Community
14 March, 2025
Helping hands needed
THE committee behind the maintenance and development of Lake Bullen Merri’s southern beach has launched a new way for residents to volunteer at the foreshore area.
The Lake Bullen Merri South Beach Committee will be holding its annual general meeting (AGM) next Monday (March 17) and is encouraging interested community members to come along and share their ideas for the area.
South Beach Committee president Phil Russell said there was also another option for those who felt they could not dedicate the required time to the committee but still wanted to volunteer.
He said the idea came from volunteer Gary O’Neil’s friend Sandy McBean, who assisted Mr O’Neil as a volunteer without joining the committee.
“The question mark for us was public liability,” Mr Russell said.
“We spoke to DEECA (Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action), and got the all clear, so if anybody wants to be a friend of the committee, they can be.
“If we have people who are friends of the committee, they can come up here and spend an hour once a month without having any other commitments to the committee – if they have a bit of free time, they can just come up here and do something.
“We’ll have a folder there where they can sign in and out – if they get hurt or if they’re whipper snipping and a rock flies up and hits a car, the personal responsibility goes away from them.
“It gives them a bit of reassurance they are covered and looked after without having that full-time commitment to the committee.”
Mr O’Neil, who volunteers his time to maintain the Lake Bullen Merri foreshore, said the committee was looking for people who are passionate about the lake.
“Someone who likes the outdoors, who likes maintaining gardens – it would even be great to have someone who likes whipper snipping to come up and just spend an hour or two just trimming,” he said.
“We supply all the equipment – all we require is their time, and they can come up at any time on any day and just have a look.
“We need more committee people, but we also need more foot soldiers.
“That doesn’t necessarily take away from the fact that we’d love to have people, if they can’t do that, just add their mind in the committee.
“On the committee, we have a lot who can do that, and we’ve got people who can do the manual stuff. It doesn’t matter if we have six or seven people up here whipper snipping or spraying.”
South Beach Committee has been busy over the past few years, working to maintain and upgrade the foreshore and banks of the southern beach of Lake Bullen Merri, with a variety of projects completed alongside ongoing maintenance tasks.
Completed projects include installation of turning circles at the boat ramp, the provision of a swimming lane with five knot speed limit buoys, installation of four solar-powered lights, installation of rock gardens on the banks, the acquisition of a new shade sail for the rotunda, refurbishing an unused embankment into a native vegetation garden through a collaboration with a local gardener, and planting trees.
Plans are also in the works to add all-abilities access pathways to the barbecue areas and toilets, as well as disabled parking spaces.
Mr Russell said current committee members were proud of what they have achieved and are fortunate to have dedicated members who work behind the scenes to enable the projects to happen.
“If you look at a place like up here and all the different things being done, you tend to overlook the amount of work that’s done behind the scenes,” he said.
“As a committee, we are so fortunate to have a fantastic secretary – there’s an enormous amount of work that goes on behind the scenes done by our secretary like minutes and paperwork.
“There’s more to it than what you see here – there’s an enormous amount of work that goes on.
“People have their own lanes – it’s like some people look after one thing, others look after something else, and I go and do this, and then we get together as a committee once a month and see where we’re at.
“People know what they’re good at or what they can control, and if they need help from other people then that happens – in general, we go about and get stuff done.”
Mr O’Neil said volunteering his time to maintain the southern beach of Lake Bullen Merri has been “rewarding”.
“It’s a great place, and you probably take it for granted – I took it for granted until I came onto the committee,” he said.
Mr Russell encouraged anyone with ideas for improving the southern beach to attend the AGM at the Killara Centre at 7.30pm on March 17.
“New people who are interested in joining the committee might have some new ideas of other things we can do here,” he said.
“We’re just here to make this place better – that’s the whole key to it.”
Those who are interested in helping out were also encouraged to contact Mr Russell on 0439 540 457.
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