2022 Sally Isaac Award Booklet

*The Sally Isaac Memorial Scholarship Fund is a sub-fund of Australian Communities Foundation

BACKGROUND

Sally Elizabeth Isaac was an extraordinary woman and young leader in the Local Government sector who passed away in early 2009.

In 2006, at the age of 33, Sally was appointed Director of Community Programs at Yarra City Council where she was directly responsible for 342 professional staff working in aged care, childcare, community planning, advocacy, the arts and library services.

She had an amazing capacity for developing people and engaging in policy debate, and her absolute commitment to social justice in the community is sorely missed. People from all walks of life, from government to business, remark on the respect and admiration they had for Sally.

Sally was exuberant and brave, bright and insightful, brilliant and engaging. She was focused and intelligent with an enduring commitment to making things better. She was also humble, loving and full of fun, with wisdom beyond her years.

There was something truly special about Sally Isaac. For all who knew her, she will remain an inspiration and close to their hearts. Soon after her death her family, friends and colleagues met to discuss ways to recognise the incredible impact that she had on people’s lives.

In 2009, they established the Sally Isaac Memorial Scholarship Fund, as a sub-fund of Australian Communities Foundation. Its aim is to raise funds and awareness to build a significant capital endowment which is distributed in perpetuity by way of an educational scholarship to help foster young women leaders who make a significant contribution to their community.

The award recipient receives a $10,000 educational scholarship for research or study in Australia or overseas.

PURPOSE OF THE AWARD

The purpose of the LGPro Sally Isaac Memorial Scholarship Fund Award is to:

• Recognise the enormous contribution that Sally Isaac made to public life, especially to those in the community who were more socially excluded and disadvantaged

• Raise the profile and support fundraising efforts for the Sally Isaac Memorial Scholarship Fund

• Foster and encourage future female leaders in the community who commit to making a significant improvement to the community

WINNER

TANARLY HOOD

Youth Officer Baw Baw Shire Council

Tanarly is an inspirational young First Nations woman with a commitment to family and community. The humble achiever is a natural leader with a talent for seeing, listening to, and understanding others while enabling them to succeed.

Describing herself as naturally introverted and selectively extroverted, Tanarly shines when face-to-face with young people. Her ability to hold their attention respectfully and adjust her style for each individual to ensure everyone is given a voice is an asset to her council and community.

2019 was a big year for Tanarly, graduating as the youngest and only First Nations participant of the Gippsland Community Leadership Program.

She was engaged as the first Youth Officer at Baw Baw Shire Council that year, the first time the council had deliberately engaged with and planned for youth within the municipality.

Tanarly drew on her community service experience, deep involvement with local sporting, and vast local network to consult with over 600 young people to create the council’s first Youth Strategy. Her pioneering work has since seen funding secured and programs designed to directly benefit young people in the region in a legacy that is ongoing.

HIGH COMMENDATION

APRIL

WILSON

Coordinator Social Planning and Equity (former Recreation and Open Space Planner) Nillumbik Shire Council

April is a strong believer in community sport as a vehicle for creating happier, healthier, and more connected communities. She is passionate about inclusive sport participation, particularly in increasing participation opportunities for women and girls and for those living with disability. She brings with her a wealth of knowledge and experience in community sport development to the Local Government sector, from work with YMCA Victoria and Gymnastics Victoria to the Special Olympics and Leisure Networks.

April actively contributes to the Shire community’s health through her advocacy for inclusive and meaningful participation in sport and active recreation.

In her first 12 months with the council, she successfully delivered Mental Health First Aid Certificate qualifications to 27 community leaders, implemented a Proud 2 Play initiative focused on engaging the local LGBTIQA+ community in social sport, and delivered a Healthy Sports Rewards initiative to disrupt unhealthy food choices in junior sporting clubs.

She has since consulted widely to inform and build the strategic plan for the council’s commitment to sport and active recreation over the decade ahead. With April’s guidance, the strategy commits to increasing participation in underrepresented groups, incentivising equitable access through facility fees and charges, delivering inclusion awareness training to community sporting clubs and improving the physical accessibility of community infrastructure.

*The Sally Isaac Memorial Scholarship Fund is a sub-fund of Australian Communities Foundation.

*The Sally Isaac Memorial Scholarship Fund

ILZ ASLAN

Coordinator Equity and Inclusion Moonee Valley City Council

Ilz is a dedicated leader, placing the needs of her team and her community first. Across multiple roles at her council, she has consistently approached her work from that community-first perspective, looking to ensure their voices are represented in areas they would not normally be heard.

A qualified social worker in the middle of studying a Masters in Public Policy, Ilz’s career in Local Government has been varied and substantial. Starting as the Team Leader Community Participation and Development, Ilz managed a significant team to deliver programs and opportunities for the Flemington Housing Estate.

