Posts related to 'activities'

Enjoying Planned Retirement Annual General Meeting

Published by Alex Makin on Thursday 20th of November, 2008

Enjoying Planned Retirement (EPR) is one of three groups based at Norwood Hall in Warrandyte Road, Ringwood North. This evening EPR held its annual general meeting to appoint officebearers for the next twelve months.

EPR prides itself on being an active, unique and progressive activities club for seniors and this is reflected in its constitution, which requires the President to stand down after a two year term. This assists the club in considering new ideas and helps distribute the workload of committee positions. As a result, the club’s President Kath Perkins stepped down from her position and James Jamieson, the Vice-President was elected unopposed into the President role.

As the local ward councillor I have worked with Kath over the past two years to assist EPR with council issues and it has been delightful to have been assisted such a lively and inclusive club. Through its group conveners EPR is able to organise a wide range of activities, including wine tasting, performances, caravan trips, tennis, social gatherings, outings and cardgames. I have been a regular attendee to several EPR events, including its annual Spotlighters Performance, the Bocce afternoons and its Hidden Talents concert, all of which reinforce the fun friendly and inclusive nature of the organisation.

While EPR has over 400 members, its key priority over the next twelve months will be the expansion of its membership base. The committee is currently considering strategies to encourage new members and I have offered to design a website to assist in promoting the group.

I wish the incoming committee the best of wishes and I look forward to continuing my association with EPR.

Maroondah Journal: ‘Get tough’ on noise breach

Published by Alex Makin on Tuesday 18th of November, 2008

Alongside the redevelopment of Ringwood Station, the relocation of North Ringwood Community House and the need for greater sustainability and accessibility, is the issue of ongoing noise violations that spoils the amenity of residents along and near Heatherdale Road.

The Maroondah Journal has reported on the ongoing action against CMA Recycling (Victoria) over amenity and noise violations. Maroondah has applied for an enforcement order at VCAT to comply with council’s planning scheme and the EPA has confirmed that CMA is in breach of acceptable noise limits.

Incumbent councillor Alex Makin said he had put pressure on CMA with two successful prosecutions under the Health Act and making the EPA aware of the issues. “I certainly agree that the council needs greater powers to enforce compliance of CMA so I will be pushing the council to change the planning definition of CMA’s activities so we can enforce conditions on the site.”

While the article quoted a number of other candidates, all of whom wanted greater powers but failed to state how they would address the problems experienced by Heatherdale residents.

Over the past three years I been have making a difference for the Heatherdale community through the two successful prosecutions against amenity breaching and further action to hold rogue operators accountable for their actions.

Delegates’ Report: community inclusion, appreciating local history and recognising our many volunteers

Published by Alex Makin on Monday 17th of November, 2008

Thank you, as per previous months there are a few items I will be reporting on this evening:

On the 23rd of October I had a meeting with the Maroondah Skylarkers. The skylarkers is a group that delivers musical performances for senior citizens centres, nursing homes and retirement villages. The skylarkers are already booked out for their 2009 season, but are on the lookout for new members, so if anyone has musical and performing talents and would like to entertain our senior citizens please do consider speaking to the Maroondah Skylarkers.

Later on that afternoon I attended the Monkami Annual General Meeting. Monkami is a non-profit service provider for people with an intellectual disability. Monkami is unique in that is has an emphasis on community inclusion and the centre funds a community inclusion officer to ensure strong connections with the community.

Monkami is involved in a number of community projects, including the highly successful Monkami Drama Group, which has performed two seasons of its Titanic Resunk production, as well as partnerships with Croydon Secondary College and Arts Out East, which includes an exhibition from a number of community groups and will be held between the 21st and 23rd of November.

In addition Monkmai has developed an office administration course, which includes customer service, administrative and computer skills. Through this course, Monkami is exploring the possibility of work placements for these students to demonstrate the capabilities of their students. Two of the students showcased the presentation skills they learnt and their computing and PowerPoint skills were exemplary. Centres like Monkami prove that all people have abilities and it is important that we provide opportunities for these skills to be valued and acknowledged with our community.

On the 6th of November I attended the Eastern Access Community Health Annual General Meeting. EACH is a community based health provider that continues to go from strength to strength.

The guest speaker was human rights advocate Julian Gardiner, who spoke about the need to break down the systemic human rights inequities. Systemic inequities prevent people from recognising their full potential and hamper the delivery of an inclusive society. Organisations like EACH, through its holistic approach to health and wellbeing, as well as Monkami help address this disadvantage.

On the 8th of November I attended the Ringwood and District Historical Society’s bus tour of Ringwood East. The tour included thirteen stops highlighting the history of Ringwood East and explaining the stories behind locations such as Burnt Bridge and the region’s early mining and brick manufacturing industries.

