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Oct 29

Ian Tooley’s responses to Questions on Climate Change

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In this post we invited all the candidates in Gawler and surrounding councils to answer the 4 questions we formulated with respect to what their knowledge and stance is on climate change.

Here’s the response we received from Ian Tooley:

Question 1: What relevance do you see climate change issues having for Gawler Council over the next 4 years?

a) Not relevant

b) A bit relevant

c) An issue which council deals with among many issues

d) One of the more important issues for Council

e) An issue which should be at the centre of Council planning

d) One of the more important issues for Council

Question 2: What actions are you aware of where Gawler Council is currently taking action related to climate change?

I don’t believe that climate change has been an important issue for Gawler Council to date.

Some of the current councillors are definitely environmentally minded and they HAVE had a positive impact but lack the critical mass necessary to have a big impact.

New cycle tracks, flood mitigation, further developing our river parks and precincts and the like are definitely positive for the environment/sustainability/climate change but there is so much more that could and should be done.

Question 3: What actions do you think Gawler Council should be undertaking in the next 4 years related to climate change?

See response to Question 4

Question 4: What actions do you think Gawler Council should be undertaking with the broader Gawler community related to climate change?

My response to Questions 3 & 4, in no particular order, includes:-

  • Gawler Council joining ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability (see http://www.iclei.org/)
  • This association would provide valuable networks and resources for council.
  • Council viewing/considering all proposals and developments through the lens of sustainability.
  • Council pro-actively promoting sustainability; facilitating group purchases of water tanks and  solar PV for ratepayers and local business for example.
  • Council investing in energy saving and water saving infrastructure.
  • Council pro-actively supporting and promoting events and community groups that promote environmental and sustainability events, expo’s, demonstrations etc.
  • Transform Goose Island into a centrepiece for community gardens and community events.
  • Gawler Council setting aspirational targets for reducing energy and water consumption including an aspiration to be the first town in SA to be 100% powered by renewable energy!
  • Hosting/convening information sessions/meetings for rate payers on climate change-the reality and the solutions!
  • Facilitate vastly improved waste reduction, recycling and waste management.
  • Actively promote Gawler as a cycling, walking and historic-trail destination with green credentials!
  • Gawler council/tourist centre to provide FREE bike ‘hire’, including electric bikes. Other councils do, why not Gawler?
  • Gawler Council leading by example re climate change and sustainability!
  • Supporting local schools, clubs, child care/kindies and associations to transition to more sustainable practices and to promote Education for Sustainability.

I hope I have provided sufficient information and answered your questions appropriately.

Please don’t hesitate to contact me if I can be of further assistance or provide additional information.

Kind regards,

Ian Tooley

0418848696

Click here to see the list of those candidates who have responded

Oct 28

1 Comment

Local Government Elections – Make sure you vote before 7th November 2014

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If you are thinking of voting in the local elections, and you should, it is important to know how the voting works.

In the Gawler Council area there are 25 candidates standing for the position of Area Councillor and there are 10 spots.

The voting system is preferential which means you need to think about the order you put your votes. You must number at least 10 squares but you can number more if you want, and these later preferences can be important on the recounts.

Research shows that many people just number straight down the line but this can be a mistake! Think carefully about who you vote for, especially your top 3 preferences, because they are the people who will help guide our local area, financially, socially and environmentally, for the next four years.

Transition Gawler would like to invite all the candidates in Gawler and surrounding councils to answer the following questions we have formulated with respect to what their knowledge and stance is on climate change. Hopefully this will help others decide who they wish to vote for, or in deciding their preference votes.

 Questions for Candidates:

Answers can be provided as comments here, email us here , or via our Facebook Page.

1.What relevance do you see climate change issues having for Gawler Council over the next 4 years?

a) Not relevant

b) A bit relevant

c) An issue which council deals with among many issues

d) One of the more important issues for Council

e) An issue which should be at the centre of Council planning

2. What actions are you aware of where Gawler Council is currently taking action related to climate change?

3. What actions do you think Gawler Council should be  undertaking in the next 4 years  related to climate change?

4. What actions do you think Gawler Council should be  undertaking with the broader Gawler community related to climate change?

