The City of Holdfast Bay has been announced as the South Australian State Winner of the Keep Australia Beautiful Sustainable City Awards for 2014.
The win was made public at the Annual General Meeting of KESAB
(Keep South Australia Beautiful) and was announced by Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation, Ian Hunter MLC.
Cities are judged on a number of criteria including litter prevention, waste management, culture, health, wellbeing, leadership and appearance.
Judges highlighted a number of qualities that contributed to the victory.
A local community garden at Kibby Reserve that features wheelchair access, recycled materials and rainwater collection has been a productive community facility.
In the Community Action category Council and LifeLinks, a volunteer friendship group available to pension only persons, were recognised for the development of an interpretive indigenous water wise garden.
The garden provides for community involvement, education and social activity.
The council recently installed interpretative signage linking plants to Kaurna culture.
Kitchen organics baskets haven also been rolled out to 170,00 households in the council area, which allows for the easy disposal of kitchen food scraps into the green organic bin.
The introduction of this system has had significant results, in March 2014, the tonnage collected was 23 percent more than the previous March.
Council has been actively restoring and improving their coastal ecosystems over a number of years, including 7,867 indigenous plants planted last year alone.
KESAB Environmental Solutions Executive Director John Phillips OAM said “The City of Holdfast Bay prepared an extensive submission highlighting the complexity and diversity of managing a council specific to environmental sustainability and community health and well-being, and we now wish them well in the national awards judging process”.
Last year’s National Winner, the City of Marion, will host the Keep Australia Beautiful (KAP) National Awards Ceremony in November.
