Governments favour street furniture that generates advertising revenue
For many years people have heeded the call and ‘done the right thing’ by using the bins. Now its Council’s turn.
“It’s important for council to continue its good work and lift its game to match the demands of a city with more and more people.” said WECA President Darren Godwell.
“This one isn’t a hard ask -Council just needs to double the number of rubbish pick-ups.”
“The physical constraints of the footpaths and the demand from many thousands of peoples rule-out the appropriateness of larger bins” added Godwell
Godwell points out that “standard, narrow footpaths can’t handle more people, more street signage, more outdoor dining, more clothes racks, more furniture and larger bins.
Council may find itself exposed to an increased public liability and potential payouts for failing to provide the public with safe and adequate footpaths in one of its highest traffic streets.”
As part of WECA’s Safer Streets initiative, the Community Association is asking City Council to increase the frequency of its rubbish collections from the public bins provided along Boundary and Melbourne Streets in West End and South Brisbane.
“It’s a public health and safety issue. When council approves all the extra outside dining plus approves all the extra bars and licensed premises over the last ten years it happily took the extra revenues from permits and applications. Council has pocketed the extra money, now its time to use those funds to sustain services.”
Since 1995 local business and community interests of West End have initiated urban improvements. A year later the result was Brisbane’s first ever Suburban Centre Improvement Program (SCIP) where fit-to-purpose street furniture and infrastructure refreshed one of Brisbane’s last remaining retail high streets. WECA members and founders were active in that local initiative.
Director Lee CunXin trains with the Queensland ballet
The World Premiere of a new production of Copelia will launch Queensland Ballet’s season next year, while the Nutcracker will become a regular Christmas feature and crowd pleaser, starting here in 4101 on 5th December.
Running from April 14 until May 10, the ballet will be choreographed by Greg Horsmann. Mr Horsmann told the ballet faithful at Brisbane Town Hall on Monday that Copellia has framed his career.
Director of Queensland Ballet, Lee CunXin, known to many as Mao’s last dancer, presented the 2014 program, announcing that the ballet has Sir … Romeo Juliet, with three international stars performing in the main roles at various times, giving both audiences and dancers a taste of the heights of this soaring art form.
The famous production of Romeo and Juliet, choregraphed by Sir Kenneth McMillan to Prokiev’s music has been closely guarded by McMillan’s widow and it is considered a real coup to have the performance here from 27 June to 5 July.
The crowd pleaser, though, both at the launch this week and for the programs to come will be the Nutcracker Suite as a regular Christmas treat. The first outing kicks off here in 4101 in two months. So popular is this ballet set to Tchaikoskvy’s music that the season has sold out and new shows have had to be added to the program by popular demand.
The expansion of coal mines west of Brisbane will double the amount of coal rumbling through the suburbs residents of Brisbane’s inner Southern suburbs heard at the Yeronga Bowls club last night.
Merryn Redenbach from Doctors for the Environment and Peter Faulkner from Oakey Coal Action Alliance brought very different perspectives to the topic.
Dr Redenbach provided a raft of evidence about those health impacts, including asthma and heart disease. She covered the damage caused by different particle sizes. Smaller particles are more dangerous as they get deeper into the lungs where the body’s defences are less able to deal with them.
The plume from a blast at the New Hope Acland mine
Most monitoring only picks up particles of 10microns or larger in diameter as only these coarse particles are governed by law. The fine particles (2.5 microns in diameter) have guidelines but are rarely measured and the ultrafine particles (1 micron) are rarely measured at all.
Doctors for the Environment has research indicating that the cost of coal’s impact on human health is around 6.2 billion dollars. If we included this in the cost of coal fired electricity, renewables start to look very attractive indeed.
All corporations try to externalize as many costs as possible but Doctors for the Environment don’t want to let them off the hook on these health costs.
Peter Faulkner’s down to earth style makes people sit up and listen
President of the Oakey Coal Action Alliance, Peter Faulkner, is in the thick of those attempts by coal mines to reduce those costs west of Toowoomba. His main concern is that our food sovereignty and regional communities are under threat as the government paves the way for international energy companies to ravage the landscape in a short sighted dream to make Australia the Saudi Arabia of the twenty first century.
“We are not second class citizens,” he asserts, “and we should not be thrown off our land and give up our food security because some shareholders on the other side of the world want to make money from it.”
