Jonathan Sri, Councillor for The Gabba in Woolloongabba | City Hall
Jonathan Sri, Councillor for The Gabba
Locality: Woolloongabba
Phone: 34032165
Address: 2/63 Annerley Road 4102 Woolloongabba, QLD, Australia
Website: http://jonathansri.com
Likes: 23406
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22.01.2022 West End's still got it... Solid reggae and dancehall tonight at The Tanuki Lounge...
22.01.2022 The Sri Lankan government is controlled by war criminals, yet the Australian government is working closely with them and providing technology and training so that Sri Lanka can control and suppress political dissidents. Australia wants to avoid the messiness of turning refugees away at our border, so now our government just supports and collaborates with the oppressive regimes that refugees are trying to get away from in order to prevent people fleeing in the first place.
21.01.2022 This image shows the location (circled in red) where residents of Hope St have been requesting that council install a zebra crossing. For visually impaired residents, and people with impaired mobility, it's currently virtually impossible to safely cross Hope St, but if a crossing was installed here, they would be able to walk all the way to Boundary St and Melbourne St safely, because the other key intersections along the route are all already signalised. Despite repeated req...uests, BCC has so far refused to commit funding to a zebra crossing being installed over Hope St. (There are no obvious technical barriers to doing this - it's simply that they don't tend to allocate much money towards local pedestrian safety upgrades) Because BCC is failing to listen to the community, some of those local residents have decided that on Wednesday, 28 April, they're going to hold a short peak-hour protest, blocking the intersection of Grey St and Peel St (circled in yellow), to protest the council's failure to prioritise disability accessibility and pedestrian safety. If you care about improving disability access in our city, and believe that everyone should have the freedom to move safely through their community, please come along and join the protest. www.facebook.com/events/563966767854330
21.01.2022 Quick update from Kangaroo Point... we've just confirmed that the last of the refugees at Kangaroo Point have just been moved to Brisbane Immigration Transit Accommodation (BITA detention centre) at Pinkenba. The government still hasn't disclosed what its plans are for these men. Looks like a fair contingent of allies are going to head to BITA this evening to show the men inside that they're not forgotten.
21.01.2022 This is not actually a public wifi project. It’s an expansion of state surveillance. Council has been gradually rolling out public wifi spots around Brisbane for years there’s nothing new about free wifi. But these ‘Smart Nodes’ are doing a lot more than just providing internet access. They have a range of features and capabilities, and BCC has not been transparent at all about which features are being enabled in which locations.... Among other things, the ‘plug and play’ capabilities on the poles include: - CCTV (video surveillance) - Audio surveillance i.e. the ability to record and listen in on private conversations in the surrounding area - Public address (the ominous disembodied voice that says stuff over a loudspeaker like it is illegal to sleep on that park bench) - AI-assisted automatic pattern recognition of different behaviours and movements (for example, it can distinguish between cyclists and pedestrians for the purposes of counting how many people are using a particular pathway, but could also be programmed to automatically flag and alert authorities to types of behaviour that are deemed ‘suspicious’) There’s a reason these ‘Smart Nodes’ have been installed in skate parks, which are arguably a lower priority for installing free wifi than somewhere like Boundary St, West End (which doesn’t currently have free wifi, but already has heaps of CCTV cameras). They're not really about giving more people access to wifi. They're about private companies making money by installing more surveillance infrastructure when that money could've been better spent on essential services and facilities. I understand each of these poles cost BCC around $100 000, so it’s a good deal for the private companies. The secondary agenda is that lots of other private companies will also be able to hire space on the poles to install their own infrastructure. If you want more detail, I posted about these poles a few years ago when council first allocated the funding, and we pushed back on their installation in public parks within the Gabba Ward www.facebook.com/jonno.sri/posts/2383923281874974
21.01.2022 This is particularly relevant to teachers and principals, but also to anyone who has been looking for a way to prompt more conversations in your workplace about refugees, and about Australia's responsibility to care for people seeking asylum. This program can come out to your workplace or school and run a free tailored session (usually 90 minutes for school groups or 30 minutes for businesses) to help people understand why refugees seek safety in countries like Australia, and... the kinds of challenges they face. The sessions usually include presentations from people with a lived experience of seeking asylum, and can be a good way to gently break down some of the barriers to empathy and to challenge the negative stereotypes that are circulated by certain racist politicians and the mainstream media. If you want to do something practical to help change public discourse around refugees and asylum seekers, but you're not confident having those conversations yourself, why not invite the Red Cross out to your workplace or to present to a community group you're involved in? www.redcross.org.au///school-resources/in-search-of-safety
18.01.2022 There's a part-time policy officer job going at the office of Amy MacMahon - Greens MP for South Brisbane which might be interesting to some people... www.ethicaljobs.com.au//AmyMa/parliamentary-policy-officer
15.01.2022 Local residents are blocking a major road in peak-hour because Brisbane City Council is refusing to allocate funding for a zebra crossing which would allow disabled residents in public housing to get across the road safely. Every year, residents across the city ask for basic safety improvements such as pedestrian crossings and traffic calming, but BCC says to "wait for the next budget." Then when the next budget comes out, the council says "sorry, there wasn't enough money fo...r that crossing." Meanwhile, BCC spends big money on unsustainable projects like major road-widenings that encourage more people to drive and make it even harder for pedestrians to move around. Wherever you live in Brisbane, please come along to this short protest on the morning of Wednesday, 28 April and show your support for equal access for people with a disability.
