Councillor Chris Harris

On 10th December 2007 Clover Moore used her casting vote to lock out young people who want to use their skate boards in Prince Alfred Park. The first time that Councillors heard that the skate plaza was to be deleted was at a briefing on Monday 26th November. It had been in the masterplan from the first draft. It looks like the voices who regard young skaters as “undesirable” have been most loudly heard by the Lord Mayor.

In 2006 the City conducted two community consultation meetings at Redfern Town Hall where residents were asked to nominate the facilities that they wanted to see in the park. At the first meeting residents supported the provision of skating facilities and a group of young people turned up and spoke of their desire for a modern skate facility in the park. I personally attended that meeting and I am very disappointed that the submissions of young people and the recommendations of a council funded  ‘Skate Facility Needs Study’ have been ignored.

In July 2006 Council unanimously endorsed an independent study into skating facilities in the City of Sydney. This study recommended a skate facility as a priority in Prince Alfred Park. When I pointed this out at the council meeting the only reason given by the Clover Moore Party was that it  considered that there would be an over-abundance of hard surfaces if the skate park was included. If increased hard surface is an issue then why are we increasing the number of tennis courts from three to five? Anyone who uses the park knows that most of the park, aside from the pool area, is grassy open space. The skate park will use only a small fraction of that space.

There is clearly a pressing need. The ‘Skate Facility Needs Study’ points out that 20.2% of the City population is aged 12-24 years and finds that  ‘The current state of facilities also does not encourage use by generalist young people and local students.’ The report goes on to recommend that ‘best practice research has shown that these spaces are most successfully located in multi-purpose facilities, co-located with other programs and services that will attract young people… Recent research has identified that they would prefer to share public space and community facilities than be isolated from them.’ The report also nominates the best sites as ‘Providing youth facilities in safe, visible locations, near public transport’

Staff previously told councilors that community facilities should be multi-use to be most effective and now they are saying that they will investigate Belmore Park, Victoria Park and Hay St Plaza. However, there are no other youth facilities in these locations so this is contrary to what council knows is best practice. Plus, the City doesn’t even own Hay St Plaza – it is owned by SHFA.”

Prince Alfred Park is ideal for a skate facility. The park contains a swimming pool, tennis courts and a very well used basketball court area. Plus it is right next door to Central railway station. Perfect for city based kids and those who travel to the city to skate.

I am very concerned that prejudice is holding sway here because the arguments against the skate park just don’t make any sense. The Lord Mayor should be including the young people of Sydney who want to skate not shutting them out.

Link to council report: council-report-skating-needs.pdf

Link to independent consultant report: independent-report-skating-needs.pdf

The recent launch of the City of Sydney Library’s GLBTIQ Collection at Newtown Library was an auspicious occasion, especially for a Greens Councillor.

It was an honour to say a few words and cut the cake at the launch which was the culmination of much inspiration and dedication by many people committed to highlighting and recording issues relating to the gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, intersex and queer communities. It was great to be in the company of people passionate about the Collection like John Witte, Secretary of the Pride History Group, Dorothy McRae McMahon, editor of the South Sydney Herald, and historians Garry Wotherspoon and Gary Simes at the launch.

The Collection, which at present includes more than 450 items of fiction, non-fiction, reference and audio-visual items, was made possible by a $35,000 open grant from the State Library of NSW - Kathleen Bresnehan graciously represented the State Library at the launch. Many items in the collection were generously donated by Larry Galbraith. The project ultimately aims to purchase about 1000 items. The collection covers a broad range of topics ranging from same-sex parenting, sexual and gender identity, art, history, economics, politics and also teen fiction.

The City of Sydney Library aims to develop a fully-fledged GLBTIQ public events program to provide an accessible space to raise awareness and educate the larger community and strengthen partnerships within GLBTIQ organisations.

Newtown, which is increasingly called “home” by Sydney’s GLBTIQ community, is a perfect location for the Collection, but items can also be borrowed from Surry Hills and Kings Cross and are also searchable in the online library catalogue, through Libraries Australia and inter-library loans.

Childcare is the biggest issue for working women with children.  The question is whether the City of Sydney council wants to or is prepared to deal with this issue.

In a motion put to Council, Councillor Harris is called on the City of Sydney to prepare a report to establish the feasibility of providing a crèche on site for the children of council staff.

“As one of Sydney’s major employers, the City of Sydney Council should be setting the example not lagging behind private enterprise in providing quality childcare facilities” according to Greens Councillor, Chris Harris.

“The greatest investment a society can make is in its children. Companies such as Lend Lease in the city, IBM at Pennant Hills and the NSW Police Headquarters at Parramatta realise this and are already leading the way with in-house childcare facilities” Cr. Harris said

“Since 1994 the Body Shop’s head office in Melbourne have had an 86-place childcare facility that provides care and education programs for children aged from birth to five. They also provide a special room with kitchenette and work station where a parent can spend the day with a sick child.

“The advantage for companies that provide childcare facilities is that their staff are more wiling to return to work earlier. There is a severe shortage of childcare places, especially in the 0-2 year group.  If mothers know they can breastfeed their babies at work and that they only have to make one trip to work rather than dashing off to childcare centres then they have an incentive to return to work sooner.  Cr Harris said.

“But it’s not just the convenience of having childcare facilities that is behind my motion, studies have shown that conflicts between employee’s work and family can hinder overall productivity.

“If we provide high quality childcare facilities for our staff, we would not only be investing in our workforce, but we would be providing a safe and secure environment in which our children can grow and learn. If because of this initiative, productivity improves then that’s an added bonus,” Councillor Harris said

Cr Harris’ motion was supported by all councillors present and the staff will now prepare a report for a future council meeting on how an internal childcare facility can be provided. 

Greens Councillor Chris Harris has nominated the City of Sydney Council for a positive award at the Greens Bad Development Awards. The Awards, run by Greens MP Sylvia Hale, target bad developments and councils, but also have categories which recognise good developments and initiatives.

The City of Sydney has 15 water harvesting and recycling systems already installed with another 34 underway, and Councillor Harris, an often outspoken critic of bad developments and the lack of sustainable initiatives, is impressed by the positive steps the Council is taking on water.

“I’m usually the dissenting voice on developments and issues that do nothing to help make this city sustainable, so it’s good to be able to promote initiatives that will help the city reduce its reliance on mains water and the volume of stormwater discharged into our waterways,” Councillor Harris said. Read the rest of this entry »