Kaleidoscope - March 2020

Mayor’s message

Gary and Jack visiting the bushfire affected Kingston region, removing hundreds of damaged trees during the clean-up process. We recently sent a separate fourperson crew over to Kangaroo Island to assist with the recovery effort. It is the generosity of these people that make our City a special place to live, and I am thankful for all our residents and businesses who have also dedicated their time and skills in investing in rebuilding affected areas.

We have a strong focus this edition on sustainability given our Climate Emergency response within City of Charles Sturt on page six. It is crucial to our council and community that we adapt and respond efficiently to this ongoing issue.

With over 105 diverse cultures and just as many languages, we are a popular destination for people who want community, diversity and a future.

Hello everyone, and welcome to the first edition of Kaleidoscope for 2020. As we look forward to the new decade, our Council and Elected Members are working hard to make our shared vision part of every decision we make.

In this 45th edition, we showcase the best of our community with our Charles Sturt Arborists Matt,

Mayor

Angela Evans

Phone: (08) 8408 1103 angelaevans@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Councillors

Semaphore Park Ward

Cr Stuart Ghent, JP

Phone: (08) 8449 9430 Mobile: 0418 499 431 sghent@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Cr Gerard Ferrao, JP Mobile: 0411 775 391 gferrao@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Grange Ward

Cr Sarah McGrath

Mobile: 0474 544 936 smcgrath@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

In this edition, we also get to know our Australia Day community winners who have dedicated their valuable time to make the City of Charles Sturt a great place to live. Along with countless others, our three winners are integral in our mission of cultivating a deeper sense of belonging and connection.

Cr Tom Scheffler

Phone: (08) 7225 2782 tscheffler@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Henley Ward

Cr Kenzie van den Nieuwelaar Mobile: 0450 869 935 kvandennieuwelaar@charlessturt. sa.gov.au

Cr Paul Sykes, JP Mobile: 0414 499 394 psykes@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Woodville Ward

Cr Oanh Nguyen Mobile: 0413 333 189 onguyen@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Cr Charlotte Watson Mobile: 0411 338 789 cwatson@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

On page eight, we reflect on 19 on Green’s development as a community centre in Bowden. Our community is a rich one, made up of residents from every corner of the globe. Like our community at 19 on Green, we pride ourselves on being a City for all people. A city where people unite to feel safe, included and connected to others.

Charles Sturt is a special place to live because of the people who choose to live in our City. They could choose to live elsewhere, but people have chosen us.

West Woodville Ward

Cr Tolley Wasylenko, JP

Phone: (08) 8268 3249 Mobile: 0428 282 624 twasylenko@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Cr Kelly Thomas Mobile: 0450 220 487 kellythomas@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Findon Ward

Cr George Turelli Phone: (08) 8356 7169 Mobile: 0419 999 575 gturelli@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Cr Helen Hibeljic Mobile: 0431 072 073 hhibeljic@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

I hope you have had a positive start to this year, and are excited for what this decade holds in our community.

Hindmarsh Ward

Cr Paul Alexandrides Mobile: 0418 500 924 palexandrides@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Cr Alice Campbell Mobile: 0425 351 177 acampbell@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Beverley Ward

Cr Edgar Agius, OAM, JP Phone: (08) 8445 7643 Mobile: 0424 451 154 eagius@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Cr Matt Mitchell Mobile: 0415 350 740 mmitchell@charlessturt.sa.gov.au

Kaleidoscope, distributed to your letterbox four times per year, provides information about Council and our City in an easy to read format. twitter.com/CharlesSturtSA | facebook.com/CityofCharlesSturt Printed by Finsbury Green 1A South Road, Thebarton SA 5031

Angela Evans, Mayor

Our Australia Day Community Winners

Community Event of the Year - Toy Boys Annual Distribution Day

For almost 30 years, the Toy Boys have been working tirelessly to improve children’s lives through play and giving kids something of their very own.

The network of retired men have created beautiful hand-made wooden toys, including everything from trucks to doll houses.

Before the Christmas season each year, the Toy Boys invite charity organisations such as the Salvation Army, St Vincent de Paul and Uniting Care to share their creations with families in need.

The Toy Boys selflessly offer their time to brighten children’s lives, and it provides them with fellowship, comradery and skills development.

New members come and go, but their vision always remains the same: To support, nurture and bring joy to the community’s upcoming generations.

