The Platform
Serving The Community
I am a fourth generation Boroondara resident and father of five. I run a consulting business based in Boroondara that supports sporting clubs and community organisations, and I care about the small businesses that are the heart of our local villages. I love trees, birds and animals and I care about protecting our environment.
Hello
Welcome
I am a fourth generation Boroondara resident and father of five. I run a consulting business based in Boroondara that supports sporting clubs and community organisations, and I care about the small businesses that are the heart of our local villages. I love trees, birds and animals and I care about our environment.
Site Content
My Priorities
- Strong and supported local sporting clubs and community groups
- Thriving local businesses and vibrant village precincts
- Meaningful and transparent community consultation on decisions that affect you
- Balanced and responsible development and controls which protect our heritage, environment and tree canopy
- High quality and accessible community facilities and services
- Measurable and targeted sustainability initiatives
Strong and supported local sporting clubs and community groups
Boroondara is home to some of the largest and most active community sporting clubs and community groups. Moreover, Boroondara leads the way in female participation in sport, particularly amongst its junior ranks. Boroondara families have always embraced club life and for many that means many hours spent at our over fifty recreational facilities across the municipality. However, with such a large footprint, we have fallen drastically behind in the need to develop these facilities to keep up with the needs and demands of a modern community. When we do develop facilities, it’s almost always to a minimum sporting body standard with no real regard for how the facility could be activated for broader public use and amenity.
As a Councillor for Boroondara I will actively advocate for and pursue:
- An overall strategy for public facility upgrades that meet the needs of all users including sporting clubs, recreational users, other community groups that can be actively engaged at these facilities.
- Facility master plans that maximise the utility of our public assets for a broad range of users and that support the needs of our community sporting clubs and community groups.
- Opportunities to add to and improve our public open space.
- Projects and initiatives that strengthen our sporting clubs and community groups that provide so much opportunity for healthy living and connectedness in Boroondara.
Thriving local businesses and vibrant village precincts
Boroondara is home to many small village precincts and the thousands of small businesses that serve them. The time that we spend in these village strips is part of the experience of living in Boroondara. However, now more than ever, those precincts are coming under immense pressure. This is evidenced by the alarming number of long-term vacant shops that you see in almost all these villages. Property rental rates continue to increase without challenge; outgoings appear to be equal to another fifty percent of the value of the base rent itself; wages are increasing and people have become much more cost conscious around discretionary spending. All of this translates to lower sales volume, lower margins, higher costs and ultimately, barely a living wage for the business owner.
As a Councillor for Boroondara I will actively advocate for and pursue an overall strategy to support our local traders to grow and thrive including:
- Master plans to guide the development of infrastructure, parking and traffic flows, and future development.
- Initiatives to bring more people into our shopping and business precincts more often.
- Initiatives to assist businesses to tap into larger markets and sell to people and businesses outside Boroondara.
- Initiatives to assist businesses to implement efficiencies and produce more for less cost.
- Initiatives and incentives to alleviate the high cost and risks associated with operating a small business in Boroondara.
Meaningful and transparent community consultation on decisions that affect you
Our city and our community are changing now at a rate that has not been seen since the original settlement of this area. As a result, there is an ever-increasing pressure on council to enact policies and make decisions that will affect the very essence of our community for decades to come. Some of these decisions may appear on first glance to be benign and even mundane. However, many small decisions can be made in the context of broader strategic issues and whilst their impact alone may not be of consequence, in a broader sense they can be far reaching.
As a Councillor for Boroondara I will seek to engage regularly with the Maling Ward community through a range of channels including:
- Regular surveys to provide you the opportunity provide comment on issues affecting you and your families.
- A monthly Newsletter to inform you of council issues, projects and initiatives that are relevant to you.
- A quarterly “town hall” style forum hosted by me for community members raise issues of concern and ask questions of their elected representative.
- Regular “Listening Posts” to encourage one on one opportunities.
- One on one interaction by phone, email and in person as required.
Balanced and responsible development and controls, heritage, environment and tree canopy
With increasing pressure from the state government to meet unprecedented targets for new home builds, we are facing a crisis that could entirely change the culture, environment and amenity of our city. Whilst change and development can and should be for the good of our community, it must be managed strategically in order to not lose the things that make our community great. We must not lose the heritage, environmental and leafy green elements of our community that makes it so sought after. We must ensure that development coincides with appropriate advances in community services and infrastructure. We must protect and continue to rebuild our established tree canopy to ensure the future liveability of our city. It is not enough to justify the loss of an established tree with the replacement of many others that will take years to provide any real benefit. We must find a balance.
As a Councillor for Boroondara I will:
- Engage with fellow Councillors to ensure a strategic approach to meeting the needs of a growing community.
- Advocate strongly for appropriate development controls that protect our heritage, community environment and amenity and our tree canopy.
- Advocate for developers and development partners that are willing and able to meet the needs of this very special environment that we enjoy.
- Advocate for appropriate Public Open Space allocations and contributions as well as maintain existing “green to concrete ratios” in any future developments.
High quality and accessible community facilities and services
Council provides a broad range of community facilities and services including:
- Support and Programs for Children and families, Vulnerable Youth, Over 55’s, Seniors
- Programs to support and engage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people; people with a disability, people suffering from homelessness, people from the LGBTQIA+ communities as well as people from a culturally and linguistically diverse background
- Community Centres, Neighbourhood Houses, Libraries and Art Galleries
- Parks and Gardens as well as Sporting and Community Facilities
- Community grants and programs
- Streets, Roads and Parking
- Waste and Recycling Management
As a Councillor for Boroondara I will work with fellow Councillors and council officers to ensure that the range and level of services provided to you are of the very highest standards, sufficient to meet the needs of a growing and diverse community and delivered at a reasonable and appropriate cost. I am well aware that whilst vital, these services are funded largely through the rates paid by you. You deserve value for money, and I will advocate for this in all decision made by council.
Measurable and targeted sustainability initiatives
There is no doubt that the world we live in is a very different one to the world that our parents, grandparents and great grand parents lived in. There are some fundamental changes that we can’t ignore, particularly around our environment and the way that we live our lives.
Often the debate is fierce between one ideology and another as to what this all means and how should we react, if at all. I take the view that regardless of ideology, we should always seek to leave the planet in a better position than the way we inherited it.
Over recent years there has been a significant shift in the way we fuel our cars, the way we heat and power our homes, the way we dispose of our waste and even the way we package our food and groceries.
As a Councillor for Boroondara I will work with fellow Councillors and council officers to ensure that as a community, we take a balanced and sustainable approach to targets and initiatives around reducing our carbon footprint and contributing to a sustainable environment. These will include advocacy for initiatives including:
- EV charging infrastructure
- Waste and Recycling
- Maintaining and growing our green spaces and our significant suburban tree canopy
- Identifying cost effective opportunities for the community to contribute to global sustainability