GAF Meeting 21 July 2008

Attendees: Annie, Lucia, Anne, Jen, Sarah, Tricia, Cathy, Miriam, Marianne

Apologies: Margaret

Venue: Annie’s place Warwick Street

Food Produce - Letter drop to establish who has excess produce from trees. Maroochydore council register of trees given as example. News of excess produce to be included on website. Action: Anne to contact John regarding website

Mellifont Orchard - There is an existing volunteer garden group – Friends of Valley St. Action: Marianne to contact Simon Clarkson about speaking at sustainability meeting

Communications - Talks at sustainability meeting about topics of interest ie keeping chickens. -    

   

Establish a way to share of propagated seeds and tools - Where to photocopy? Action: Miriam to do draft flyer including; fruit sharing, propagating seeds and tool sharing.

Permablitz - Greater community involvement for gardens and permablitz. - Working bees and skill sharing within WH Action: Hannah to talk about source co-op and permablitz

Community garden - Existing Newtown model given as example. - Possible involvement with schools. Action: Trish to contact Lansdowne, Marianne Goulburn St

Next meeting of GAF 3pm 18th August at Annie’s place.

Structure of WHEN, 2008

In a general discussion on how our group might be structured the following points were raised. Most people preferred that the group remain unincorporated and simply be an informal network. It was suggested that we need formal statement of our purpose indicating what we intend to do (and not do). To cover the costs of hiring the venue, it was agreed that we should request a $2 donation from those attending. Bill Harvey from the Hobart City Council mentioned that the Council has a meeting space available for community group use (but this can only be used after working hours on weekdays).

Name of the group:

As the group has not had an official name, a number of possible names were discussed and voted upon. And, the winner was - West Hobart Environment Network (WHEN).

Group communications:

The Yahoo discussion group was a problem for some of those attending and they asked if it was possible to have direct link from the webpage to Yahoo. Paul Turvey will investigate this. Not many people expressed interest in the discussion group. There was also a request for the inclusion of subgroup reports and meeting notices on the webpage. Bill Harvey mentioned that the Council can be asked to put up community notice boards.

Other matters:

The damage caused by plastic bags was raised and discussed. This is an issue that the group may wish to look at further in the future. Simon Clarkson gave us an overview of the plans for the Mellifont Orchard. Tasmanian heritage apples (and possibly pears) will be planted on terraces.

Beat Winter Chills & Bills, 2008

We had a great turnout again and it was a full house. There were many new faces as well as many from previous meetings.

Presentations were given by our expert panel – Peter Boyer (Al Gore Project),
Chris Harries (Waterworks Rd Community Project), Helen Pryor (Sustainable Living Tasmania) and Katrina Graham (Hobart City Council). The meeting was facilitated by Anne Bliss.

WHEN Meeting 22 June 2008

Chris Harries started things off by giving us a really helpful talk, He spoke about the Waterworks Road Community Group, solar hot water heating, and answered questions from the group. If you weren't able to make it to yesterday's meeting, you might like to take a look at Waterworks Road website at http://waterworksvalley.com/.

Margaret then brought us up-to-date with what is happening locally, including the planned Hobart City Council sustainability workshops, which are expected to start within the next few weeks.

We then discussed how we might move forward as a group. It was decided to continue to meet on a regular basis while initially focusing upon the three primary areas of interest that we identified during our first meeting -- making our homes sustainable, gardens and food, and sustainable transport.

A subgroup was formed to act upon each of these issues. These individual subgroups will meet to explore ideas, establish priorities and devise plans of action.

If you were unable to attend yesterday and would like to participate in one of the subgroups, please contact the group convener for information on when they are meeting.

• Making our Homes Sustainable
  John Carpenter, convener (6231 6349)
• Gardens and Food
  Annie March, convener (6231 0378)
• Sustainable Transport
  Margaret Steadman, convener (6231 4751)

A fourth subgroup was considered, one which would look at developing the sense of community within parts of West Hobart, but it was decided to leave this for the moment. It is expected that new subgroups will form over time as new issues arise.

The importance of expanding the size of the our group was considered and a number of suggestions were made, including;

• everyone bringing along someone new
• a notice in the Neighbourhood Watch Newsletter and on their planned website
• a media event
• the promotion of the group at the Hobart City Council sustainability workshops.

Inaugural WHEN meeting - Sunday 25 May 2008

It was great having so many people turn up who were concerned about the issues of community and climate change and who were also eager to start taking action on them.

In our discussion on Sunday, we identified a number of areas for possible group action. They are listed below. The numbers in brackets indicate how many green dots each item received as a measure of its popularity with the group.

There were three main areas of interest:
. making our homes more sustainable
. gardens and food
. improving local transport
Additionally, there were a number of suggestions associated with other community-related issues.

Making our homes more sustainable (28)
. rainwater tanks (10)
. solar hot water (7)
. photovoltaic panels (4)
. retrofitting (4)
. grey water recycling (3)
. composting toilets
. a demonstration house to show the potential for sustainable living

Gardens and food (16)
. community gardens (5)
. a register of garden tools (3)
. community composting(2)
. "retrofitting" gardens with native plants (2)
. bulk buying of garden supplies (1)
. information on growing your own food (1)
. information on keeping chickens (1)
. street trees (1)
. beekeeping
. distributing surplus food
. information on "permablitzing"
. utilization of Council green space for gardens

Improving local transport (14)
. better local transport (5)
. transport that is more sustainable (3)
. bike racks on buses (3)
. development of a light rail system (2)
. street calming (1)
. car sharing

Other issues raised (8)
. sharing knowledge and skill-sharing workshops (3)
. establishing a local walking club (2)
. acting to create change by influencing others in the community (1)
. building community resilience in the face of changing conditions (1)
. information on Transition Towns (1)
. creating safety in the community
. banning toxic substances in West Hobart
. sharing general resources - tools, equipment, etc.
. organisation of the Group and a venue for meetings