Markets & Justice

Markets & Justice
Freely operating markets yield a just outcome?

White Australia Has A Black History

White Australia Has A Black History

Wednesday 23 March 2016

This is what happens in a Christian country of British origins when people are treated no better than or as badly as animmals.

This post gives some insight into what life was/is like for the First Peoples of Australia. Even people who have lived and worked alongside Aboriginal friends may not know of this obscene bureaucratic practice. One can think of two book-ends - on one end what has done/is being done to Australia's First Nations and on the other end is what has been done/is being done who seek refuge and asylum in Australia.

Did you know that all people that were born under the flora and fauna Act did not have birth certificates???Until the...
Posted by Susan Rankin on Monday, 21 March 2016

Thursday 17 March 2016

Islamic Society of Ballarat is hosting an open day at the Mosque of Ballarat on 16 April. Details in the pot below.

The post below is cross posted from the blog of the Ballarat Interfaith Network, Beside The Creek.


Ballarat Interfaith Network
is happy to promote
for the
Islamic Society of Ballarat
an opportunity to visit
the Mosque of Ballarat
on 16 April 2016
details below
The theme of the event is
'Come to Common Terms'


Lecture by Sheikh Waseem Razvi on interfaith dialogue

Friday 11 March 2016

Learn about your locality: walk the Yarrowee with Advocacy to-morrow ... details below



Advocacy member, Julie Werner has being doing some backgrounding for to-morrow's walk along the Yarrow Trail to the Nerrina Wetlands.  For details of where and when to meet, please go here.

~~~~

The painting is by Eugene von Guerard.
In the background is Mount Warrenheip.
In the foreground, are headwaters of the Yarrowee River. 

Anyone who grew up near water whether it was a creek, a river, a dam or a lake has spent time trying to catch insects, small fish or tadpoles.  Over time our society has not respected our precious water courses and we seem to have spent time doing everything we can to tame them.  This is true for the Yarrowee River who has its head waters close to Ballarat East.  This important water way is the one that parts of our city are built on, literally.

The Growling Grass Frog is a native of the Nerrina Wetlands.

To find out more please go here and here.

Brian Simpson at the Yarrowee Flora Reserve
 
A lot of work has been done to clean up our River and a plan was developed a number of years ago which allows us to enjoy the river now.  In the 30 years since Brian Simpson and a friend started clearing weeds along the river nearly 80 community groups, including 30 schools, have helped resuscitate the river.   

Mr Noyce, an environmentalist says in one article “For 150 years, the Yarrowee River had been treated as a stormwater drain but, when the Gnarr Creek flooded in the 1980s, a slow water management plan was introduced including a soft engineering approach where the use of the environment controlled storm water,''

He goes on to say. “Soft engineering takes the energy out of the water, which is captured and then run through growth pollutant plants before being held in a lagoon for three days and slowly released.  If the Yarrowee River master plan had not been implemented, future generations would be forced to undertake a reactive approach to management, rather than the present proactive program.  We are looking at the historic fabric of the river, the indigenous plant community and also the non-wanted species.''


Since the introduction of the plan, five major new parks have been created along the Yarrowee - Gong Gong Reservoir Park, Nerrina Park and Wetlands, the Yarrowee Flora Reserve, Yarrowee-Redan Reserve and the Yuille Station Park and Wetlands.

 Yuille Station Park and Wetlands
off Vickers Road, Sebastopol

Since 1999, the City of Ballarat has constructed seven wetlands. These projects provide better regulation of run-off and allow retention to reduce flooding. The greatest threat to lakes, rivers and streams is pollutants, litter, nutrients and sediments.

Wetlands with appropriate litter traps and riparian plant communities can provide a natural and sustainable method of regulating such inflows and protecting water quality. The establishment of shallow protected waters separate from the lakes and rivers provides an appropriate habitat for a desirable range of native birds and flora.

The Linear Network of Community Spaces Group’s vision is one of the green threads radiating out from Ballarat's urban environment and connecting to natural areas and features.  They offer the following historical perspective of Ballarat’s River.

The word Yarrowee was thought to be from the early settlers' use of the Scottish ``Yarrow'', a diminutive to describe smaller streams.


One of the earliest references to the Yarrowee was when author Withers, in his History of Ballarat states, with respect to pre-gold Ballarat: ``Mr Henry Anderson, who was the earliest pioneer in what  is now known as Winter's Flat, plated his homestead near the delta formed by the confluence of the  Woolshed Creek and the Yarrowee.''

In the driest of the early summers, squatters used to find permanent waterholes at the junction of the Gong Gong and Yarrowee, or Blakeney's Creek as it was then known, after an early settler.

The Yarrowee was described in 1851 as being a ``clear running creek three to four yards wide, with wide grassy alluvial flats. It has also been described as the ``rivulet Yarrowee'' and ``the little river that ran through the Ballarat diggings''.

According to Ballarat historian Peter Butters, geologically speaking, the Yarrowee has also been referred to as a marginal stream.

The discovery of gold altered the tranquility of the Yarrowee and introduced pollution. In researching the Yarrowee, Mr Butters found information about the river during the 1850s gold rush stating ``the green banks of the Yarrowee were lined with tubs and cradles, its clear waters were changed to liquid yellow as the yellowest Tiber flood, and its banks grew to be long shoals of tailing.''



Professor Weston Bate's book Lucky City says that, in 1883, ``the infamous drain that ran down Sturt
Street from the hospital to the Yarrowee, often containing infected sewage and often overflowing into cellars, was abolished. ``But that was only a minor reduction in the pollution of that once beautiful stream. A soapworks and a fellmongery upstream, the woollen mill downstream, the Chinese village, the gaol, the gasworks and dozens of factories gave it their effluent.''

That once-beautiful stream was becoming a sewer.



Older residents of Ballarat can still recall the extent of pollution in the Yarrowee in the early 1930s.
Blood from the meatworks in Skipton St flowed under the street and then entered the water as an open drain and mixed with the blue-coloured run-off from the woollen mill, the two pollutants merging and turning the Yarrowee's water purple.

In more recent years, Mr Butter writes, the Yarrowee had become a dumping ground for all kinds of refuse, including shopping trollies and assorted rubbish.  Thanks to the works being undertaken by the Linear Network of Communal Spaces (LINCS), the future of the Yarrowee looks much brighter.

 Nerrina Wetlands - Brown Hill

The Brown Hill and Ballarat East end of the river was used as a rubbish dump by some people but it was not nearly as bad as the end down near Sebastopol.  The VictorianWaterway Management Strategy was developed some time ago and the CorangamiteCatchment Management Authority has been managing an initiative to further improve the river.  There have been artificial ponds established in the Brown Hill wetland to assist with flood mitigation.  The removal of invasive weeds, particularly willows, blackberries, hawthorn and gorse, remains an ongoing problem. 

The wide variety of birdlife in the Nerrina Wetland remains a big drawcard for birdwatchers to visit our city

Leith Street, Redan, Ballarat - 2011

Thursday 10 March 2016

Advocacy on walkabout - Yarrowee River and the Nerrina Wetlands - Come join us ... this Saturday 12 March.


Ballarat Environmentalist, Hedley Thomson
Chair of Advocacy @ St Paul's 
 
 

This week-end is a long week-end in Victoria.  And Advocacy @ St Paul's is going walk-about on the Yarrowee River to the Nerrina Wetlands.  Hedley Thomson has provided the words. Brigid Walsh has provided the pictures.  Julie gives details on time and meeting place.

