Voices from outside “the centre” – hearing the stories of regional and rural change
SHOW ME THE CHANGE
Complexity and the Art of Evaluation – Reporting Sheet
Leader: Tricia Hiley
tricia@potentialspace.com
Participants:
Key Points:
We had a rich and flowing sharing of stories, people working with projects in regional or rural areas.
Some of the themes included:
1. Lack of access to services increases isolation.
For instance –
• No local insulation installer and no local relationship with one from “away”
• Home sustainability assessors not funded to travel to rural locations (ie travel costs paid from post office closest to clients house)
• Don’t have local trades people
• Not eligible for water tank rebate because they are not on town waters
• Regional project staff may only be able to do one visit a day because of distance compared to 6 or 8 in the city
How do we take this “systemic” consequence into account when planning and evaluating ∆ projects?
2. Enthusiasm and involvement of whole communities.
Examples include:
• Heyfield, where the whole of the community has embraced a sustainable town project. It includes a “game” where people can, through their sustainability efforts, “attain” a white then green then blue flag to place prominently on their roof for all to see and celebrate.
• Mildura, which has benefited by being a small, discrete community which has an inherent focus such as a city community may find it difficult as residents are members of so many different “communities” (ie living, working, school, shops etc.).
3. There was a reasonable amount of sharing of the experience of vulnerability in farm families, particularly where there is a single income in which leads to a perceived lack of robustness – which can lead to resistance to change. One group member introduced “crunch theory” which considers a community’s vulnerability with respect to natural hazards. The example of the consequences of a similar sized earthquake to Haiti and Chile was given as an example. In Haiti over 200,000 died. In Chile it was in low hundreds.
4. A couple of images that linger for me are (I NEED THE ARTIST HERE)
a) “the value of one tree in the paddock”
b) a small town with a white, green or blue flag on the roof of every building
c) “the country wave” as a young woman waves to or says hi to everyone she passes
d) a set of scales with “natural hazard” on one side and “community vulnerability” on the other
e) a project worker in the city – a project worker in the country
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