Page 1822 - Week 05 - Thursday, 2 April 2009
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MS PORTER (Ginninderra) (3.50): I am pleased to be able to speak to this matter of public importance today. I have a particularly strong interest in the area, and I thank Ms Hunter for bringing the matter forward.
During the last term I was involved with members of the Hall and District Progress Association on a number of matters regarding the village of Hall. These matters range from the community facilities available to the development that the minister mentioned during his address on this matter, including the future of the school site and the future of the school museum.
I was approached by members of the Hall and District Progress Association and other residents. On Friday, 2 July 2006 I met with them regarding plans for the Hall school precinct and the use of the headmaster’s cottage by the association and other community groups. I also had a number of meetings in the village with Alastair Crombie, president of the association, and other members of the Hall and District Progress Association. I had many conversations with Alastair regarding the association’s concerns and ideas and on 11 August 2008 I facilitated and attended a meeting at the school attended by staff from the minister’s office and officers of the Department of Territory and Municipal Services property group and members of the progress association and the parents and citizens association to discuss possible options for community facilities.
I also worked with the association to support their application for funds to progress an education program involving the school museum and, lastly, to support the establishment of a domain name for the Hall village website. I was pleased to be invited to be with the people of Hall on the occasion of the launch of the website, which is an up-to-date and fantastic tool that the Hall residents use to attract and inform visitors to the area.
Unfortunately, the heritage grant application, as is often the case with such applications, was not successful. I well know from my previous roles in many community organisations the disappointment that one feels when one’s organisation’s application does not get a guernsey. As we know, there are always many applications, and they cannot possibly all be accommodated.
Nevertheless, I continued to work with the association to support their further efforts to obtain other financial resources to enable this project to go ahead. I was pleased to be able to assist with both the domain name and to support the heritage grant and the plans for the museum’s education program.
Regarding the school site, when I and the minister’s advisers and departmental officers met with the association and representatives of the parents and citizens association on site during the last term, it was stated by all the Hall representatives that they needed to get back to me and the minister’s adviser on the make-up of a steering committee that would work with the government to advance a master plan that would include plans for the Hall school site and the parkland adjacent to it. It was agreed that the school museum would remain and the headmaster’s cottage would continue to be used by community groups in Hall. The department mentioned work
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