~~~~~~


 We’ll meet at 3 p.m. on Saturday afternoon, 12 March, at the pedestrian bridge across the Yarrowee River that links Princes St Nth, Ballarat East & Clissold St, Black Hill (next to the Pine View Retirement Home) for our 1.5 kms stroll upstream along the Yarrowee Trail to the Nerrina Wetlands (sandwiched between Lofven St, Hillcrest Rd, Ainley St & the Yarrowee River in Nerrina).

The Trail and the Wetlands were constructed over a 10-year period between 1995 and 2005. The Trail (which extends from the Gong Gong Reservoir Park to Magpie) has become very popular with walkers and cyclists. The Wetlands were constructed for a number of reasons: to control stormwater runoff into the River, as a refuge for wildlife and as a picturesque location for community activities such as picnics, birdwatching and running events.

The Trail and the Wetlands were constructed as a result of community action, making use of a variety of funding opportunities that were available at the time. The impetus that existed in the 1990s to rehabilitate what was a very degraded environment has waned and there is a need to reinvigorate community involvement, particularly at the Wetlands. Located in the middle of our St Paul’s Parish,

Advocacy @ St Paul’s has identified the Wetlands as a place where we can put a bit of TLC back into our local environment. Because so much has been done to create the Wetlands, it’s a case of looking after the place and ‘keeping an eye’ on it on behalf of our community, including letting the Council know when some repairs, etc are required.

Following the Walk, at a date to be advised, the plan is to hold a clean up-cum-maintenance type activity at the Wetlands; nothing too big but enough to show that ‘someone cares’.

For the moment, though, the aim of the Walk on the 12th March is simply to enjoy the environment.


Wednesday 9 March 2016

Sunday 6 March 2016

The Intervention - An Anthology : Book Launches.

Georgina Gartland posted 6 updates.
11MAR
Fri 14:00 · Wesley Centre, 100 Yarra Street, Geelong, 3220
Cheryl Kaulfuss invited you