Last Wednesday night spring was in the air and warmth was in our hearts as we gathered again for Awesome Newcastle at the Young Street Hotel! We welcomed returning guest board members including Rebekah Prendergast of NCIG, Kate King of Katalyst, Fiona Morris of The Better Clean Team and the lovely Jan Bynon. We welcomed first timers Jake Haymen of OzPest Solutions and Tim from Wickham.

Our finalists this month were Masha Kondrasheva of Heavy Matters, Nikki Sebastiano of High Earth Community Library and Ray Cox from Food Not Bombs Newcastle.

We all had a drink and a yarn and got down to the business of giving away $1000 no-strings-attached cash.

Masha went first. She is a litter prevention officer and project lead of Heavy Matters which is a part of Full Circle Collective, which has previously won awesome Newcastle, twice! She explained that every week, Newcastle residents book council kerbside collections for items they no longer need, like couches, appliances, bikes, etc. And every week, before the truck arrives, neighbours quietly rescue the good stuff. Heavy Matters embraces this and they’re building a community platform that makes it safe and coordinated. She said the $1,000 would help her hire an assistant for 2–3 months to create social media content to promote what’s happening with the project.

Next up was Nikki. She explained that High Earth is a community project built around reducing waste. It began when she started collecting unwanted fabrics, clothing and materials with the idea of putting them back into circulation through a Community Textile Library. Since then, people have started donating materials and wanting to help. They have taken the Textile Library to a local market and started building an online presence. The next step for High Earth is to create an online community marketplace where people can buy, sell, swap and redistribute fabrics. She would use the $1,000 to launch the High Earth Marketplace, which will cover the platform, marketplace functionality, setup and initial running costs to build and test the system.

Last but not least was Ray, who only go the call to pitch 20 minutes prior! (A previous finalist had pulled out!) Regardless, Ray whole-heartedly embraced the challenge, and she explained to us how Food Not Bombs Newcastle is an anarchist, secular, volunteer-run crew sharing free vegan food and other resources in the spirit of solidarity n mutual aid. For many years they’ve been offering free meals, no-questions-asked, to people all over Newcastle and they are currently in need of better cooking supplies including an industrial rice cooker, and that is what she would use the money for.

The judges had a challenging task ahead, but they talked and deliberated and at last a decision was made. Phil handed the sack of cash to Nikki! Congratulations Nikki we can’t wait to see High Earth Marketplace get going, and congratulations to Ray and Masha as well! Each initiative was fantastic, and remember, applications never expire so there is a chance we may see you back again at another Awesome Newcastle!