A fountain with friends

Clifton Springs fountain 

Around thirty people concerned about the state of the Clifton Springs fountain met last night and resolved to establish a working group charged with investigating the current state of the fountain and proposing options for its future.

The fountain originally marked the gateway to the then-new Clifton Springs housing estate and was a larger, grander structure than it is now. The fountain itself was switched off during the recent years-long long drought and, as a consequence,  the fountain's pipes and pumps have been damaged significantly. The City of Greater Geelong owns the fountain and is responsible for its maintenance as part of the city's collection of 'public art'.

At last night's meeting at SpringDale Neighbourhood Centre, a range of local residents expressed a variety of concerns about the fountain's future. Three broad options emerged from the discussion:
1. Do nothing. This was dismissed immediately - people had come to the meeting to get something done!
2. Return the fountain to its former glory. While several people supported this idea, there was general concern about a fountain splashing away beautifully when we're trying to conserve water. There was also concern about the possible cost of mending or replacing the original pipes and pumps.
3. Rework the fountain as a piece of public art.  Several people were attracted by the idea of amending the structure to turn it from a sad, unused fountain into a celebration of the area's history and future. There was broad support for integrating some form of toughened, industrial glass 'sculpture' into the structure - perhaps with an enclosed water feature using recycled water.

It was pointed out that mixing glass and water would evoke the time at the start of the 20th century when Clifton Springs was famous for its bottled mineral springs water; and it would build on the area's growing reputation as a centre for glass art and craft around the annual Festival of Glass and the planned Bellarine Glass Trail.

The meeting resolved to form a small working group to investigate the engineering and funding issues around the fountain's future and to talk to the City of Greater Geelong officers and councillors about refurbishing the fountain. Once this work was done, the working group would report back to the larger group and present some possible next steps. Local councillor Lindsay Ellis has shown some interest in the fountain's future already and he would be among the first people the group would contact.

Finally, the people at the meeting decided to call themselves 'Friends of the Fountain' - albeit a dry fountain at present!

2013 Glass Expo beats the heat!

Crowds at the 2013 Festival of Glass

Thousands of people braved 38 degree conditions to visit the Glass expo in Drysdale, Victoria on Sunday 17 February.

The Expo was the focus of the 2013 Festival of Glass, a DCSCA initiative now in its third year. Visitors strolled around the 70-plus sites, looking at glass of all shapes, sizes, colours and forms. With so much diversity, there was something for everyone to see - from leadlight to lampwork, from splashbacks to platters and from beads to bottles.

A warm welcome
The Expo's official opening started with a 'Welcome To Country' from Uncle David Tournier, of the Wathaurong Aboriginal Co-op in Geelong. This was followed by greetings from Doug Carson, Chair of the 2013 Festival of Glass committee, local councillor Rod Macdonald and state MP Lisa Neville. Finally, Geelong Mayor Keith Fagg declared the Expo officially open!

On Twitter, Cr. Fagg wrote, '@ festival of Glass Opening. Stunning array of glass in all forms. All day Sunday at Bellarine College, Drysdale.' Thanks, Mr. Mayor!

After the opening ceremony, our guests talked with exhibitors as they walked around the Expo. They remarked on the diversity of the exhibits, the high quality of the entries in the glass-art competition and the attractiveness of the prizes in the raffle, each one donated by an exhibitor at this year's Festival.

Kind words
Since the Expo, many exhibitors have posted messages of thanks and appreciation on the Festival's Facebook page. Several exhibitors were kind enough to remark on the Festival's high degree of organisation. E.g. 'we exhibitors don't have to worry about anything other than our own tables during setup, take down and the day itself.'

The Festival Committee is basking in those kind words .... before addressing the list of suggested improvements for 2014!

We're getting talked about!

Festival of Glass exhibitor Katrina Newman has just published an article about the Festival on her blog. (http://katrinanewman.com/2013/02/07/festival-of-glass/)

The article has a great photo (reproduced here) of some of Katrina's hand-made flamework beads annealing (cooling and hardening) in her kiln.

As Katrina says, 'It's going to be a colourful day, do drop by and say hello'.

Geelong - the 'City of Festivals'?

DCSCA has suggested to the City of Greater Geelong council that it considers promoting Geelong as the ‘City of Festivals’.

Each year, the City of Greater Geelong council supports at least fifteen community festivals through its Community Arts & Festivals grant programme. (This includes, of course, the excellent Festival of Glass in Drysdale - a DCSCA initiative!) Some of these festivals are one-off events receiving a one-off grant, while others are recurring events which receive triennial funding.

A glance at the list of these festivals shows its great diversity - a tribute both to the council's Arts department that has nurtured community arts and festivals in Geelong and to the council committee that disburses the grants.

DCSCA has suggested to the council that it considers building on Geelong's strength and diversity in community arts and festivals by promoting Geelong as the 'City of Festivals'. Such a strategy has three advantages:

1. Promoting Geelong as a 'City of Festivals' would build on and celebrate Geelong’s diversity and would highlight the creative activity that is happening across the whole of Geelong, rather than focus simply on the city centre.
2. Having several strong festivals throughout the year would mean that visitors would be likely to find a festival in Geelong, no matter when they visited.
3. Promoting Geelong as the ‘City of Festivals’ would make better use of a lot of the grant money that the council disburses currently. At present, each festival has to spend a significant part of its budget on promotion, whereas promoting Geelong as a 'City of Festivals' would offer each festival the chance to fold its specific promotions into an ongoing promotional effort.