The historical weekend continued through the 9th of November where I attended the Launch of Ringwood East Collections. The book captures some of the memories of Ringwood East through the retelling of thirty-five stories. The book is available for purchase through the Ringwood and District Historical Society and the group is already planning the recollections of Ringwood North, which is due in 2010.

On the 13th of November I was invited, as the Deputy Chair of the Eastern Transport Coalition, to participate in a panel discussion as part of the Victorian Transport Infrastructure Summit. The discussion provided an opportunity to highlight the strong support for better public transport in the eastern suburbs, where the majority of respondents surveyed through the ETC believed that governments were not giving sufficient priority to the provision of public transport.

On the 14th of November I attended the annual performance of Enjoying Planned Retirement’s Spotlighters. I spoke about Spotlighters last year and it was great to see at least one other councillor attending this year’s performance. EPR’s Spotlighters mixes music, singing, acting, tapdancing, comedy and theatre into an extremely polished musical production. Spotlighters is an entertaining event and I do look forward to the 2009 season.

On the 13th of November I attended Maroondah’s Volunteer Recognition Evening and I would like to commend the many people that devote their time to creating a better and more inclusive community. Volunteers are the strength of any society and it is great to see an ongoing interest in people wanting to devote their time to volunteer and community activities.

Lastly, I would like to thank the many community groups and individuals that I have met over the past three years. It is wonderful that we have many committed people within Maroondah and I do wish each and everyone well.

Maroondah Sustainability Strategy Workshop

Published by Alex Makin on Tuesday 11th of November, 2008

This evening I attended a workshop to discuss Maroondah’s Sustainability Strategy which is currently available for public comment.

The Strategy serves to provide a policy framework to improve water and energy conservation, as well as reduce resource usage and to educate both council and the community on the importance of sustainability.

The Strategy will be accompanied by an annual action plan, which will include specific council activities to implement the goals within the plan. The Strategy is expected to be considered by the new council in early 2009 once community feedback has been considered.

It is critical that Maroondah becomes an environmental leader to address climate change. To provide your comments on the document please visit www.maroondah.vic.gov.au.

Councillor Magazine: How councillors can harness the Internet

Published by Alex Makin on Friday 31st of October, 2008

Councillor is a quarterly magazine designed to help educate current councillors and demonstrate innovative approaches to local government.

I was contacted by Councillor Magazine to write an article on how councillors can harness the Internet to assist in encouraging dialogue with their community. The article was featured in the September/October edition of the magazine:

How Councillors can harness the Internet

City of Maroondah councillor Alex Makin has operated his own website and blog since 2004. In this article, Cr Makin describes how councillors can also establish their own website and blog, and why more elected members need to use the Internet to engage the community.

Compared to the UK and the US, Australian politics has been relatively slow to embrace the capabilities of the Internet and its potential to re-engage the community and our constituencies.

While the use of websites is not new, Australian politics is still typically not using the Internet for more than a digital version of their off-line campaigns. The Internet, through the use of blogging has the potential to be so much more.

As local Councillors, representing the needs of our local constituencies, we are best placed to take a leadership role of embracing the Internet to create dialogue and re-engage with our communities.

We need to move beyond static webpages and move into an era of dynamic blogging and dialogue.

Going beyond a website

Some Councillors already have experience with establishing a website. A blog extends the capabilities of a website by providing interactive content.

A website can be likened to a static shop window, which displays information but provides little opportunity for someone to interact with the content.

Standard websites can also become difficult to maintain over the longer term as information becomes out of date.

A blog, otherwise known as weblog, is an interactive website, likened to a diary, that allows you to post new entries, keeping content relevant and allows people to post comments and subscribe to updates.

Blogs use categories and tags to file new content and provides readers with the opportunities to subscribe to updates so they are notified when new content is posted.

Getting started - what do you need?

Establishing a website is neither difficult nor expensive.

There are numerous free tools, such as www.wordpress.com or www.blogspot.com, which provide templates and a basic blogging presence free of charge. Using these tools you can set up your blog, complete with photographs and content within 10 to 15 minutes.

While these free tools provide you with a good start, there are advantages in having your own web presence.

To do this you firstly need a domain name. A domain is the physical name of the site, such as www.alexmakin.com.au. Domain names are easier for people to remember and also provide greater flexibility in how your site will look and function. A .com.au domain normally costs around $65 per year, US .com domains are slightly cheaper.

Secondly, you need a web host. The host provides the computing system that stores your website and makes it viewable on the Internet. Total costs for hosting a site varies but you generally do get what you pay for.

If you want to set up a blog you’ll need a host that supports database and dynamic capabilities, namely functionality called mySQL and PHP. Most mid-level hosting packages provide these features.

I use a carbon neutral hosting provider that provides maximum reliability and detailed site statistics, my costs are roughly $300 per annum.