Young Citizen of the YearLila Tran

Lila is not your average school student. Now in Year 11 at Mount Carmel College, Lila has been instrumental in making her school a better place to be for other students.

Last year, Lila was part of the St Vincent de Paul Sleepout where she not only raised money while sleeping rough for the night, but also helped bake 300 muffins to feed homeless people in the community.

Lila is always the first to put her hand up to help others. With many Year 7 students adjusting to life at high school for the first time, she helped to make sure the younger students felt welcomed and supported. She has also secured a position as a Student Leader for 2020.

Citizen of the Year - Linda MacGillivray OAM

As a well-known icon of Adelaide’s western suburbs, Linda MacGillivray has been the Girl Guide Leader at Woodville South Girl Guides for 47 years.

Linda empowers her unit to develop a varied, fun and educational program for every Guide, ensuring they feel special and challenged.

As the Leader in Charge of Camp Amity, an annual camp run by Guides for children with special needs, Linda works closely with Novita Children’s Services, invites children to the camp, visits service groups, and applies for grants so the camp can continue to be a free service for children to learn new skills.

Recently, she was presented with the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl ScoutsAsia Pacific, Adult Leaders Achievement Award for Unit Leaders and was awarded an Order of Australia Medal in 2008.

Linda’s leadership, guidance and support are unquestionable, but it’s her patience and warm nature that makes her a figure the young Guides can look up to.

Community Event of the Year winner Toy Boys Annual Distribution Day Peter Read, Tony Curtis and John Cook with special guest Australia Day Ambassador Michael Keelan and Mayor Angela Evans

Young Citizen of the Year winner Lila Tran with Michael Keelan and Mayor Angela Evans

Citizen of the Year winner Linda MacGillivray with Michael Keelan and Mayor Angela Evans

The Australia Day Awards and Citizenship Ceremony celebrates our amazing community. Congratulations to all winners and nominees.

Arborists volunteer to support bushfire clean up

When our very own Arborists, Matt Bailey, Gary Thomson and Jack Ashcroft, arrived on the outskirts of a bushfire affected Kingston, they knew they were facing a major challenge in the clean-up process.

Started by dry lightning on the morning of December 30, the Keilira fire burned more than 25,000 hectares with a perimeter of 76 kilometres, destroyed three properties, 2,000 bales of hay, hundreds of kilometres of fencing and an estimated 3,000 sheep.

“You see the fires everywhere on the news and just want to do something, so it was great to have the opportunity to helpout,” Jack said.

“We put our hands up straight away,” Matt said.

With many years of experience behind them, the crew spent a week in the area clearing hazardous burnt out trees. They also made assessments on the trees that weren’t too badly burnt, saving around half of what was damaged.

Despite their lengthy experience as arborists, they say that the different terrain made the experience more challenging compared to their usual metro work within our City.

“You could feel the heat underneath your feet,” Gary said.

“I honestly thought the bottom of my shoes were going to melt some days.”

Working 12-hour shifts and knocking down two to three hundred trees a day meant almost two thousand trees were cleared over the space of a week with some trees almost one hundred feet long. That’s a lot of trees!

While the work was challenging, they all agreed that the people in Kingston and their sense of community stood out the most.

“You can’t beat that community spirit,” Jack said.

“People driving through would pull over and say thank you as we were working, which was encouraging.”

“The community really had ours and each-others backs,” Matt said.

Nat Traeger, CEO of Kingston District Council had the same sentiment of appreciation as the locals passing through.

“It was like winning cross-lotto, Kingston Style!”

“Having a competent and experienced crew to work alongside our team over the whole fire front was reassuring at a time when our resources were being stretched to the limit.”

As a small community, Kingston District Council has just ten staff, with only two looking after all parks and gardens.

While Traeger says the community is resilient and still getting it done, they are thankful that our staff were able to jump on board to help.

“They demonstrated high work ethic and put in long days with a can-do attitude.”

At the peak of their usual tourism season, Kingston now awaits a long recovery process, including rebuilding over 400 kilometres of lost fencing.

Despite the immense damage, Traeger says the Kingston

community is thankful that a large council would reach out with a generous offer of support.

