• Maylands Peninsula primary principal Paul Andrijich, P&C president Dan West, Bayswater Community Bank manager Sean Kay, Maylands MLA Lisa Baker and student councillors Ashleigh Bolton, Kai Kabugua, Alysha Trinh and Samson Pozzi.
KIDS at Maylands Peninsula Primary School won’t be using the playground in shifts anymore after new $40,000 equipment was installed.
Students number have doubled to about 650 since the school opened in 2004 and earlier this year there was a weekly roster to use the playground equipment.
The school’s P&C president Dan West said the kids love the new play space.
“This is a big improvement in terms of play facilities for the students,” Mr West said.
“[The students] are no longer rostered on which days they can use the play equipment.”
The new playground is part of the P&C’s long-term plan to have more modern, “nature play” facilities.
The playground upgrade was funded by the state government, Bendigo Bank, Bankwest and the school P&C.
Maylands Labor MP Lisa Baker says the school leadership and P&C had worked hard to secure the money and equipment.
“The school’s play equipment was 40 years old, with the original equipment from the old East Maylands Primary School.”
A SATURDAY morning growers market at Bert Wright Park in Bayswater could open as early as next month.
Organiser Future Bayswater have got stallholders on board, and the final hurdle is raising $12,000 for start-up costs.
They launched a crowdfunding page on July 25, and after six days they had already raised more than half the amount needed.
Market organiser Laura Thomas says it’s reaffirmed there’s a lot of interest: “It’s gone really well. We knew from some surveys that the community was really keen on a farmers market, but people have actually put some dollars into it.
“Our idea is to have a weekly farmers market in Bayswater to activate the town centre and bring the community together.”
In February, Bayswater council agreed to waive $13,000 in hire fees for Future Bayswater to hold the markets at Bert Wright Park.
The group’s online polling found 98 per cent of the 738 respondents wanted a fresh food market. It will be run by Heart Inspired Events, which already manages Mount Hawthorn Hawkers and Vic Park Farmers markets.
Ms Thomas says they hope to “bring people in to help support the existing businesses. Bayswater train station is about to go through a massive construction phase, so it’s just about bringing everyone together and bringing life to the town centre.”
If you want to crowdfund the markets go to: chuffed.org/project/help-launch-the-bayswater-growers-market
INGLEWOOD Police Station is one of 11 Voiceland properties set to get heritage protection from Stirling council.
Following a heritage review by the city, consultants nominated 11 sites to be added to the city’s heritage list, which offers protection under the Local Planning Scheme.
Mt Lawley Society president Paul Collins says his organisation has an eye on the old cop shop.
“The Mt Lawley Society thinks the Inglewood Police Station would make a great home for us,” he said, noting the Maylands Historical Society occupies the former Maylands Police Station
“We were disappointed the previous state government sold the buildings to the adjoining land owner.”
Mr Collins says the city’s heritage review helped solve a 1950s mystery.
“The society was particularly impressed with the significant find by the city of the origin of the building used for the Inglewood Kindergarten on Hamer Parade,” he says.
“The building was originally the clubrooms for the Mount Lawley Tennis Club, built in 1937 and requisitioned by the federal government for use as a communications centre during World War II.
“The city discovered it was moved to the current Inglewood Kindergarten site in 1958.”
The heritage nominations will be reviewed by Stirling councillors at an upcoming workshop, before coming back to council for the vote.
by STEPHEN POLLOCK
Other sites nominated for Stirling’s Heritage List:
Mount Lawley War Memorial, 59 Queens Cres;
Annesley House, 51 Lawley Cres;
Civic Theatre (Inglewood Clock Tower), 919 Beaufort St;
Beaucott Building, 654 Beaufort Str;
Residence 107 Colin Road;
Residence 37 Railway Parade;
Mount Ingle Tennis Club (Inglewood Pre Primary), 6 Hamer Pde;
Walter Hamer Eighth Reserve (Inglewood Triangle), 5 Hamer Pde;
Dianella Library, 44 Chester Ave; and,
Cottonwood Crescent Reserve
• Belinda Teh and Ministers including Premier McGowan together holding white roses outside Parliament House when meeting to discuss Parliament support on the Voluntary Assisted Dying draft bill tabled Tuesday 6 August.
VOLUNTARY assisted dying advocate Belinda Teh was met by premier Mark McGowan on the steps of parliament Tuesday (August 6), after completing her walk across the country to raise awareness of the issue.
Flanked by health minister Roger Cook and other WA ministers, Ms Teh and the premier placed white roses in a basket in a show of mutual respect.
Ms Teh arrived with over 300 supporters at parliament at about 1pm, the same day the WA parliamentary draft bill on voluntary assisted dying was released.
Joining her on the final 1km leg from Kings Park was Andrew Denton.
“I gave a quick speech thanking everyone for attending and listening to my perspective,” she says.