13.01.2022 I haven't yet seen much commentary on this, so I'm wondering if a lot of people - including BCC and the various active transport advisory groups - have perhaps overlooked this... I'm looking at the council's development application plans for the Kangaroo Point bridge - https://developmenti.brisbane.qld.gov.au/Home/FilterDirect It seems that on the Kangaroo Point side, where the bridge lands at Scott St, BCC is proposing an elevator connection and a staircase (circled in red)... between the bridge and the existing riverside pathway, but hasn't included a ramp for bikes/scooters. I understand why it's not feasible to have a wheelchair-accessible ramp due to the height difference from Scott St down to the riverside pathway, and the elevator is an obvious solution for wheelchair access. But considering the very high volumes of bikes and escooters that might want to move between the bridge and the riverside pathway (as well as people with strollers, hand trolleys for shopping etc), I would have thought it would be better to include some kind of ramp that can at least be used by bikes and scooters, rather than no ramp at all. Otherwise, every single rider who wants to get from the riverside path up onto the bridge is going to have to carry their ride up the long flight of steps, or queue up to use the elevator, which I expect will be in very high demand. What do other riders think of this? We're going to see continued growth in the number of people using escooters, ebikes and other wheeled micromobility transport options over the coming years, so the volumes and demand are likely to exceed the capacity of an elevator. Surely a linking pathway from Scott St down to the riverside pathway is worth including? Has anyone else been posing this question or am I the only one who's concerned about this? Seems like a bit of an oversight. Space4cyclingbne Bicycle Queensland Brisbane CBD BUG?
12.01.2022 This certainly isn't the biggest issue impacting our local area, but I think it highlights an all-too-common scenario, where council leaders and decision-makers don't actually understand how their own systems are failing. In this case, BCC introduced a toll credit scheme which was supposed to be available to all residents in the 4101 postcode. But the way they set it up, it excluded vans and utes because the default state government rego category for all vans and utes is 'lig...ht commercial'. We explained this repeatedly to council officials, and it has taken Cr David McLachlan several months to finally understand. It's a reminder that busy leaders have so many competing demands on their time, that they usually don't have enough hours in the day to get across the specific details of how the systems they're implementing might not be working as intended. They're making decisions about stuff that they don't necessarily understand, and their subordinates are too insecure in their jobs to speak up and challenge or correct them. www.brisbanetimes.com.au//council-reviewing-toll-bridge-su
11.01.2022 For those around Raymond Park in Kangaroo Point who are wondering what all this fencing is about, work is underway to install a second picnic shelter near the BBQ. We've been hearing from people who wanted more facilities in the park to support social gatherings and community events, and funding for this was allocated in a previous round of our community voting process. The increasing use of inner-city parks like Raymond Park is an important reminder that BCC and the State Government need to invest in significantly INCREASING the amount of parkland and green space available for our rapidly-growing community, rather than just squeezing more and more facilities into existing public green spaces.
05.01.2022 Do you have Instagram? I haven’t previously bothered to set up an Instagram account because I’m flat out covering existing inboxes for email, phone calls, Facebook and Twitter. But we wanted to make sure people on Insta don’t miss out on important updates, so our Gabba Ward Office Volunteers have created this account to help promote local issues and campaigns that we’re involved with.... If you’re on the platform, check it out and encourage your mates to follow us www.instagram.com/gabbawardvollies/ For those of you who don’t frequent Facebook as often, this will be another handy way to stay up to date with our work and upcoming local events. Given Instagram’s format, we’ll also be using the account to promote art and photos of events/rallies, so get in contact with the page after an event if you’ve taken some good photos you’d like us to share, or if you’ve got something important to promote.
01.01.2022 There's nothing natural about a person dying in custody.