Rebuilding communities is a long term process – please continue to offer support where you can to affected communities. You can donate to local bushfire relief funds across SA by searching online for your nominated organisation, or visit the State Government coordinated appeal at sa.gov.au/bushfireappeal

Matt Bailey, Jack Ashcroft and Gary Thomson

FREE School Holiday Sports a smash hit!

Our School Holiday sports program (run by local sporting clubs and sport providers) is held during the April and October school holidays each year and is open to all children aged 3-17 years to come along and try a new sport.

Our October 2019 School Holiday sports program saw more than 1,600 kids participating in 84 sessions across 21 different sports and 26 local sporting providers within our City, including the West Lakes Tennis Club who had strong participation numbers over the two weeks.

Club President, Col Lawson was extremely pleased with the

participation numbers and is excited by the positive outcome for their club.

“The Charles Sturt School Holiday Sports program has been outstandingly successful for our club, and we had more than 200 school kids across 5 sessions during the two-week program,” Col said.

Since the program, the club has signed up 10 new primary school aged kids for tennis coaching and an additional 50 kids from West Lakes Shore Primary School alone.

“That’s 60 new school kids who have now joined our club because of the previous school holiday program”.

These children have begun lessons and will be promoted to Hot Shots and Junior tennis teams as they develop their skills.

The next School Holiday Sports Program will be held during the April school holidays (11 April 2020 – 26 April 2020).

The program is in addition to the school holiday activities held across our Libraries and Community Centres. To find out more about our school holiday programs and how you can book visit charlessturt.sa.gov.au/ schoolholidays

ENVIRONMENT

Climate Emergency in Charles Sturt

9 December

organisations to use when responding to the challenges of climate change. Starting this year, Council will report annually on our actions to address climate change as part of the program.

This partnership and our endorsed commitment to climate change have set a clear direction for our council.

Given the summer we’ve just had, we believe additional effort is not only necessary, but an urgent matter.

This declaration is a commitment to real and immediate action on climate change. It further strengthens Council’s previous commitment to joining the Cities Power Partnership – an Australian-based platform operated nationally by the Climate Council - that provides support and a reporting framework for local government

The latest advice from the Climate Council, the IPCC and others is that approximately 1.1 degrees of warming has already occurred globally, and 1.5 degrees of warming is highly likely based on current global commitments. Keeping temperature increases to well below 2 degrees will require urgent action by all of us.

We will all need to ‘think global, act local’ to reduce our emissions, and adapt to the changes that are no longer avoidable.

Our organisational response will be delivered across Council’s operations, informed by the

science and prioritised to ensure greatest impact. We are collaborating with neighbouring Councils, including through the region’s AdaptWest climate change adaptation program, which was established in 2017. We are also liaising with other Councils across Australia that have made similar commitments to urgent action on climate change.

These efforts build on Council’s previous actions to address climate change, some of which include:

• Establishment of the Western Adelaide region’s AdaptWest Climate change adaptation program, jointly with the Cities of Port Adelaide Enfield and West Torrens

• A major program to upgrade Council’s streetlighting to energy efficient LED lights – 7,850 lights changed over from 2018-2020

• Solar power installed on 26 Council buildings, with an additional seven solar systems scheduled for delivery in 2020 – totalling 505KW of solar power on Council buildings

• A major energy efficiency program at Council’s Civic Centre complex, which resulted in a 20% energy efficiency improvement. Savings from this program funded community energy efficiency grants for clubs and grants in our buildings

• A solar hot water program for eight sports clubs located in our buildings across our City

If you would like to learn more about the Western Adelaide region’s climate change adaptation response, visit www.adaptwest.com.au

On

2019, we declared a Climate Emergency in the City of Charles Sturt.

Managing your waste

We’re committed to providing the best in waste, recycling and green organics services. Together, we can make our City a clean and sustainable community.

We provide a 3-stream residential waste collection service to manage your household waste. Our Residential Waste and Recycling Policy provides a domestic waste, recycling and organics bin per rateable property.

You can also grab a free kitchen caddy from our Civic Centre, with free compostable bags to help collect organic waste within your household for disposal in the green organics bin. Food scraps make up around 40% of the weight of household rubbish so using these can really help lighten your blue bin.

But, what can I do if it just won’t fit?

The Residential Waste and Recycling Policy also provides opportunity for residents to request additional bins and collection.

The cost of an additional service includes the initial supply of the bin with an annual service fee as outlined in the table.