Ms Teh started campaigning for voluntary assisted dying after losing her 62-year-old mum to breast cancer in February 2016; describing her last weeks as horrific and filled with pain.
“I’ve done my part. Now it’s time for ministers to have a robust and mutually respectful discussion with the West Australian community.
“The stakes are too high for any ministers to not take this issue seriously.”
State MPs will be given a conscience vote on the The Voluntary Assisted Dying Bill 2019, which will be debated over the upcoming weeks, although a group within the Liberal opposition is reportedly pushing to have that dropped so the party can present a united opposition.
• The Tranby on Swan complex has solar street lights.
TRANBY on Swan is the first medium-density apartment complex in Perth to completely switch to solar-powered street lighting.
Council of Owners chairperson Sue Cundale says they wanted to be greener and have smaller energy bills at the Maylands complex.
“We started to think outside of the box and thought, well, why don’t we go solar,” she says.
“We thought this is great – it’s a lot more environmentally friendly”.
Ms Cundale says that the change was unanimously supported by the Council of Owners, and they have only received positive feedback from residents.
“It’s not going to stop here,” Ms Cundale says.
“We have a resident on-site who’s done some environmental sustainability work, and is trying to find energy systems for the electricity supply here that are sustainable. We are considering what else can we do.”
There were some initial challenges to ensure the lamps got enough sunlight during winter, but they were quickly resolved.
To conserve energy, the lights only go to full brightness when someone passes by.
VINCENT households are being encouraged to install solar panels in the city’s new Sustainable Environment Strategy.
The five-year strategy, unanimously approved by councillors at the July 23 council meeting, focusses on minimising the city’s impact on the environment.
Householders will be encouraged to install solar panels or batteries in order to reduce the use of fossil fuels.
The city will work to reduce dependency on petrol or diesel engines, and support the community to use hybrid and electric vehicles.
The use of public transport will be encouraged and cycle pathways will be improved, leading to greater road safety and sustainability. Residents will be encouraged to learn about the local water cycle, and to reduce the use of ground water in favour of recycled sources.
There will also be a focus on increased water capture, including the implementation of water sensitive urban design on public and private land.
Cr Dan Loden said, “we got quite a lot of feedback from the community on strategy, which was great to see…I felt we put some pretty strong and clear targets into what we were doing, and the community agreed or said that we weren’t going far enough, in the majority”.
• A West Perth movie theatre will be full of avid gamers, watching people play games.
ON August 25 an audience will gather in a small West Perth movie theatre for a state first: A public cinema screening of a global video game championship.
“Defence of the Ancients 2: The International” (Dota 2) is one of the biggest events on the calendar for electronic-sports, a serious-business subset of video games played by professionals who can earn millions at the highest level.
Dota 2 is one of the biggest e-sports games and on August 25, 18 teams of six players will gather in Shanghai to play as elves, wizards, centaurs and goblins in a fantasy clash with a prize pool of $31 million.
The games can be complex and bewildering to play, but they’re pretty easy to watch according to the two local groups staging the Perth viewing: Flaktest and Visor Immersive.
Flaktest CEO Brett Sullivan hopes holding the Dota 2 screening at a cinema can “reframe how consumers enjoy e-sports” and this’ll be the first in a series of screenings and seminars.
Usually the tournaments are just watched alone at home on a laptop late at night given the unfriendly timezone schedules.
But the hosts want the screenings to be social and approachable, and it’s a good event to start on given Perth shares a timezone with Shanghai.
Mr Sullivan says “our aim is to provide frequent access to live e-sports content in local communities, whether it be via a screening or live LAN event,” where players hook up their computers in person for lag-free games.
Visor Immersive CEO Ian Hale is hosting the Dota 2 screening at Backlot Perth, his small movie theatre on Simpson Street.
Mr Hale is a movie industry veteran, with Visor Immersive he’s branched out into virtual reality tech.
He says he hopes teaming up with Flaktest will create “a world class gaming and e-sports venue in WA at the Backlot Perth”.
It’s on at 21 Simpson Street, August 25 from 3.30pm-6.30pm. Reserve a seat via flaktest.com/dota2ti-screening
by DAVID BELL
Electronic sports is nearly as old as gaming, dating back to the ‘70s when players would try to get the highest scores in simple games like Space Invaders.
It evolved from a nerdy hobby into a huge industry in South Korea in the last days of the ‘90s, when the technophile nation fell in love with a clunky humans-versus-aliens game called Starcraft.
E-sports in South Korea is now serious business and game fans fill stadiums in greater numbers than footy fans fill the MCG.
Like the Olympics, extremely strong teams are fielded by China, Russia and the US. But where Australia punches above its weight in physical sporting, we’re a minnow on the e-sports scene, and part of that’s due to our shoddy internet and isolation.