She then utilised her social work background and expertise in community programming to lead the Youth Counselling and Case Management team. She led her team to achieve significant targets in case numbers and secondary referrals whilst also delivering a youth mental health first aid program within schools.

Her ability to build relationships saw her then brought in under Moonee Valley’s Chief Executive Officer as a Senior Neighbourhood Engagement Officer. The role drew on her strategic and political acumen and deft management of relationships. She led a team of community engagement professionals who simultaneously ran programs that addressed social exclusion during the COVID-19 pandemic.

LAURA BALES

Coordinator Public Health Glen Eira City Council

Laura’s placement in the Glen Eira’s Pandemic Response and Recovery Team in the midst of the pandemic was an unexpected but fruitful appointment. Laura originally came to the council as a student working with the Department of Health and was appointed as an Environmental Health Officer. Thrust into the senior role of Coordinator Pandemic Response and Recovery amid successive, intermittent lockdowns, she quickly proved her worth to the organisation and an asset to the community at a level of seniority higher than what she was used to.

She was depended upon by the community, senior management, and the wider organisation for her public health advice, drawing on her public health expertise to set clear instructions to the entire organisation and community with a calm and considered approach. Part of the role required Laura to interpret State Government requirements which were changing often. The level of responsibility was foreign to Laura as her substantive role was at the officer level while she was appointed two levels higher. She has since been promoted to Coordinator Public Health and part of the council’s leadership group in recognition of her skillset, leadership, and excellence in communication.

NINA BARRY-MACAULAY

Manager Customer Communication and Advocacy South Gippsland Shire Council

Nina was drawn to a career in Local Government through her motivation to have an impact and improve life outcomes for people in her local community. A humanitarian, feminist, and passionate advocate for her community, Nina utilises her diverse background including in the arts, sporting, event management, and public service to deliver for this community. She brings her values to bear in her work and volunteering, chairing local charity Women for Change, which works towards improving opportunities for women and girls in Bass Coast, and sitting on the Board of the Bass Coast Community Foundation.

Beginning her Local Government career in communications and engagement back in 2017, she played a key role in the award-winning community engagement campaign, ‘Help Shape Bass Coast’ – the largest ever undertaken by Bass Coast at the time. Following promotions that have built her leadership skills over the years, she has since brought these skills over to her current role, leading the delivery of the most extensive community engagement program for South Gippsland.

As a vocal advocate, she has led numerous successful advocacy campaigns, including her most proud moment: gaining a $5 million commitment from the Australian Government to establish the Bass Coast University Centre.

JENNY CAO

Prevention of Violence Against Women Project Officer and International Health Project Officer Multicultural Centre for Women’s Health

Jenny’s upbringing in a migrant family has given her the lived experience of social disadvantage associated with culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities that has shaped her devotion to social justice and addressing health inequities for those most systemically marginalised in Australia and in a global context. As a leader within the Vietnamese community, she is well respected for her passionate commitment to mentorship and supporting young people, and for her empathetic leadership style. These values have underpinned her commitment and passionate work to improve public health for these populations in her early career so far and as a life-long volunteer.

Jenny has shown a dedication to social justice and community health for CALD communities through her work throughout the not-for-profit space. Jenny is a dedicated public health practitioner and strong community health advocate for young people from multicultural backgrounds and women of migrant and refugee backgrounds, particularly on sexual and reproductive health rights and violence against women. She has led work to improve the capacity of twenty multicultural organisations and settlement services to prevent violence against women and has led multi-organisation joint advocacy to improve the family violence service system for migrant and refugee women through embedding intersectionality, cultural safety and more bilingual family violence workers.

AMELIA JONES

Education & Public Programming Officer Hamilton Gallery, Southern Grampians Shire Council (former Education & Public Program Officer at Latrobe City Council)

Amelia is a passionate supporter of the arts and artists with a particular focus on connecting diverse people to the arts – those who are marginalised or do not see themselves represented in galleries. As a queer person with a lived experience of mental illness, they have a strong vision for access and inclusion in the arts that drives their work.

Describing themself as a ‘culture maker,’ Amelia’s work at the newly opened Gippsland Performing Arts Centre supports their commitment to social justice through the creation of an inclusive space that invites participation from reluctant or marginalised audiences and artists.

They are establishing a creative learning destination where young people, First Nations people, the LGBTIQA+ community, and people with disability will be represented, breaking down real and perceived barriers to the world of the arts.

Amelia applies their business acumen toward this creative goal. They use their commercial art background to help local artists produce commercially viable products. With a history in retail galleries, printing, and illustration, Amelia has been able to empower artists by bringing a marketability to their work.

ALICE LEAKE

Principal Landscape Architect Boroondara City Council

An adept communicator and passionate landscape architect, Alice operates with integrity and follows through on promises. Highly regarded for her ability to lead and inspire others to work together to achieve excellent outcomes for the community, she respects the talents of each person she works with and knows when to draw on their skills to achieve positive outcomes for Boroondara.