Growing together: 19 on Green

Formerly known as The Bowden Brompton Community Centre, 19 on Green (namely at 19 Green Street) was acquired by council in 2015. Following its closure and renovations in 2016/2017 prior to its re-opening, 19 on Green has been working hard to become a place where the long, rich history of the area blends with the evolving opportunities presented by the large-scale developments in Bowden and Brompton.

The centre has been achieving this by steadily increasing its activities and programming, with staff and volunteers constantly exploring and introducing new ways for the community to get involved and come together. 19 on Green is drawing on locally sourced skills and talent for many

of its initiatives, and there is no shortage of either in the Bowden Brompton area. Whether it’s making environmentally friendly cleaning products, developing practical graphic design skills, exploring inks and paints or simply coming together for a game of table tennis, 19 on Green has a simple goal in mind – that there be something for everyone. 19 on Green finds it particularly important to be family friendly environment. The Grubbies on Green nature playgroup meets weekly and provides children the opportunity to learn about the creatures and plants in the garden, while a new partnership with ‘Unity’ has introduced inter-generational activities to the centre. Many of these activities are available for gold coin donation or provided free to give all families the opportunity to attend.

To meet the needs of students, self-employed and small businesses, 19 on Green has established Co-Work on Green; a space where people can study and work with dedicated desk space and office services. The centre has also struck up a

partnership with local job services agencies to provide employment advice and recently offered the City of Charles Sturt’s Digital Spring Board workshop to help bring business ideas to life.

“We are home to a number of small business operators and entrepreneurs, and I admire their drive and passion. We want to see local residents succeed in business and by working with them we are able to quickly bring new and creative programs to the community”, Michael Abbott, Community Development Officer, said.

In addition to community and centre-led activities, 19 on Green is proving a popular hire space for community groups and service providers who take advantage of the affordable fees, mixed use spaces and great facilities for meetings, workshops, training, events and programs. There are currently over 30 regular groups and organisations who use the large community kitchen, multimedia room or meeting spaces and we know why, with one recent hirer describing it as ‘…a fantastic facility with fantastic service’.

The centre also offers its spacious function room, playroom and outdoor gardens for kids’ birthday parties, baby showers and family functions and has developed a great network of local entertainers, caters and planners to make special occasions memorable ones. Staff, volunteers and community members are all part of making the centre a hub of activity. With a strong commitment to working with local leaders, building on the strengths and interest of residents and recognising the community as the primary drivers of change, 19 on Green continues to grow with the local community.

Amy, who has been volunteering with the centre since 2019, loves that the centre has been working on creating a welcoming space for locals to drop in to; “it’s wonderful to be able to drop in, have a chat, pick up a book and see what else is happening. It has become a really inviting space.”

Find out what’s on at your local community centre, visit our website charlessturt.sa.gov.au/ communityspaces

Located at Bowden/ Brompton, 19 on Green is at the heart of the local community.

Where to find your local library

We have five libraries conveniently located across our City. Where is your local?

Hindmarsh Library is for the dreamers amongst us and it is evident as soon as you see the architecturally unique building. With its large open spaces and floor to ceiling windows on one side of the library, the natural lighting is perfect for art exhibitions and being only a short walk from the tram, it also provides quiet study places for students. Moveable collections (collections that can travel between locations) also enable us to be more creative with the many events we hold throughout the year, such as our popular children’s weekly Storytime sessions, art workshops and family history courses.

Sometimes there’s nothing better than heading down to the beach, laying down a towel, popping your big floppy hat on and laying back with a book in hand. So where better to visit first than our Henley Beach Library. Borrow a book, or perhaps even a Kindle, and sit back and relax to the sound of the waves crashing onto the shore. When you’ve had enough of the beach, why not escape the sun to check your emails and catch up on the latest news with our public computers and free wi-fi?

West Lakes Library might be on the fringe of the shopping precinct, but it sure draws in a crowd every day of the week. With our extensive collection of European language items, art exhibition space, author talks and publishing workshops, children’s Babytime, Toddlertime and Storytime sessions, and technology help every second

Sunday, there’s something to suit everyone.