While the big tournaments are held in person and players fly in from all over the world, all the thousands of hours of practice needed to get to the top takes place online.
A delay of 1/5th of a second as a signal travels through thousands of kilometres of cable means Australian players can be fried by a laser cannon before they can react.
Despite the lag hindering athlete development, we’ll have one Australian player on the big screen for Dota 2: TI. Sydney’s Damien Chok is one of the world’s best Dota 2 players. The 26-year-old has earned more than $1.5million playing games and is the 40th highest-earning e-athlete in the world.
STIRLING council is set to cut red tape to help small market operators set up in the city.
Under the proposed policy change, operators with up to 20 stalls will not have to apply for development approval if their market is on private land.
The operators still have to meet a list of criteria including no vendors arriving at the market before 6am and only holding the market one day a week.
The proposed changes will also allow operators to hold markets on non-residential land zoned “business”, “hotel” and “industry”, where they are currently prohibited.
Additional car parking will also be waived in “civic” zones, in a bid to revitalise town centres.
Stirling mayor Mark Irwin says the proposed policy would benefit operators like the Inglewood Night Markets.
“The intent of the draft policy is to allow markets to operate on private land in a way that reduces regulation and makes them easier and quicker to operate,” he says.
“The draft policy also seeks to make it easier for markets, such as the Inglewood Night markets, to operate on public land and not require development approval.
“The control of markets on public land would still be through the city’s event application process.”
The draft local planning policy is currently out for public comment.
ALL too often a restaurant starts with good intentions and great food, but somehow the love is lost and the quality nosedives.
The West End Deli is the exception to the rule and is still serving upamazing food after 10 years in business.
The Carr Street eatery was formerly a Greek deli and in the 1930s was the Melrose Cash and Carry.
The building’s decor reflects its eclectic past–Industrial chic meets post-war Paris with flaking walls, semi-polished concrete floors and chairs strung with lights dangle from the ceiling.
I arrived before the lunch sitting, but this didn’t phase the waiter or chef and the service was spot on.
As I waited for my meal, a delicious apple juice ($7.50) got my taste buds zinging.
The menu is small but has something for everyone, from confit duck leg ($25) and seared beef skirt steak ($28) to cuttlefish with chorizo ($24) and ricotta gnocchi ($23).
A good gnocchi is a wonderful thing, but a recent shocker at another cafe made me cautious, so I went for the roasted barramundi ($27) instead.
It turned out to be an inspired choice, because it was sensational. The fish was firm but tender, and the crispy, salty skin was out of this world.
The barra sat on a bed of quinoa tabbouleh with harissa, and was accompanied by a superb persimmon, fennel and feta salad.
The flavours blended in perfect harmony and I found myself slowly chewing each mouthful to really appreciate the tastes and textures.
Everything is made in-house and the brownies ($3) and Portuguese tart ($4) I took home were delicious.
The West End Deli was superb and next time I won’t hesitate to order the gnocchi.
By JENNY D’ANGER
West End Deli 95 Carr Street, West Perth 0437 609 716 open Mon-Fri 6.30am-3pm, Sat-Sun 7am-3pm licensed
• Women in Red: Portraits of the Red Brigade Lucknow is at the Pakenham Street Art Space in Fremantle until August 30.
LEEDERVILLE photographer Jessica Eva is helping to empower Indian women who have been sexually assaulted.
For her latest exhibition Woman in Red, Eva travelled to Lucknow in India to photograph young women – some still in school – who had been sexually assaulted and in many cases gang-raped.
She says she felt compelled to meet them after watching an ABC news piece on the Red Brigade Lucknow, a grassroots organisation in India that helps victims of sexual assault.
“I just had this unshakeable thought that you need to go there, you need to meet these women,” Eva told the Voice.
Eva says she was driven by “a desire to represent these women as powerful, empowered figures.”
“[My art is] political, not just aesthetic. It’s about telling stories and creating change for the better”.
Some of the girls being photographed had travelled an hour on the bus straight after school.
Because of the language barrier, Eva used mostly gestures to communicate with “one word here or there they’d understand”.
“I was very conscious of avoiding the colonial gaze; a way of taking photographs that disempowers the subject. I was very conscious of not taking photographs in this way, making sure they got to choose how they look and how they stand, crouching down, keeping the camera at eye level”.
The RBL was formed by Usha Vishwakarma, after the then 18-year-old was attacked by a co-worker and used self defence to escape.
The RBL campaigns against street violence, gang rape and assault, and tells children who to contact if they’re abused.
The organisation also provides safe houses to women who have been attacked, and those kicked out by their family because they have been raped and brought “shame” on their family.
The RBL is lobbying the Indian government for compensation for victims of sexual assault, and more female police and CCTV cameras on the streets.
Women in Red: Portraits of the Red Brigade Lucknow is on at the Pakenham Street Art Space in Fremantle until August 30.
Perth Voice Interactive 