Page 3887 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 30 November 2021
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I can cite a couple of examples of collaboration in action. Caroline Chisholm School is one, where an ACT Health initiative called It’s Your Move has benefited from collaboration between the ACT Health Directorate, the Education Directorate, Caroline Chisholm senior school campus, the TCCS, the University of Canberra and the Office for Mental Health and Wellbeing to progress It’s Your Move outdoor environment project. In late 2020, Caroline Chisholm students consulted with their broad school community in Chisholm and worked with undergraduate design students from the University of Canberra to co-design an innovative outdoor environment for the Caroline Chisholm senior campus. These students developed five distinct design concepts to facilitate outdoor learning opportunities, increase physical activity and improve mental health outcomes.
A dirt bike track is the first stage of the implementation, made possible through shared funding contributions by the ACT government. Importantly, the bike track on school grounds will remain publicly accessible, adding significant play value and play diversity to the Chisholm area. This is the first collaborative play space project attributable to the Better Suburbs play space forum and the pending play space strategy.
Florey Primary School provides another example of a local approach that has been driven by the school community in seeking better access to quality open space for the students. This is a unique circumstance which is having an individual approach so that the school has more open green space, using part of the dryland oval that exists there. In this instance I have had the chance to meet with and hear firsthand from students and community members about their needs. I can report that this collaborative approach, which is led by the Education Directorate with the support from TCCS, will continue to seek to meet their needs through future enhancements to the Florey dryland oval. I am really looking forward to continuing to work with the Florey Primary School community to ensure that they have a green space that is sustainable and meets the needs of that school community more broadly.
Every community has its own unique perspective on what it needs to enhance the local area, but the principles of equity and consistency are very important to this government, and it takes a holistic approach to such matters to ensure that available resources are distributed in a fair, transparent and effective way. To this end, strategic policy documents are important to guide decision making. There are currently two processes underway in this regard, both of which will support the intent of this motion.
I can advise that TCCS, as the custodian of urban open space, is leading a review of statutory public land management plans for urban open space to update existing plans. These plans identify the areas of public land and associated management objectives and design how the management objectives will be implemented and promoted. This review is expected to be finalised and a draft plan provided for community consultation. In 2022 the draft plan will specifically consider management prescriptions for dryland ovals as a category of urban open space and will provide an opportunity for community views and aspirations to be heard. In addition, Minister Steel recently released a draft play space strategy, which is available for the community to have input until 14 December via the YourSay website.
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