Findon Shopping Centre is a great communal space and the Findon Library is no different. Grab a takeaway coffee a few doors down and settle into our café style chairs and lounges to read a magazine or the daily newspaper. We also provide meeting spaces for our community to use during library opening hours, and we are hugely popular with the Italian community for our range of Italian language books, magazines and DVDs. They say if you’re looking for items in an Indian or Asian language, the Civic (Woodville) Library is your place to go, and with over 15 different languages available, we try our hardest to deliver. Speaking of languages, if you have trouble communicating with technology why not attend one of our many digital training sessions in our state of the art

hub? We’ll delve into anything from basic computing, social media, to job searching and building your own business. During breaks you can even take advantage of our private courtyard area filled with deck chairs, plenty of shade and free wi-fi access.

Have you heard of our Express Collection?

If you don’t want to wait months for those new items to hit the shelves check out the express collection at a library branch near you. Here’s how it works:

• One week loan

• No renewals

• No reservations

• Two items at a time

Just look out for the special express slip and grab your favourite titles before anybody else does.

Visit our libraries today or go to charlessturt.sa.gov.au/library

Getting the most out of our assets

The Asset Management Team regularly conducts audits across our council area to ensure we receive maximum life of our assets and to help identify areas for improvement. One such audit is our kerbing and gutter review.

Transport Assets plan

Over the last 12 months we have been auditing the condition of our Transport Assets and revising the service level they need to provide.

The aim of our work has been to develop a Transport Asset Management Plan (AMP). The main goal of our Transport

AMP is to combine the existing management plans for roads, paths, bridges, carparks and traffic control devices to develop a single overarching Management Plan. This will allow us to manage Transport Assets at a network level, meaning our projects can be integrated and aligned accordingly.

What are Transport Assets?

Transport Assets are all assets that have a primary function of facilitating the movement of people and goods within our City. They are critical for day to day life of the local community and have an overall value of $884 million. Transport Assets include;

• Roads (consisting of road seals, road pavement, kerb and gutter, on-street car parking areas)

• Walking and Cycling Paths and Kerb Access Ramps

• Bridges and Boardwalks

• Traffic Control Devices

(i.e. roundabouts and speed humps)

• Bus Stop Assets (Surface and Shelters)

• Off Street Carparks

What are Asset Management Plans for?

Asset Management Plans communicate the actions required for the management of transport assets owned and maintained by our council (and services provided from assets), compliance with regulatory requirements, and funding needed to provide the required levels of service over a 20-year planning period.

To manage these assets correctly, we need to spend (on average) $19 million each year on maintenance, renewal and upgrade. This ensures our assets are safe and people can get to their destinations safely using their mode of transport.

For more information, visit charlessturt.sa.gov.au/amp

Two of our team are out walking the streets in our City, collecting information on our kerb conditions to help us better plan our repair and replacement work. You may have noticed them walking down your street, avenue, lane or road with devices in hand, looking at the kerbing in your area.

By the time they finish this review, they will have walked some 1,200kms. That’s further than the scenic route from Adelaide to Melbourne via the Great Ocean Road!

One year on: Revisiting the Immunisation Clinic

It’s been one year since our Immunisation Clinic moved into the St Clair Recreation Centre on Woodville Road. Since then, the clinic has been a booming success.

Expanding the site has allowed for greater support of a healthy community. With more immunisation rooms, a bigger seated waiting area and a parents room, the patients feel comfortable, which is the clinic’s number one priority.

“I think we’ve been successful because we try to ensure parents and children feel safe,” Immunisation Coordinator Jenny Kutyna said.

“It’s extremely important for the young children who visit as they can be having up to three injections at a time.”

Not only has the move been beneficial for patients, but the clinic has also welcomed others from far and wide.

In January, the clinic hosted 30 Korean nursing students for an educational information session. Flying over from Jinju City in South Korea, the students were in Australia for two weeks

and set aside a block of time to learn about community and youth health, which is unlike any program they have in South Korea.

In conjunction with TAFE SA, we were the only Council invited to participate because of our community support programs. The students were particularly interested in how our Local Government connects community into public health.

Along with the clinic’s educational programs and the development of our City’s community health, the clinic also has frequent drop-in times.

“Compared to other nearby clinics, we certainly run more drop-in sessions,” Jenny said.

“The clinic is able to run all these sessions because of the support of our council.”

The clinic is open to the public every Tuesday and Friday between 10am and 12.30pm. Sessions also run every second and fourth Monday of the month between 10am and 12.30pm, and covers later hours every first and third Thursday of the month between 4.30pm and 7pm.

