PTS Hosts Waikato Counterparts
The visiting group of Andrea, Rien and James are involved in designing community and school engagement programmes for stream restoration in the upper part of the Waihou river catchment, and wanted to glean insights into what has and hasn’t worked for the communities participating in our project. In contrast to the 10,000 hectares and 100,000+ population of the PTS catchment, their project in the Waihou will be looking at a catchment of some 200,000 hectares with a population of around 25,000. Like PTS they are taking a mountains-to-the-sea approach, and the project will also involve partnering with Sustainable Coastlines in improving the environment of Tikapa Moana (Firth of Thames).
The group was particularly interested in the PTS creative engagement approach, and they very much enjoyed Kristen Kell’s guided tour of the adobe wall at Henderson Valley School. Afterwards they visited an area west of Border Road with Shane Butland to discuss the value that Wai Care brings to PTS community engagement, and met with the assembled Community Coordinators for information sharing over a barbecue lunch. Special acknowledgements to Kristen and Shane for taking time out of busy days to manaaki our colleagues from the Waikato; and thanks to Derek and the assembled PTS Community Coordinators for their warm lunchtime hospitality and lively discussion.