DCSCA's proposal draws on our three years experience (and success!) in presenting the Festival of Glass, which each year attracts a greater number and - more importantly - a greater diversity of exhibitors from across the wide world of glass. Our focus remains the Festival of Glass as an event in our local area, of course, but we are proposing this city-wide initiative because it would benefit all the community festivals in the area by making each one part of a bigger identity - 'Geelong, the City of Festivals'.

(The 2013 Festival of Glass opens on Saturday 16 February with a Bottleneck Guitar Evening at the Harvester Moon restaurant, 2320 Portarlington Road, Bellarine. [Bookings and enquiries: 5259 3200]. Then, on Sunday 17 February a glass Expo happens between 10.00 a.m. and 4.00 p.m. at the Bellarine Secondary College Sports Centre in Peninsula Drive, off Anderson's Road, Drysdale. [Melway 470 F3]. Free admission. We're planning a post-Expo exhibition of competition winners and short courses in glass arts and crafts by Expo exhibitors.)

Birdsong and bylaws don't mix

Kurrawong

Kurrawongs and Kookaburras are currently delighting Drysdale residents in the vicinity of McLeod's Waterholes.

The large, charcoal-grey Kurrawongs have bright yellow eyes and flashes of white on their tail and wings. Allegedly, their name comes from their musical call, but you need some imagination to hear it! It's been several months since they've been in the area, because Kurrawongs are migratory, moving between feeding and breeding grounds.

The reappearance of the Kurrawongs in the area coincides with a visit by a group of Kookaburras. Interesting birds, Kookaburras are notable for their socialised child care! Kookaburras live in groups and in each group, one or two adults will look after young birds from several pairs of adults - an efficient, cost-effective approach to child care of which, no doubt, federal treasurers would approve! Kookaburras are migratory, too, but a group will generally move around a regular route.

Kookaburra

A 'wildlife corridor' - who needs it?
The recurring presence of the Kurrawongs and Kookaburras in the area shows the importance of the 'nature corridor' formed by the stretch of trees and shrubs along Griggs Creek that crosses Jetty Road and continues to McLeod's Waterholes. Many other birds, including Galahs, Lorikeets and Red-rumped Parrots (a.k.a. Grass Parrots) also fly regularly along that corridor; and Wattle Birds and Honeyeaters are semi-permanent residents.

Until recently, the corridor had a 'spur' of some trees at the junction of Jetty Road and Wyndham Street, but these were destroyed to make way for the enlarged junction. These trees formed a local landmark, but the first that local people knew of the trees' fate was when they awoke to the sound of chain saws cutting them down. Among the trees was an old Willow tree, described by the contractor's supervisor as 'just a weed'!

Doing what's legal - or doing what's right?
When the City of Greater Geelong's supervising engineer was asked why the council hadn't consulted local people about the trees' planned destruction, he replied, 'We don't have to'. He meant that the council has a legal obligation to consult the public about changes to bylaws, etc (e.g. re-zoning), but has no legal obligation to consult the public about any 'non-legal' issues - and destroying these trees was one of those 'non-legal' issues.

So the council's guiding principle isn't 'What is right?' but 'What can we get away with?' A council's operations offer many opportunities to strengthen local democracy and build citizenship by involving local people in council decisions that affect them. For this council, however, local democracy appears to mean 'electing a councillor every four years'; and citizenship appears to mean 'paying your rates on time'.

Jetty Road still threatens cyclists, walkers

Loose gravel in Jetty Road

The section of Jetty Road in the vicinity of the Clifton Springs Primary School continues to pose a threat to cyclists and walkers, despite recent road works.

DCSCA and by the Clifton Springs Primary School have called vigorously and frequently for action to make the junction safer. We were concerned that the new footpath and junction constituted a threat to walkers and cyclists - especially to students of the primary school - because they had been built so poorly. (See 'Squeezing a Jetty Road bottleneck tighter' on drycliftdays 2 March 2012.)

Loose gravel in Jetty Road

In response,  potholes have been filled-in and road edging improved. Bouquets to the City of Greater Geelong for doing the work; buckets to the council for taking months to do it, for leaving dangerous loose surface gravel that could still injure walkers and cyclists and for leaving in place the dangerous 1.5m section of footpath.

It is clear that without the campaign by DCSCA and the Primary School, this junction would still be dangerous to walkers and cyclists. Decent, respectful consultation with local people would have shows precisely what needed to be done to create a safe junction. Why should local people have to fight for decent, safe infrastructure when developers are spending millions of dollars to create the new housing estates in Jetty Road - allegedly under the supervision of the council's planners?

Drysdale Cemetery safe from development

DCSCA hosted a meeting on Monday 19^th November at SpringDale, at which Darryl Thomas, CEO of the Geelong Cemeteries Trust described the Trust's role.

The Trust maintains the 13 local cemeteries in the Geelong region (with no government funding); individual graves are owned privately and their maintenance is the owner's responsibility.

Local people at the meeting were concerned about the future of the Cemetery, in particularly the vacant land adjoining Clifton Springs Road. Daryl said that the Drysdale cemetery has enough land to accommodate current demand for 15 to 20 years. Daryl said that  the vacant land is zoned as 'cemetery' and that the Trust has no plans to ask for the land to be rezoned and/or to sell it to housing developers. He added that before the Trust could sell the land, it would have to consult the local community extensively.

The vacant land in question would accommodate about ten thousand graves - nowhere near enough to meet the area's expected population growth. The Bellarine Peninsula in general is expected to see a major increase in population in the coming years and each of its local cemeteries (including Drysdale's) has only about 20–25 years worth of grave sites available. Consequently, the Trust is looking for land on the Bellarine for a new Bellarine Cemetery.