Increasingly, the needs and views of the public are being incorporated into ecological and environmental policy and programs. To do this ethically and meaningfully, we must recognise that the views of the community and diverse and they change over time. There are many different groups within the community with different views that should be considered.
Projects
- We worked with the City of Melbourne to engage the community for nine urban forest precinct plans (2013-2015 and again 2022-). We facilitated community workshops bringing over 1000 people together to map landscape values, discuss preferred tree traits and neighbourhood character, and develop vision statements for the future urban forest in each neighbourhood. The precinct plans are used to guide tree planting (and removal) activities for an urban forest with over 70,000 trees. This work was awarded national and international awards by the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2).
- With Knox City Council, we brought together interested community members and internal stakeholders, including traditional owner representatives, to discuss the climate resilience of urban trees to inform policy and strategy.
- We have worked with experts and stakeholder across a range of issues including horizon scans for future urban forests across Melbourne, Canberra and Hobart, and to explore effective the application of Key Threatening Processes in the EPBC Act with the Threatened Species Scientific Committee.