Blue Sky Thinking On Sustainability For Our ’Hood

By Nicola Saltman (Waverley Enviro Officer) on August 24, 2015 in Other

Let’s face it: most of us live in this local wonderland because we love the lifestyle it offers. From the beaches and parks to the cafes and bars, we are pretty lucky to call this ’hood home.

But let’s imagine for a minute that there were no limits, failure was not an option, and you could think ‘blue sky’; what would the sustainable Waverley of your dreams look like? How could we as a community do our best for the environment, shrink our negative impact, make our places more liveable and keep them beautiful for generations to come?

If we had a chance to let our minds go wild, what would be our clean energy future? How could we make recycling the norm and spaces litter-free? What about water and our beaches? What is our incredible community capable of if we pull together to create positive change?

These are some of the big questions local sustainability leaders tackled recently at a forum overlooking Bondi Beach. The ‘Sustainability by the Sea’ event invited sustainability leaders to join Council in brainstorming a collective vision for our area and ideas on community-driven projects to help bring it to life.

We’re blessed to have professionals from a variety of backgrounds who know their stuff in the sustainability space as neighbours. Attendees included experts who work with corporates, local government, non-government organisations and community groups – from policy, design, social, economic, communications and campaign perspectives. All up, between the 40 attendees there were over 500 years of professional experience on major environmental issues. That’s a lot of brain juice.

The ‘think tank’ event was a chance to draw on this wealth of knowledge to dream big, explore environmental aspirations, and turn them into practical, locally led projects. Partnering with the community like this is one key way that Council is working to help drive positive local change.

As Asha Kayla, Sustainable Communities Manager of Waverley Council said: “We know we can’t solve our sustainability challenges alone and we don’t always have all the answers. We are keen to work with our local community to achieve our environmental goals. This event is just one example of how we are trying to achieve this.”

The event sparked many creative conversations. Leaders explored the ‘heart’ of our stomping ground, like our local values, strengths and assets. The ideas generated touched on energy banks, community-owned energy grids, innovative financial models for sustainability, greening our rental stock and waste-free solutions.

So what happens next?

Smaller discussion groups led by community sustainability champions will focus on specific topics. The first of these will explore community energy and reducing waste. Once the projects are refined they will be opened up to a wider section of the community to get involved.

For more information about the projects, email environment@waverley.nsw.gov.au.

To view Waverley Council’s current environmental targets, visit www.waverley.nsw.gov.au/environment.

Sustainability by the Sea was developed by Waverley Council working with local sustainability experts Robin Mellon from the Green Building Council of Australia and Sally Asker from InSIGHTsustainability.