ADVOCACY ROLE
The essence of the community independent movement is strong advocacy for what the community wants. To me this is all about working with people to develop ideas, forming them into strategies and following it through to implementation. Long term strategic planning is essential for good community outcomes. I will continue to make this happen in the NT Government and pursue reform in relation to strategic planning.
As a response to the Biodiversity Crisis one aspect of this advocacy will be to imbed the principles of Biodiversity Sensitive Urban Design (BSUD)[1] into our planning requirements
The BSUD framework sets out five principles:
(1) maintain and introduce habitat,
(2) facilitate dispersal,
(3) minimise threats and anthropogenic disturbances,
(4) facilitate natural ecological processes, and
(5) improve potential for positive human–nature interactions
As an example the Lee Point development would appear to breach all 5 of the principles
One of my core beliefs is that we need very strong advocacy for issues across Darwin. This role includes a process of action, not just talking about it, and it involves reporting against actions to make sure that people know what progress is being made on projects.
This process is vital in allowing people to understand and work with the implementation process. This not only develops a sense of inclusiveness within the community but it allows people to plan around the progress of the activity.
A clear and accountable process, with reporting, is really important.
I have the ability to be a strong advocate and to follow up with action.
[1] Garrard, G. E., Williams, N. S., Mata, L., Thomas, J., & Bekessy, S. A. (2018). Biodiversity sensitive urban design. Conservation Letters, 11(2), e12411.