Benalla Food Cooperative -  After a recent meeting, it was decided that the Food Coop will continue working with current covid regulations - that is, with Supervisor, Computer Operator and two assistants, two customers at a time.  Thursdays usually very busy, are currently quiet.  Saturdays are busy. Current arrangements will continue until end of year and be reviewed in October, November and December.  There is a regular mail out of news to members with the roster, however there is scope to look at social media for younger people.

Renewable Energy Benalla - Kevin provided details of the Haystack Solar Garden Project, https://haystacks.solargarden.org.au.  Haystacks Offer Summary.  Kevin provided details of the Offer, Report available from Kevin.

Greening Benalla  - Kate Holmes reported on activities of the group, which include developing gardening days with children at Waminda as a way of getting the community interested.  Waminda's upcoming wicking bed workshops were discussed.  Landscape Plans were reported to be available for public comment, but to be progressing before public comment.  If trees are removed, matching not a monoculture, is required.  The question was asked, can access to Mair Street from bridge be blocked.  Concern was expressed of subdivisions becoming heat islands.  A strategy mooted 'BSFG Plant A Tree Day'
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Connecting and Engaging Benalla - Empathy Café Discussion Groups -  Rachel DeSumma has organised three Empathy Café meetings at the Benalla Library Meeting room, Oct 19 - 5.15 - 6.45 pm, with location time details to be decided for Nov 16, and Dec 7,  Three meetings planned for next year.  Link to Shepp News article.  Lou Bird has developed templates using the Canva application which can be applied flexibly by the group for Instagram, Facebook, the website and general advertising.  

Ecological, Sustainable Planning and Development The Ecological, Sustainable Planning and Development group has not met formally since the Review, however there has been some email discussion of ESD and Subdivision Development Planning. There has also been follow up with Council Environmental Officer Nathan Gasperoni re arranging a Planning Meeting with Developers to consider passive solar design principles. Nathan reported that the Council Planning people appear reluctant to pursue this, reminscent of a theme in a paper on ESD in Australia, ‘Ecologically Sustainable Development’: Success in Principle, Failure in Policy, Still in Prospect'.  Perhaps a Target for Ecologically Sustainable Development is in order, such as the Ecological Footprint.  The meeting was ralso eferred to Peter Maddock's article 'Ecological Sustainable Development and Planning' in BSFG Newsletter 33, August 2022.

Waste Action Group - The 'Waste Wise' action group, flagged at the last meeting, held its first meeting on 26 September.  Group members Karen Nankervis, Judy Schwartzman and Kay Blore considered items including - 

• Discussion with Council And Ensign.
• Repair cafe
• Green shed at Tip
• Additional options for green waste bag collection
• Council recycling trailer
• NE Water trailer
• Update list for recyclables, new labels from Cleanaway
• Join with other Councils
• Plastic forest in Albury, polystyrene collection
• Collection bins, at Council?

 
The Group has decided upon a12 month program to focus on one item per month, Ensign and corflutes, for example:  

1. Blister packs
2. Bread ties
3. Plastic numbers
4. Milk bottle tops
5. Lids on glass
6. Soft plastic
7. Light bulbs
8. Little reusable bags for F&V
9. Minimiser landfill... competition for best idea. 12 mth membership of Food Co-op.
10. Balloons, illegal
11. No single use plastic
12. Your rates pay for illegal dumping
13. Snap, send, solve app   

Sustainable Farming.  As reported at our last meeting, Charles Massy is too busy to visit.  Kerry Robson and John Murphy are assisting group.  Kerry has some funding which could be used for talking with schools and including sustainable agriculture in curriculum.  Items arising in discussions include - AG carbon capture and storage - running  Field Days for community education - Connecting with  food sovereignty cooperative and Serenity Hill.

Empathy cafés are a connective community building activity that practices reflective listening.  In a small group of 3-4 people, take turns listening in response to a prompting question. You will learn to listen out for, and hear the other person, reflecting what they said, which can be helpful in resolving conflict, and gives the listener the opportunity to see the speaker's perspective. Reflective listening helps the speaker to feel seen and heard and can support your nervous system to relax and it's truly easy to learn. ​

Members and Supporters are invited to attend our BSFG General Meeting at 7:30pm on Thursday 29th September at the Benalla Uniting Church meeting room.

At this meeting we will gather member’s suggestions about waste management/minimisation strategies to take to the proposed Council working group. We will also address Council’s promised review of the Climate Change Adaptation Plan (should it be Mitigation Plan?)

Rescheduled from our July meeting, we will show 'Together We Grow' from Happen Films.  'Common Unity' is the organisation featured in the film which runs for 39 minutes. Jordan and Antoinette, who are Happen Films, attended the Swanpool Environmental Film Festival in 2018 for the screening of their feature film 'Living the Change'.
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We apologize that Cr Laura Binks, Mayor at Strathbogie Shire, was unable to attend this month because of her hectic work schedule, and will be coming to our November meeting instead.

A light supper will be served at the conclusion of the evening.

Please RSVP your attendance to [email protected]   We hope to see you there,


Judy Schwarzman
Secretary, BSFG

The U3A Sustainability group has been most fortunate to have group member John Lane take up the convenor’s role, following on from John Lloyd, who convened the group for 13 years before his recent move to the Bendigo area. 

Trained as an urban and regional planner, John brings to the role a 40-year career in a range of environment related jobs, mostly in policy and strategy as well as managing various programs covering land use planning, pollution control, natural resource, coastal and catchment management, climate change mitigation and adaptation and biodiversity conservation, work which took John from Victoria, to Cape York Peninsula, southeast Queensland and a number of small island states of the southwest Pacific. 

Initially sharing his role with former CSIRO scientist Frank Dunin (who also moved away recently), John’s sessions are thoughtfully planned and engaging.  In July, for example,

​“The Sustainability group began the preparation of an integrated sustainability index that attempts to integrate the social, environmental and economic elements of sustainability; a replacement for Gross Domestic Product (GDP) that is currently used in Australia which focuses only on economic indicators. The New Zealand government is preparing a draft Wellbeing Index. Our index is based on the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as the primary organising system. We had a go at drafting 'targets, measures, indexes and scores for these goals. We discovered it's not an easy task.

The group also looked at what was needed to achieve a net zero carbon energy system for Australia. We compared two approaches from advocates to 'electrify everything' on the understanding we will eventually achieve carbon-neutral electricity production. The first was a bottom up (household up) approach proposed by Rewiring Australia and the second was a top-down approach proposed by the Clean Energy Council. We then considered these pathways with the Federal government's policy it took to the last election. We found that the new government's policy generally matched the primary steps each of the advocates propose.”  John Lane, U3A Sustainability Group Report, U3A Newsletter.

The U3A Benalla Sustainability group meets twice a month, on the first and third Fridays from 10 to 12 midday, in the U3A Meeting Room at the Seniors Community Centre.  Check the Sustainability group’s page on the U3A Benalla website for more information.