City of Whittlesea scoops the pool in state and national awards

The City of Whittlesea has received an award at the National Growth Area Alliance conference for our advocacy efforts through the Pokies Play You campaign.

Council is a lead partner in the Alliance for Gambling Reform’s Pokies Play You campaign which highlights the harm caused by poker machines. We have joined with the community to ask the state government legislative change to reduce the impact in our community.

In the 2018-19 financial year $303,715 was lost on poker machines in the City of Whittlesea placing us as the sixth highest of all local government areas in the state. This figure is equivalent to $655 for every adult.

The City of Whittlesea also has four of the top 10 commercial venues for pokies losses in all of Victoria.

Read more and your voice about to the campaign.

Council also won two awards and a commendation at the Victorian Planning Institute of Australia (PIA) 2019 Awards for Planning Excellence. 

The City of Whittlesea was awarded the Improving Planning Practices and Processes award for a project to streamline planning permit processes. We also received a commendation in the same category for a project to better record and manage the large volumes of development contribution data.

The Best Planning Ideas – Small Project category award was for a project to measure urban tree canopy cover to support implementation of Council’s Housing Diversity Strategy.

The two winning projects will now go on to represent Victoria in their categories at the National Planning Awards in May next year.