Links to Candidates responses:

Ian Tooley

Adrian Shackley

Morgan Smith

David Hughes

Kelvin Goldstone

Paul Koch

Karen Redman (Mayoral Candidate)

Martin Bailey

Diane Fraser

James (Jim) Buckoke

John Bolton (Mayoral Candidate)

Peter Graham (Mayoral Candidate)

We will update as we receive more responses

May 23

Adelaide’s First Cargo Bike Party!!!!! – Sunday 25th May 2014

I can’t do the shopping using a bicycle, where will I put all the shopping to!!!!

What if we told you that bicycles now come with “cargo space”………

Introducing Cargo Bikes, with these you have a place to put all that “precious cargo”  be it, those bags (recycled and reusable of course) of shopping, or your living “precious cargo” (kids, dogs etc).

We stumbled across this great Blog written by a fellow “Adelaide Bakfiets Rider” who shows that doing things that “need” a car, (like dropping the kids off at school and even picking up some compost) can actually be done with one of these cargo bikes.

If you aren’t ready to take the plunge and buy one of these Cargo Bikes, there are other options like adding racks, panniers, and bike trailers, which will turn your existing bike into load carrying machine, but with the ability to turn it back into a “normal” bike with a few common household tools.

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If you have never ridden (or seen) one of these then head along to Adelaide’s first Cargo Bike Party at the Old Tennis Courts on Anzac Highway next to the West Terrace Cemetery, in Adelaide on this Sunday, 25 May 2014, from 12pm to 4pm.

There will be an obstacle course challenge, load carrying challenges, speed races in each bike category and more. There will also be bikes there which you can test ride.

For more information see:

http://www.velo-city2014.com/pages/velo-fringe.php#The Adelaide Cargo Bike Race/

https://www.facebook.com/events/1490313824521175/

http://dutchcargobike.com.au/2014/05/meet-us-in-adelaide-this-weekend/

 

May 20

Homegrown seedlings for sale in Willaston

One of our members has some spare homegrown seedlings for sale in Willaston.

If any of these interest you, head over to the “Transition Gawler Chat Group” or contact Miriam and Andrew Yip on 0427316976 or email miriamyip@esmedia.com.au
From Andrew:

Pricing starts from 75c, or 5 for $3 for individual vegetable seedlings. Flowers and herbs are $1/pot and come as a clump of 5-6 seedlings.
The list of available seedlings at the moment is:

  • sugarloaf cabbages
  • cauliflower
  • some russian kale
  • marigolds
  • Pak Choy
  • corriander seedlings

These are grown in Willaston from open pollinated saved seed. They are raised in homemade compost and sand mix and raised without chemical fertilisers and pesticides.

Also we will have frilly lettuce and soon we’ll have many more vegetable and herb seedlings to offer. Also looking to sell seeds in the future.

Remember if you would like to meet others who are interested in Gardening, or want to learn how to get started, come along to our one of our Garden and Produce Share days.

Apr 12

Another successful Garden and Produce Share

Another great Gawler Garden and Produce Share happened on the weekend.

Yet again we managed to fill up the table with excesses from our gardens, which is particularly impressive because most of us are in that “in between” time in our gardens where not too much is being harvested at the moment.

Along with the sharing of produce, there were discussions around potatoes, chickens and peafowl dust bathing and roosting habbits, using herbs to keep dogs out of the garden (and the antics of such dogs who wont stay out of gardens), purple garlic, broad beans and growing herbs from cuttings, and how the weather influences how they will strike or not.

A few of us admitted to having no idea how to use broad beans (which was rather surprising to Kathy), so hopefully sometime in the near future we will see a bit of a “how to guide” from Kathy about how to grow, harvest, prepare, and cook broad beans.

If you can’t get to the Share’s, but would still like to “meet” others and discuss these sort of things join our Facebook Group  “Transition Gawler Chat Group”

 

Feb 17

Get on your bike (GOYB), Gawler meeting No. 2 this Sunday

Hi Everyone,

After a successful meeting on Sunday we will be meeting again next Sunday (23rd Feb) to continue the discussion and planning of the Cycling Event in May and the formation of the on going GOYB Gawler.

There were some great ideas discussed and we meet some great new friends over a cider.

We still need your  help, so if you love the idea of making Gawler a better place to ride, wish your kids could ride their bike to school or just want to get involved with the Gawler Community join us for a chat on the 23rd February (Sunday afternoon 3.00pm) at the PA (Prince Albert) and help us continue to plan what needs to happen next.