“We are very lucky the City of Charles Sturt is able to fund the need for our patients and promote our services to the public,” Jenny said.

The busy location, inside St Clair Recreation Centre, has also brought more traffic with a larger area for parking on site, as well as parking spots nearby on Brocas Avenue.

For more information and to see the available immunisation times for 2020, visit charlessturt.sa.gov. au/immunisation

Ducks dying for bread…

away from danger or to another area to feed.

Uneaten bread left in the water can grow mould which causes a fatal lung infection in ducks (aspergillosis) and it pollutes the water, impacting on other aquatic life in the vicinity.

Feeding bread to ducks and other birds may seem harmless and something fun to do with the kids, but did you know that it can also harm them?

While Charles Sturt’s feathered friends may respond fondly to the sight of bread, it does not mean it’s good for them. When ducks fill up on bread, they don’t eat the food that is beneficial to them.

Bread is like junk food for ducks – high in calories and low in nutrients. Feeding a duck a

slice of bread is the kilojoule equivalent of giving a human three slices of pizza. While that may be okay occasionally, when this happens multiple times a day, (because it’s not just you that feeds the ducks) this quickly adds up to being an unhealthy diet.

Living on this junk food diet can lead to young ducks developing a condition called “angel wing” which is a wing deformity that usually means ducks cannot fly. This is incurable and changes a duck’s life forever - it can’t fly

Feeding bread to ducks also increases the amount of droppings in the area further making pollution worse in two ways - a carbohydrate-rich diet makes a duck poop more and increases the number of ducks in the area than would otherwise be there. This concentration of bird droppings gives rise to avian botulism, a disease which paralyses ducks leaving them unable to feed and causes them to drown.

Allowing ducks to hand feed regularly may prevent their babies from learning how to forage properly and teaches them to demand food from humans leading to aggression in their attempts to snatch food. This increases the risk of accidental injury, especially to small children.

Food intended for swans and ducks also provides a supply for the other bird species (like seagulls, pigeons and ibis) that loiter around the eating areas in the gardens. This encourages these birds to wait for food handouts, which is a nuisance, and sometimes a danger to others.

We appreciate that feeding ducks is a fun activity, but we want our residents and wildlife to be as safe as possible.

If you still want to feed the ducks, please reconsider the food you are bringing along. Instead of bread feed them:

• small amounts of corn

• duck pellets

• lettuce

• defrosted frozen peas

• oats

• seeds

Community Purpose Land Rebates

You might be eligible for a rebate on your rates in the City of Charles Sturt.

Rate rebates apply for land used for health and community services, religious purposes, cemeteries and educational institutions. These rebates vary from 25% - 100% and supporting

documentation is required when applying.

If you believe your organisation may be eligible for a mandatory or discretionary rebate, you will be required to lodge an application form by 30 April each year.

Download the Rate Rebate application form at charlessturt. sa.gov.au/raterebate

If you require more assistance requiring, obtaining and completing the application please call us on 8408 1111.

Pussycat pussycat where have you been?

the impact of cats roaming and predating upon our native wildlife both during the day and at night.

We have more than 1000 cats registered in our City.

We love our feline friends in our City of Charles Sturt. With more than 1,000 cats registered in our City, there are still many more cute and cuddly cats an important part of our families yet to be registered.

Registering your cat is required by law, you can register your cat for free online at dogsandcatsonline.com.au

Through the Cat Tracker Project run by the University of South Australia, research revealed that while most people think their cat stays on or near to their property, cats will roam many kilometres from home and tended to roam further at night.

Our recent biodiversity survey identified that we have made amazing enhancements to habitat in the city and have some highly biodiverse areas, though one of the greatest threats is

Interestingly, cats tend to hunt in response to a primal instinct than a desire to eat. Nationally, it’s been identified that cats prey on at least 400 native and introduced vertebrates in Australia, including 123 birds, 157 reptiles, 58 marsupials, 27 rodents and 21 frogs. Cats have played a key role in the extinction of at least 22 mammals, and are a current threat to several threatened mammal and bird species. With this in mind, it’s important to keep your cat at home not only to protect our natural environment, but it’s also really good for your cat’s happiness and well-being and will help it live longer. GoodCatSA.com identify that outdoor roaming cats have an average lifespan of just three years compared to confined cats that can live to 15 years or more.

