THE HOME OF EXPERIMENTAL PROG NEWS SINCE 1986 The Byron Shire Echo • Volume 39 #35 • February 5, 2025 • www.echo.net.au
Marine conservation group hit by Trump funding cuts
Mostra del cinema cinema !
Hans Lovejoy
Bringing Italy to town, the Bangalow Film Festival will open with Milano: The Inside Story of Italian Fashion – a documentary about the glitz and drama of Italy’s fashion industry. Pictured are producer India Reynolds with Italian greyhound China, and festival founder and program director, Christian Pazzaglia. The festival runs from March 6 to 16, and the line-up of guests includes Warwick Thornton, Rolf De Heer, Gary Sweet, Aaron Pedersen, with more to be announced. For more info visit www.bangalowfilmfestival.com.au. Photo Eve Jeffery
Indigenous crime prevention program scrapped Staff reporters The closure of an educational program for at-risk Aboriginal youth in the region is being suggested as one reason behind the recent jump in crime in the Northern Rivers. At a series of recent community crime meetings, senior police have said key offenders in places like Suffolk Park and Lennox Heads are young people coming in from outlying areas, including Lismore, Goonellabah and Coraki. The Aboriginal Alternative Learning Program (AALP) had operated for many years in exactly those areas, working to keep children
Mullum SEED funded for regen food lab ▶ p3
educated and out of jail, but it was closed abruptly in August last year, amid a storm of protest. It’s unclear why the program was cut by the NSW Labor government. At the time of the closure in August, Casino mother Caroline Wilson presciently warned in The Echo that ‘With at-risk children wandering the streets together, feeling abandoned and with nothing to do, you can guarantee an increase in community unrest.’
Increased crime Parents and teachers contacted in the past week all say they have watched with horror as crime has
What do fed candidates think about native logging? ▶ p4
risen in recent months, and all see a connection between the education program closure, and the increase in car theft, and break and enters. ‘Our communities are hurting’ says Mandy Nolan, Greens candidate for the federal seat of Richmond. She’s been listening at community crime meetings over the summer. ‘Clearly, there are complex causes driving these crimes, including the devastation from the 2022 floods, and the deep crisis of unaffordable housing. Solving this problem is also complex, but one key solution comes from education programs like the ▶ Continued on page 2
Sport is back for 2025 ▶ p15
With US President Trump axing funding for aid programs across the globe, it’s also forced a marine conservation group to start laying off staff and stop work while they ‘work around the clock to fill the $300,000 gap that has been created’. Positive Change for Marine Life co-founder and CEO, Karl Goodsell, told The Echo the not-for-profit, formed in Byron Shire, and most of its Australian employees are located in the North Coast. ‘We started as a small, volunteerled org in 2011 off the back of work that myself and the cofounder were doing in Japan around sustainable fisheries, dolphin hunting and shark finning issues. We registered in 2012 and have since grown to run programs in seven countries, with teams now in Australia, India and the Solomon Islands who focus on turning waste into wealth, rewilding coastal floodplains and coral reefs and developing sustainable fisheries within some of the world’s marine biodiversity hotspots,’ says Goodsell. The Trump administration, under Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), has frozen funds of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), impacting millions across the planet. It’s also put lives at risk in third-world countries, with food monitoring programs being reportedly defunded. Federal opposition leader, Peter Dutton, has called for a similar department of efficiency if elected. The BCC reports that USAID is ‘by far the world’s biggest aid donor’, and that Trump is calling for a review to ensure it abided by
A special little something for your valentine? ▶ p18
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his ‘America First’ foreign policy. In 2023, USAID operated on a US$50 billion budget, and as of 2016, had 10,235 employees. It was founded in 1961 by John F. Kennedy. While all US foreign aid has frozen, ‘life-saving humanitarian assistance’ will continue, says the US government. Yet Reuters reports that, ‘The lack of detail in Trump’s executive order and the ensuing waivers has created confusion among global humanitarian groups’. Goodsell said, ‘They shut down the USAID website. DOGE went into USAID offices and marched the top execs out of the building’. ‘Currently we are owed $70,000 through USAIDS contracts. Ten out of 14 local staff are impacted, and all 138 employees in India and the Solomon Islands are impacted. This undermines trust in the US and its allies.
Gives China an advantage ‘It also gives China an advantage with places like the Solomon Islands’. Goodsell, who says he is on maternity leave with a four week old baby, is scrambling to find the massive funding shortfall. ‘We’ve raised $8,000 in the past 48 hours; however we need to raise a lot more to fill the void and keep our teams and programs operating. ‘We are hoping for major donors, philanthropic foundations, and other foreign aid like AusAID, JaICA to fill the gap; however, every donation helps to keep our vital work going. ‘Anyone can reach out direct to me at k.goodsell@pcfml.org. au if you would like to discuss a tax deductible donation, or donate direct to our website at www.pcfml.org.au/action/donate’.
Sign on or enrol for all manner of great stuff ▶ p19
For the love of the arts ▶ p22