Let us know if you would like to join us, contact Leigh on 0428 610 237 or email us at TransitionGawler@gmail.com

Regards

Leigh Dalwood

Feb 4

Transition Gawler’s First Energy Project

CORENA sml

CORENA sml

We are thrilled to be part of creating the second ever CORENA project. The Gawler Community House has been contributing to the local community for many years and we are happy to give such a great organisation a (solar powered) boost. In 2014 we will be establishing a Transition Gawler Energy group to further develop our partnership with CORENA.

Donate now – follow this link http://corenafund.org.au/category/quick-win-projects/current-project/

We will work with the Gawler Community House to investigate specific fundraising events and to generate local media interest, and we will be promoting the Gawler Community House project at outreach activities such as:

  • our ‘Gawler’s Energy Evening Info session’
  • fortnightly Gawler Garden and Produce Share
  • our monthly ‘Crafternoon’ in the pub
  • monthly workshops, such as soap-making, vegetable wicking bed making, open gardens

Jan 15

First Crafternoon for 2014

The first Crafternoon for 2014 is happening this Sunday 19th January.

This time we have a focus on crochet skills, but bring whatever you want work on!

If you know how to crochet come and share what you know with those who are keen to learn.

Join us at the Prince Albert, Murray St, Gawler

2.00-4.00pm

Dec 18

Minimise food waste this Christmas

With the festive season upon us, give some thought to minimising the amount of food you waste.

Each year, Australians send four million tonnes of food to landfill – enough to fill 450,000 garbage trucks.

When food rots without air in landfill it gives off the greenhouse gas methane, which is 25 times more damaging to the environment than the carbon dioxide that comes out of your car exhaust.

Australians waste $8 billion worth of fresh food, leftovers, packaged and long-life products, drinks, frozen food, and takeaways a year.

For the average South Australian household, that equates to 20% of the food they purchase. That’s the same as just throwing away one out of every five bags of groceries you buy without even bringing it into the house.

Over a year that can be as high as around $1000 worth of food that gets wasted – that’s enough to feed the average household for over a month, and at this time of year especially if we think about being smarter about our food waste then there’s more money in your pocket and benefits for the environment.

When you throw out food you also waste the water, fuel and resources it took to get the food from the farm to your plate, so it’s not just your hip pocket that wins when you avoid wasting food, the environment wins too.

Here are some simple steps to reduce this waste:

  • Only cook what you need. Food is often wasted when we cook too much.
  • Use a website like foodwise.com.au to find out inventive ways to use leftovers.
  • Check the use-by or best before date before throwing food away.
  • Avoid buying take-aways at the last minute instead of cooking the food you already have at home.

Nov 30

Transition Gawler is establishing an energy group

Transition Gawler is establishing an energy group, that will look at clean energy solutions specially for Gawler and regions. Transition Gawler is interested in investigating the right mix of energy sources for Gawler. It might be energy efficiency help, community owned solar power schemes, wind turbines or maybe even a big project for baseload power such as concentrated solar thermal who knows! If you are interested in getting involved, contact Transition Gawler.

Right now Transition Gawler is already working with CORENA (Citizen’s Own Renewable Energy Network Australia) to fund solar and energy efficiency projects in Gawler the first of which is at Gawler Community House.

CORENA provides a practical and immediate way for ‘the people’ to collectively fund new renewable energy installations. CORENA finds worthy projects and organisations then ‘crowd source’ the funding. Transition Gawler looks forward to working with CORENA to bring more great projects to Gawler.

A rapid transition away from polluting fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas must occur in the next decade to avoid catastrophic climate change.

We will be meeting soon to plan an Energy info night to occur the week of ‘Earth Hour’. So if you are interested please contact us.

Clean renewable energy is the best way forward to meet the energy use of our community.

What you can do:

Join Transition Gawler Energy Group by contacting us- https://transitiongawler.org/contact-us/
Donate to CORENA’s great energy project – http://corenafund.org.au/
Visit the Natural Resources Centre and hire the Home Energy Audit Kit http://www.communitywebs.org/nrcgawler/resource.php
Get professional advice on your energy options – http://dteconsulting.com.au/

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