each week at www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/subscribe

The 2019 Youth Council recently wrapped up their last meeting for the year.

The Youth Council is an advisory committee established to respond to issues relevant to young people aged 12 to 24 years and provide an opportunity for Council to develop better relations with Tweed's young people.

This year, the Youth Council was comprised of 17 motivated students from seven high schools across the Tweed.

Youth Council member, Jazmine Cooke from Tweed River High School made some great on some fantastic environmental initiatives, including a successful nomination to YMCA NSW Youth Parliament where she worked on a bill to ban single use plastics that went on to be adopted.

She also developed an environmental project in partnership with Tweed Heads South Primary School, to educate children on their environmental impact, to reduce plastic waste and carbon emissions.

To further student learning, Jazmine spoke at the school assembly about climate change, pitching the idea to start a student 'Green Team'.

"It was exciting to see students were keen to join, almost everyone in the room raised their hand," Ms Cooke said. Jazmine also spoke at the 2019 World Environment Day alongside Mayor of Tweed, Councillor Katie Milne about environmental initiatives.

It's been a busy and successful year for Jazmine, who also shared the Academic and Leadership Award at the BASE Youth Leadership Awards with Lindisfarne Anglican Grammar School's Chloe Green.

At the final meeting for the year, each young person was asked to express their Youth Council highlight and sentiments included, "I liked learning how Council works" and "I enjoyed learning from peers interested in similar issues".

Council's Director Sustainable Communities and Environment Tracey Stinson and Senior Program Leader - Waterways, Tom Alletson presented the draft Climate Change policy to Youth Council members recently and the young people have been encouraged to provide feedback on the policy.

"The young people have a genuine concern for their community, the environment and the impacts of climate change and appreciated learning about Council's role in this and its future plans," Ms Stinson said.

To find out more about Youth Council and young people in the Tweed visit www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/YoungPeople

Have you ever wanted to find out what happened at a Council meeting but were unable to attend? Soon you'll be able to catch up online.

Tweed Shire Council will soon start webcasting Council meetings to increase the transparency of Council decision making, enable access for members of our community who are unable to attend in person and comply with new State requirements.

Visitors to the website will have the option to view the entire meeting, or only those sections of the meeting they are interested in thanks to a new agenda and meeting management system that will integrate the Council meeting minutes with the webcast.

To allow for the minutes of the meeting to be uploaded at the same time as the webcast, the recorded Council meeting will be posted to Council's website the day following the meeting - a delay of less than 24 hours.

The first scheduled webcast for Council will be the Planning Committee meeting to be held on 6 February 2020.

For more information on Council meetings, and to read Council's Code of Meeting Practice, visit: https://www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/CouncilMeetings

Level 2 Water Restrictions come into effect for Tweed residents from Friday, 13 December.

The level of Clarrie Hall Dam is at 77 per cent and falling 1.8 per cent a week against an original estimate of one per cent a week.

Tyalgum customers remain on the most severe level of water restrictions at Level 4.

Council will launch its Save Water Now education campaign on Friday to raise awareness of what Level 2 water restrictions mean and how best to save water.

This week’s average water use figure of 194 litres per person per day shows that everyone has to find ways to save 50 litres of water a day, that’s five household plastic buckets; or, for a family of four, a standard bathtub filled to the brim.

The easiest way to save water is to reduce your outdoor water use, have shorter showers, fix any leaks and dripping taps and make sure your rainwater tank top-up system is working correctly and not being topped up by the town water supply unnecessarily.

For more information see www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/WaterRestrictions

The Resident, Environment, Industry Group Roundtable Stakeholder Forum is held three times a year and is a key initiative in Tweed Shire Council's Community Engagement Strategy It’s designed to improve ‘ground up’ engagement and strengthen relationships with official groups across the Tweed.

Some of the Tweed's most deserving environmental champions took home trophies at Tweed Shire Council's inaugural Tweed Sustainability Awards showcase, held on 15 November in Murwillumbah.

The awards highlighted a range of environmental initiatives active in the Tweed, and to go with the theme, everything involved in the awards was done with sustainability in mind, including the trophies crafted from reclaimed timber, the recycled or local dress code and food from locally sourced and native ingredients.

Mayor of Tweed, Councillor Katie Milne said this community Sustainability Awards event, which is a first of its kind for Tweed, has been a great opportunity for Council and the community to express gratitude and acknowledge the achievements of forty inspiring people and projects.

"Our huge congratulations and heartfelt thank you goes out to all the nominees for rising to the challenge of addressing our biodiversity crisis and climate emergency," Cr Milne said.

"They are an inspiring group of people, who are teaching and leading the way in protecting our precious Earth and making our world a better place. And thank you to all those who supported their efforts by voting for their favourite project and to all those other sustainability champions we have not heard from yet," she said.