His group agitated to raise awareness about New Hope’s expansion plans and have watched in dismay as the company has divided the community with a PR war by throwing money at the local paper, school committee and “any body with their hand out who is prepared to go quiet on the impact of coal.”
The New Hope Acland mine is about eight kilometers from the town of Oakey and is expected to double in size. New Hope has exploration licenses across vast swathes of Queensland from the NSW border north in a band that runs from Toowoomba in the East, West to Dalby.
Peter presented a range of photographic evidence showing the effects of mining on the community. An inspiring speaker, his down to earth style and factual approach had the audience firing questions with a passion.
The evening was organized by Clean Air Queensland, which is well connected to Stop Brisbane Coal Trains, Lock the Gate, Bridging the Divide and the many local groups trying to salvage their communities and their farmland in the face of this onslaught from energy companies with the full backing of the government.
The hugely successful Australian cricket coach, John Buchanan, graced the South West chamber of commerce last Thursday and shared his five tips for leaders.
President Alice, John Buchanan and Manager Roger at the SW Chamber of Commerce breakfast.
His relaxed style and bottomless kit bag of yarns kept the members of the commerce glued to his talk right up until the 8:30 curfew, when some of us had to run away to open the doors of our own businesses. There was still an excited crowd around the man as I drove off.
Part of the fascination was the level of personal honesty he portrayed as he discussed the life journey that he took which eventually led to his coaching of the Australian cricket team. “Taking a good hard look at yourself and working out who you are, is absolutely essential if you are going to excel at anything,” he said.
Knowing your vision is the first rule in Buchanan’s five pillars of success. Understand your vision clearly. Be absolutely sure of it with every fibre of your being, be able to describe it in ten seconds, and be happy that your whole life is going to revolve around it.
Powerful as this message was on its own, coming from a man who has excelled at the pinnacle of international sport, it reinforced the key message at the COSBOA business breakfast covered by Westender in July. (see related story – http://westender.com.au/mobile-media-future/)
The logic is simple. The focus and determination required to succeed require a single mindedness that simply cannot exist if you have doubts, second thoughts or other distractions that take your focus off the game.
Knowing who you are and what you want is the starting point for all of life’s endeavours.
The other four pillars took much less time to lay out. Partly because they are less important, partly I expect because this presentation was a little shorter than those he is used to giving and he needed to abbreviate his schtick to get us out the door on time.
Leadership culture comes next. Buchanan’s point is that the organisation follows the leader. What the leader does, so will the organization. The leader’s behaviour, then, determines the culture of the organization. There is no point in sitting down with a wish list of what the organization’s culture should look like, if that is at odds with the leader’s own style. Far better, John Buchanan says, to get someone to make a few notes about the main positive character traits of the leader and synthesise that into an expression of the organizational culture.
Learning environment is third on John’s list. His thesis is that every leader should be in the business of making themselves redundant. You want people to be able to lead in your absence. You do not want the entire organization grinding to a halt while you have a moment to yourself. You really should be working for the day when your business just keeps making buckets of money without you working your guts out to keep the machine going.
That can only be achieved if you allow people the scope to learn, encourage them to learn and support them in that learning.
Developing talent is the key to growth. Obviously success comes from improvement and that improvement has to come from somewhere. Finding raw talent and developing it is part of that process. The other key that stops many people succeeding is the development of talent that is different to the leader’s. This is especially true where the leader may be weak in an area and needs to complement that weakness. There is a natural tendency in many of us to become defensive and avoid exposing our weaknesses. A good leader though acknowledges them and fills the organisation with a range of talents that complement each other.
Measurement is the final pillar that underlines all the others. Being able to determine if the other pieces of the puzzle are working is essential to managing to a plan and refining the plan as external circumstances force us to rip it up and start again.
Many readers will have come across similar templates for success. The joy in this presentation is that John Buchanan has a down-to-earth style that makes them ring true. This is not a high pressure presentation with a lot of hoopla. It is a real bloke that the audience feels they can identify with, who is quite open about some the challenges he faced along the way, talking about how success comes from the determined application of a few key principles.
For the members of the South West Chamber who were there, the recommendations resonate all the more for that directness and personal touch. I’m sure I was not the only attendee who took the time to check out http://buchanancoaching.com
The Roller Derby opened the season with a pinch and a punch for the first of the month. Hundreds of residents lined the streets to celebrate all things wheeled. (more…)