With a genuine desire to collaborate with officers of all levels, Alice lends her engineering acumen to her colleagues’ skillsets, taking a full-spectrum approach to place-shaping and creation.

Always seeking to engage and learn, she is a strong advocate for community engagement and finds innovative ways of embedding community voices into her projects on creating critical public spaces as diverse as central business districts to local dog parks.

She is at her happiest when working through roadblocks creatively and practically, but does not cut corners. Alice has paid keen attention to the environmental impact of her work, embedding sustainability into all projects she works on, from creating natural drainage and water capture to reusing felled trees. Alice further embeds art with a sense of place into her projects to inspire a sense of wonder and delight in residents.

BRIDGET LE ROY

Community Engagement Senior Coordinator YMCA Victoria

Bridget is dedicated to health promotion and the community health field, bringing a friendly approach to her work that sees her quick to build rapport with stakeholders. She manages professional relationships respectfully and adaptively, facilitating the positive outcomes her community has seen.

Bridget has strived to improve community life through community health by developing and delivering programs and events to those in the community who experience barriers to participating in physical activity. She promotes equality and access through a commitment to developing locally relevant programs and services that address specific needs within the community.

Bridget’s active engagement with those who are experiencing disadvantage has helped YMCA to remove or reduce many of these barriers, ensuring everyone in the communities they serve has an opportunity to be active and healthy. Collaboration is critical to YMCA bringing value to these communities, building trust and relationships with other organisations with similarly aligned values. Many of Bridget’s programs are run collaboratively with local clubs and organisations, youth services, and council departments.

Through the Active Moreland initiative, she has helped bring non-traditional users of aquatic and leisure facilities to these services and more involved in their community and physical activity including LGBTIQA+ groups.

MOLLY ODGERS

Environment and Waste Coordinator Strathbogie Shire Council

Molly has been described as an energetic colleague with a level of enthusiasm that is infectious across her council, earning her the respect of her Council, management, colleagues, and community. This enthusiasm – mixed in with a strong emphasis on sustainability and environmentalism – has stewarded her elected representatives through difficult decisions, including the declaration of a climate emergency that will lead to improved outcomes for her community for generations to come.

With a mixture of community engagement and technical expertise across the waste and environment fields, she has managed a range

of projects through their concept phases, design phases, and into funding where she has been instrumental in promotion and lobbying for construction funding. She has applied this skilful project management to the introduction of one of the first FOGO waste programs in a Victorian council, the development and public exhibition of a climate change action plan, the design of a recycled water project to reduce the use of potable water in green spaces like schools and sporting facilities, oversight of planning for a major landfill rehabilitation, energy audits of community facilities, and urban cooling, street re-greening projects.

STACEY ROBINSON

Senior Landscape Architect Manningham City Council

As a landscape architect, Stacey has a passion for working with communities to create innovative public spaces for all. She has extensive experience designing and delivering complex projects with the community at the forefront of the design. Passionate about this kind of community-led design, Stacey draws on her strong relationship building skills to help design spaces that are loved by the community and that they feel a genuine connection to.

This work with communities to enhance landscape design is demonstrated in many of the community spaces Stacey has designed, planned, and redeveloped for local communities.

Her curiosity and drive for excellence sees her take every opportunity to research and visit new examples of innovative design that is futurefocused, projecting how a community will grow over time. She brought this learning to reality in the development of a 15-year masterplan for Ruffey Lake Park in Doncaster, designed with the contribution of over 1,000 voices.

Her work in improving public spaces supports the environment, urban planning, community health, the arts, and Aboriginal affairs and reconciliation. In support of reconciliation, Stacey led Manningham’s first Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung place naming in a historic moment for Manningham City Council.

URSULA VAN DYK

Strategic Planner

Mount Alexander Shire Council

Ursula is dedicated to the profession of urban and regional planning and passionate about the role that strategic planning plays in creating and shaping liveable communities. Since commencing at Mount Alexander Shire Council in May 2020, she has made positive contributions to her strategic planning team, the wider organisation, and the community they serve.

Her problem solving and analytical skills have been crucial in preparing sound and robust strategies, plans, and amendments to the planning scheme, demonstrated in her work on three planning scheme amendments and as the project manager for a housing and neighbourhood character strategy.

Ursula played a key role in preparing the planning scheme amendment documentation for the implementation of Plan Harcourt, a strategic document that guides the growth and development of Harcourt into the future. She values the importance of building strong working relationships within her team and the wider organisation, as well as with external stakeholders. These attributes were integral to her work on projects like the Harcourt Infrastructure Plan –the first time the council had prepared an infrastructure plan to form the basis for collecting development contributions.