Council's Program Leader - Sustainability Debbie Firestone said the Tweed has so many hard working people active across our community with a deep passion and commitment to preserving and enhancing our environment.

"It's been a great thrill to shine a spotlight on the amazing work they do and to see how strong their support network is through the People's Choice voting," Ms Firestone said.

The following people, groups and organisations were the award recipients:

Regenerative Agriculture Category: Trophy winner: All Natural Meat Co

Wildlife & Habitat Conservation Category: Trophy winner: Green Heroes

Tweed Sustainability Category:

• Youth Trophy winner: Josh Carpenter, Tackle Bin Project

• School Trophy winner: St Ambrose Student Green Team

• Community Group Trophy winner: Pottsville Beach Neighbourhood Centre

• Business Trophy winner: Summerland Credit Union

• Adult Trophy winner: The late Claire Masters

People's Choice Vote winners:

• Regenerative Agriculture: Matthew and Henry Prichard, Cudgen Road Farms Pty Ltd

• Wildlife & Habitat Conservation: Team Koala

• Sustainability - Youth: Alyce Togo

• Sustainability - Schools: Sathya Sai College

• Sustainability - Community Groups: Nature Explorers

• Sustainability - Adult: Claire Masters

• Sustainability - Business: Gary Bagnall, New Leaf Cafe

For the full list of winners and details visit, www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/SustainabilityAwards.

Council is very proud to be announced as a finalist in the ‘Lifetime Achievement Award for Organisations’ category of the 20th anniversary of Green Globe Awards for our work as sustainability leaders.

This includes a strong commitment to protecting our internationally significant environment, adapting to climate change with a flood risk strategy, planting almost 50,000 koala habitat trees, and growing the population of endangered bird species. Council’s Renewable Energy Action Plan has driven the installation of solar power in 16 Council facilities, reducing emissions by 1000 tonnes per year.

Supporting sustainability leaders across New South Wales for 20 years, the annual Green Globe Awards are NSW's premier environmental awards, recognising and celebrating collaboration and partnerships that encourage others to achieve positive change and protect our environment.

Winners will be announced at an awards ceremony on 27 November. Read more about the finalists at www.environment.nsw.gov.au/greenglobes

The 2019 Kingscliff Rotary Duck Race is on Sunday 10 November from 9am – 11.30am at Ed Parker Rotary Park, Kingscliff.

Council staff will be at the event to cheer on the duckies and promote the ‘Emergency Dashboard’, an online tool to help you find the information you need in an emergency, storm, fire or flood.

Visit the Council stall to sign up for the online engagement portal ‘Your Say Tweed’ and have your say on what is happening across the Tweed.

Council’s friendly Coastal Ranger will also be available to have a chat about the dog zones across the Tweed Coast and provide handy pocket sized maps to help you locate the on and off-leash dog areas.

North East Waste will be representing Council with their ‘less to landfill’ tent and will be available to chat about composting, worm farms and what goes in the green, yellow and red bins. They will also have free compostable liners and reusable bags to give away until supplies last.

Find out more about the duck race at www.kingscliffrotary.com.au/event/kingscliff-rotary-duck-race-2019/

One hundred and forty people representing long-term residents, business owners, regular visitors, local Aboriginal and South Sea Islander communities and community groups attended two Community Conversations at Cudgen Leagues Club recently to share their vision for the future of their local area.

“We just think that it is good that the Council has brought us all together to discuss this subject and hope that we are all listened to and our views acted upon,” said one attendee.

Vince Connell, Director Planning and Regulation said it was important that the community’s vision for the future of Chinderah was central to Council’s decision-making about how Chinderah changes over time.

“Council is committed to making decisions in partnership with the community and these Community Conversations were the first step in that process,” Mr Connell said.

The feedback received from the Community Conversations will help Council create a shared community vision for the future of Chinderah to guide development of the Chinderah Locality Plan.

“The Locality Plan will combine the community vision with analysis, objectives and actions that will guide future decision making about the improvement of public spaces, infrastructure and how land in Chinderah can be used. It will help ensure the community’s vision for Chinderah is achieved over the coming years.”

These Community Conversations were the first step in developing the Chinderah Locality Plan.

To view the community feedback from the Community Conversations and to have your say visit www.yoursaytweed.com.au/FutureofChinderah

There’s not much time left to nominate your school, sporting club or a member of the community for a 2019 Australia Day award. Nominations for this year’s awards close on Friday 18 October 2019.

The six award categories are:

• Citizen of the Year
• Young Achiever in Community Service
• Arts and Cultural Achievement Award
• Sporting Achievement
• Community Event of the Year
• Volunteer of the Year

For more information visit www.tweed.nsw.gov.au/AustraliaDay