While free blogging providers certainly have their use, your own dedicated web presence will provide you with greater flexibility in the functionality and features of your site.

In addition many hosting providers are able to supply detailed site statistics so you can ascertain how people are accessing your website and the content they are accessing.

Getting your blog online

One of the common mistakes people make is keeping their blog separate to the rest of their website.

Web users typically dislike navigating through a site; so if the content isn’t there when the page loads, it is unlikely that they will look to find what they want.

Likewise don’t reinvent the wheel. There are many blogging programs, such as Wordpress (www.wordpress.org) that are available free of charge and provide the functionality that you need.

Wordpress and other blogging tools, such as Movetable Type use templates that guide the layout of a site. There are many templates that are available and these can be further customised.

Once you have downloaded Wordpress or a similar package, you will need to upload to your website. Your hosting provider should be able to assist with this, once uploaded you will be able to install the package and begin blogging.

Wordpress (which is the program I use), allows you to create two types of content, pages and posts. Pages are designed to be static content that is always available, like contact or about pages. These are the links across the top of my site.

Pages contain information that generally does not change, such as my contact details or information about the ward I represent.

Posts are the blogging element of your site. Posts are filed in specific categories (such as urban sustainability, accessibility, delegates reports that I use on my site), as well as tags, which help define the content of the post (such as accessibility, public transport, planning and so on).

Posts relate to a certain event or activity that occurred at a point in time and hence newer content appears towards the top of the page. Blog posts can be used to discuss council events, community meetings or other activities you undertake as a councillor.

When I first designed the website in 2004, the concept of blogging was still relatively new, so I referred to the blog as an Internet Journal.

The Journal stores the posts I created with the five newest entries listed first.

Each blog post provides an opportunity for people to comment. This way your community can add their thoughts or ask for additional information.

Blog posts can also be linked to each other, meaning you can provide an easy chronology of events. For example, I link my delegates’ reports, to each event that I discuss so that people can easily find additional information on the activities I attend and speak about.

Posts and pages are created just like using a standard Word Processor or email program. Like email you can also attach other documents to your posts to allow people to download additional content, I normally discuss presentations I deliver and include the slides for people to download.

The template system in Wordpress or similar tools controls the layout of the post so you simply need to type its content. This means each post and page will have a similar look and make it easier for people to navigate throughout your site.

My website has had three substantially different designs and the template system meant the content of my site was unaffected by these changes.

Separating the layout of a site from its contents makes it much easier to maintain and extend compared to traditional web pages.

Extending your blog

Comments are usually moderated meaning that they need your approval prior to being included on your blog. This means you have the possibility to prevent inappropriate comments from being included on your site. Likewise spam filters exist which block spam comments from appearing.

While you have the ultimate control over what comments are included within your blog, do not go overboard in preventing feedback.

The purpose of a blog is to encourage dialogue and interaction and all relevant comments should be encouraged. Also make sure that email and phone details are available as some people will prefer these methods of communication.

Once you have established your blog and website it is worth considering ways of expanding its reach. Blogs utilise RSS feeds which allows people to be notified when new posts are created.

RSS feeds operate similarly to email where a subscriber receives the content of the post. RSS feeds are a standard feature of blogs and it is worth encouraging your readers to subscribe to them.

In addition you can also create an email subscription list for people that prefer to receive emails. This way email subscribers can receive an email message of your blog post and raise awareness of the activities you undertake as a councillor.

Just as newsletters assist in informing the community about our activities as a councillor, an electronic newsletter or RSS feeds can expand the reach of your communications with the public.

Wordpress has a number of plugins, which can add additional features. Examples of plugins include the calendar and event system I use on my site. This enables me to post details of meetings I attend. Likewise previous posts can be accessed through the calendar or using the search functionality.

The web as an accessible medium

The Internet, through accessible web standards, means we can truly create a medium that can be experienced and accessed by all people.

Screen readers, larger font sizes, colour contrast and other technologies are available to assist people with disabilities to view content on the Internet and your website should be mindful of accessibility issues.

For example screen readers cannot read images so any graphics you include on your site should not be used in place of text.

In addition, the layout of your site should be mindful of people who prefer larger font sizes and your site should adapt to these requirements.

Future use of the Internet by councillors

Councils are the closest form of government to the community and we need to consider new methods of encouraging community engagement and interaction. In particular the web has the potential to assist us in communicating with younger people, as well as people with disabilities and the many other people in our community that prefer communication via the Internet.

Just as mobile phones are now considered essential equipment for Councillors, no doubt a web presence will be seen as a necessity shortly into the future. As councillors we have an obligation to remain relevant and keep pace with new technologies.

Creating a web presence is neither difficult nor time consuming and while purchasing your own domain and hosting provider may incur some expense it will be of benefit to the wider community and assist in conveying the work you undertake as a councillor.