Citizens Jury prepares to deliberate

THE IMAGINE Lismore Citizens’ Jury is finalised and ready to assemble this week to deliberate on and develop a vision for the Lismore Local Government Area.

JURY DUTY: Nora Vidler-Blanksby, of Tregeagle, a member of the Imagine Lismore Citizen's Jury.

THE IMAGINE Lismore Citizens' Jury is finalised and ready to assemble this week to deliberate on and develop a vision for the Lismore Local Government Area.

The 26-member jury will be guided through a facilitated discussion over two and a half days where they will consider a range of information about the Lismore LGA - covering subjects that canvass the bottom line of our economy, environment, society and leadership.

Council's General Manager, Gary Murphy, said he was looking forward to hearing the Jury's vision.

"This is such an exciting process where we have randomly selected people from our LGA who represent the demographic profile our community and they will be coming together to spend quality time thinking about where this community wants to go and how we are going to get there," Mr Murphy said.

"The Imagine Lismore team have spent considerable time developing a comprehensive program which will be presented to the Citizens' Jury and give them plenty to think about.

"They will be presented with the results of the recently completed community-wide survey as well as views from special interest groups, and they will hear about challenges and opportunities in the areas of education, the environment, the rural sector and the economy.

"I would like to make a point of thanking all of the Jury members who have agreed to take part, as they have volunteered to contribute their valuable time to this important process."

Nora Vidler-Blanksby from Tregeagle said she was delighted to have been selected as a member of the Citizens' Jury.

"I love this community and I was just so thrilled to be invited to take part. I think this is such an exciting process and that there is much more we could do as a community if we all worked together towards some common goals," Ms Vidler-Blanksby said.

"I have lived here for 30 years working in both the media and then at the Lismore Neighbourhood Centre in aged care. I love this area, we have a wonderfully diverse community and we have a rich history to leverage off.

"My understanding of how it will work is that we will be provided with information about our LGA and then we will be working together as a group to identify a vision in response to that information, it's such an exciting opportunity."

The Citizens' Jury was randomly selected in accordance with the age, location and sex demographics for the Lismore LGA by external recruitment company Iris.

The Imagine Lismore Citizens' Jury, to be held from Thursday evening, August 2 through until Saturday, August 4, will be facilitated by Dr Kath Fisher.

A nominated member of the Citizens' Jury will present their findings at the conclusion of the deliberations at a public presentation to be held at Invercauld House in Goonellabah on Saturday, August 4 at 3.15pm.

The public are invited to attend the presentation.

Originally published as Citizens Jury prepares to deliberate