Metropolis of Melbourne councillor Jamal Hakim says a recent excursion to New Zealand has delivered precious insights into numerous cultural and social courses that can be embraced back residence. 

Cr Hakim frequented the towns of Auckland and Christchurch from August 22 to 27 to acquire a improved understanding of Māori lifestyle and id, public art, group volunteer programs, and modern day libraries.

For the duration of his check out, he achieved with Auckland City Council mayor Phil Goff and local Māori leaders and was hosted on a tour of the new Christchurch library, noting he was impressed with the children’s engage in areas, which showcased augmented reality technology.

Cr Hakim claimed he was particularly fascinated in how both metropolitan areas had tackled homelessness, which he hoped would assist the Metropolis of Melbourne’s long term approaches to the situation. 

“Ending tough sleeping and homelessness is an vital issue for our neighborhood and looking at the quite a few strategies in position in Auckland enables us to fantastic-tune the perform we are accomplishing to provide for our local community,” he claimed.

He explained he was also impressed with the cities’ profitable graffiti-no cost plans and “how we can combine learnings into our personal future programs”. 

“Sharing knowledge internationally will allow our city to produce far better for our local community.”

Although in Christchurch, Cr Hakim frequented local community websites where he paid out his respects on behalf of the Metropolis of Melbourne to the life that ended up missing in the 2011 earthquake, as nicely as the tragic terrorist assault on two mosques in 2019, noting the “resilience and compassion of the persons of Christchurch in reaction to these tragedies has been incredible”. 

 

Cr Hakim’s excursion, which expense the City of Melbourne $5961, was detailed in a council report on December 13, which mentioned the “projects and courses explored throughout the visit align and will inform deliberations and operate in a number of areas”. 

 

This included the council’s plan in relation to its general public arts system, Aboriginal Melbourne, Properties Melbourne, which addresses homelessness, libraries, and the speedy response clean up staff which is eliminating graffiti at substantial stages. 

The council’s foreseeable future talks with its New Zealand counterparts will also advise its strategy to local weather transform mitigation and resilience, intelligent cities and innovation, and the CBD’s restoration submit-COVID.  

Lord Mayor Sally Capp, who visited Singapore previous year as component of a council-organised journey, mentioned Melbourne was continuing in its aspirations to be a “world-course city” and it’s “important that we’re continuously mastering from metropolitan areas about us”. •

 

Caption: Cr Jamal Hakim through his council-organised trip to New Zealand.