Councillor, City of Sydney
During my six and a half years as a City of Sydney Councillor I took action on some of the key issues facing our community, and created opportunities to make Sydney the most inclusive, sustainable and creative city it can be.
I secured free early childhood education for asylum seekers and expanded access to renewable energy infrastructure in heritage areas. I championed a child-friendly and Laneway Commons approach to public realm planning. I successfully advocated for extended hospitality and retail trading hours and the creation of new nightlife precincts.
A number of my contributions are outlined in this Lord Mayoral Minute of April 3, 2023.
Creative Sector and Nightlife Advocacy
I helped achieve long-term planning changes to unlock new night-life precincts in Sydney and to extend trading hours right across the city.
I advocated for the “map of fun” approach to streamlining and extending our Late Night Trading DCP 2019, including the establishment of the North Alexandria Entertainment Precinct, and generating a huge level of community participation (including 10,000 submissions) in support of Sydney’s nightlife and entertainment future.
I supported the nightlife, entertainment and creative sector post lockouts and lockdowns as the co-chair of the City’s Nightlife and Creative Advisory Panel, giving evidence to the NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into the music and arts economy in New South Wales, and speaking to crowds at Keep Sydney Open and Don’t Kill Live Music rallies.
Speaking at the Don’t Kill Live Music rally in February 2019.
Speaking at a Keep Sydney Open rally in October 2016.
I also secured access for musicians and roadies to be able to use loading zones when bumping in or out of gigs – no matter what car they’re driving.
In October 2021 I brought a motion to Council asking us to advocate against changes to loading zones which would have excluded station wagons and other smaller vehicles for using them, which would have worked against musos and roadies, among others.
In November, a joint government-opposition amendment in the Legislative Council included an exemption for roadies and anyone prepping for a gig, and then-Shadow Minister for Music John Graham was kind enough to give me a shout out in Parliament for my advocacy. Thank you, John, for being a voice for music.
There were two other great changes carried, undoing the labelling of some festivals as “high risk” which MusicNSW and Australian Festivals Association had been campaigning against for years, and the expansion of a very good rule we implemented in the City of Sydney – bonus trading hours for venues who host performances – right across NSW.
On the cover of the Wentworth Courier for my nightlife advocacy in September 2021.
Fighting for safer streets and a family-friendly city
I unexpectedly found myself in a debate with the then-Premier Dominic Perrottet, and future Premier Chris Minns in early 2023, as I supported my community in demanding safer, slower residential streets in our inner city neighbourhoods – asking for consistency and a pedestrian-first framing of streets as safe places – and traffic calming standards around childcare centres.
I worked with courageous community advocates like the Little Blue Dinosaur Foundation and local community members, to demand state-wide standards for pedestrian and child safety around childcare centres, including slowing speeds across the City of Sydney LGA to 40kmph to save lives on our streets. You can read coverage of my successful motions and campaigns on this issue in the Sydney Morning Herald and ABC News.
I also advocated for a “Cities for Play” framework to be incorporated into our long term strategic work, to make the City more welcoming to families with kids, to create more opportunities for play and to build dwellings which accommodate family life.
I championed the Laneway Commons and community-led greening of our city, asking the City to develop a dedicated laneway gardens guideline to enable more citizen-led greening initiatives, turning grey laneways into green oases: a principle which has now been incorporated into the City of Sydney’s 2030-2050 Community Strategic Plan.
Practical Climate Action in our neighbourhoods
Imagine if every school and childcare centre in Australia was a virtual power plant: generating their own electricity through renewable infrastructure and even powering their neighbourhoods through microgrids?
I worked with the Australian Parents for Climate Action (AP4CA) network on their Solar Our Schools campaign, to identify the barriers faced by schools in implementing renewables, connected with dozens of local P&Cs and school leaders to understand the challenges in Sydney schools, and secured a meeting for the AP4CA with then-Education Minister Sarah Mitchell.
With AP4CA leaders, then-Education Minister Sarah Mitchell, Lord Mayor Clover Moore and I in 2020.
I also helped expand access to sustainable and energy efficient infrastructure in Heritage Conservation Areas through a motion in 2020 which asked the City to remove planning control restrictions on solar panels, water tanks and other house-level modifications for sustainability. You can read more on my motion and advocacy here.
Fighting for state-wide investment in Aerial Bundled Cabling
I called on the state government to fund Aerial Bundled Cabling for councils across NSW, reducing the over-pruning of trees around powerlines, making our streets cooler and our electricity infrastructure more resilient against fires and storms.
We know trees cool us – every 10% increase in canopy can reduce land surface temperatures by 1.13 degrees – but did you also know a mature tree can absorb 3,400L of stormwater a year? We need more healthy trees with full canopy. Imagine the positive impact on tree canopy, shading and urban cooling if we had more underground cables - or, their cheaper cousin, Aerial Bundled Cabling. This gathers the cables into one bundle, as we have done on Bourke St in Surry Hills, allowing trees to spread out and flourish.
In the City of Sydney, 55% of our powerlines are bundled, but not all areas are so lucky…
Ausgrid are working on a co-funding program to support councils to do more bundled cabling: in 2022 I asked the City of Sydney to endorse a motion for the NSW Local Government conference to get more councils to back this program, to extend it across the state, and to ask the NSW govt to tip in funding for councils who can’t afford it. The motion calls on the NSW government to stump up $8m to back Ausgrid’s $12.2 million contribution, to help more councils afford to bundle cables.
Here’s ABC News coverage of my advocacy on this issue.
Support for marginalised communities
In May 2022 I brought a motion to Council asking the City to provide access to free early childhood care and education to families who are seeking asylum and unable to access early childhood subsidies that many Australian families depend upon. As a result, the City of Sydney now offers free early education childcare services to families seeking asylum, beginning from 1 July 2022.
There may only be a handful, but I hope it makes a tangible difference in every family it touches.
You know this is an area very close to my heart and I’m grateful that in a small, practical way, we are extending more support and welcome to people who have come into our community needing the care and healing that we can provide in our generous and fortunate city.
I was inspired by earlier motions with this effect by Mayor Khal Asfour from Canterbury Bankstown and Councillor Mat Howard from Inner West Council, so thank you to them and thank you to the Asylum Seekers Centre for their context info and wonderful work too.
In 2018 I asked the City to establish an AIDS Memorial in Green Park, supporting a community campaign which generated over 1200 signatures in support of a lasting memorial to a tragic period in Sydney’s history.