Contained cats are less likely to become lost or injured (hit by a

car or attacked by a dog). They are also less likely to get into cat fights and have cat fight-related injuries such as abscesses or catch diseases such as FIV (Feline Immunodeficiency Virus).

Cats which have always been able to roam freely can be trained to stay entirely indoors and you can still contain your cat at home and give outdoor access. You can cat-proof your fence or build at cat enclosure in your garden.

Keeping your cat at home rather than left to roam, helps us protect our native wildlife and provide an important boost to our biodiversity.

For more about responsible pet ownership, latest news, competitions and events, please like and follow our Pets of Charles Sturt Facebook page.

Get ready for another pawesome day with Doggy Day on the Green.

To be held on 4 April between 11am - 3pm at Point Malcolm Reserve in Semaphore Park, it’s a fun, free day out with your four-legged friend! This year we have teamed up with the City of Port Adelaide Enfield to make the event even bigger and better.

There will be a range of activities on the day, including dog training demonstrations, behaviourist talks, doggy stalls and more.

There’ll also be $10 microchipping thanks to Chipblitz!

For information on how to get involved, visit the Pets of Charles Sturt Facebook page for event details and updates.

Henley Beach artwork

If you walk along Coast Park you might have noticed a change to the toilet block at the end of Henley Beach Road.

It recently underwent a colourful transformation, as a result of a collaboration with Mary Lovich from Henley Mosaics and students from Henley Beach Primary School. Three large mosaic works have been constructed by Mary; a leafy sea dragon, a mermaid and king Neptune. The mosaics are made of broken and handmade ceramics, tiles, coloured glass, crystals and mirror.

The Leafy Sea Dragon is significant to South Australia and this part of the coastline as it’s the marine emblem for South Australia and they are only found in southern Australian waters. The “leafies” are subject to both

natural and manmade threats and as a result they have been a protected species in SA since 1987.

The small tile mosaics bordering the leafy sea dragons were made by Year 1 and 3 students at Henley Primary School. The students participated in art workshops and learnt the art of mosaics.

We also took the opportunity to paint the toilet block a bright blue to match in with the colours of the mosaics.

Support was also provided by the Henley Beach Hotel and WACRA.

On Sunday 2 February, we hosted a Coastal Art Stroll showcasing the mosaics, murals and sculptures between Grange and Henley Beach, finishing at the toilet block. Ten artists

shared the stories behind their works and over 40 people and their dogs attended. People commented that the mosaics have transformed this toilet block and people loved the

colour and creativity. The leafy sea dragon was a favourite amongst many as were the artworks created by children from Henley Primary School.

Draft Annual Business Plan and Budget 20/21

In April this year, we will be seeking your views on the 2020/21 Draft Annual Business Plan & Budget.

Your feedback will help us decide priorities when faced with competing decisions about service provision. Every dollar collected of your rates tax gets invested in your community. This is your chance to make sure these dollars are spent on delivering the community you want to live in.

To get involved and have your say:

•Present to Council on 14 April 2020

•Go to yoursaycharlessturt.com.au to provide feedback online from 15 April – 8 May 2020

• Attend our Information Session at the Civic Centre on 22 April 2020

Consultation closes 8 May 2020 at 5pm.

For more information please visit yoursaycharlessturt.com.au

•Visit our Civic Centre for hard copy information 72 Woodville Road, Woodville 5011

Australia Day Awards and Citizenship Ceremony

What’s On

Friday 3 April, 1 May, 5 June

Foyer Fridays

Woodville Town Hall

5pm – 8pm

There’s a new pop-up event happening at Woodville Town Hall, the first Friday of every month, starting in April.

Foyer Fridays will showcase local musicians, there’ll be drink tastings and the bar will be open for drink purchases. Whether you

live or work nearby or are keen for a new spot to meet up with friends, we can’t wait to see you there.

Saturday 4 April

Doggy Day on the Green Point Malcolm Reserve, Semaphore Park

11am – 4pm

Join us for our annual dogs’ day out on the green - a fun, free day out with your four-legged friend!

Visit our Pets of Charles Sturt Facebook page for event details and updates.

@PetsofCharlesSturt

Mayor Angela Evans presented the awards at the Australia Day Awards Presentation and Citizenship Ceremony on Sunday, 26 January 2020 at Woodville Town Hall, with special guest Australia Day Ambassador Michael Keelan.

@WoodvilleTownHall