In the beautiful Anderson Gardens, Townsville locals and visitors enjoyed the sights, tastes and activities of Townsville City Council's massive biennial community event, Our Townsville.

Nestled into the Our Environment section, our site was a hive of activity all day long, thanks to our energetic and dedicated volunteers!

Pictured: Frank greets visitors to our stall with a smile! His colour coordination with our signage was a happy coincidence.

NQCC is supported by a Management Committee, one part-time Coordinator, and an incredible team of volunteers. Read on to get to know some of the people behind our organisation!

Staff

Crystal Falknau - Coordinator
[email protected]

Crystal has always been driven to protect nature, and has been involved with NQCC since 2017, shortly after moving to Gurambilbarra (Townsville) from Toowoomba. She holds a Bachelor of Science (Environment and Sustainability) from USQ and is particularly curious about the intersection of policy, education, First Nations perspectives and community in approaches to long-term environmental protection. 

Crystal's involvement with NQCC has given her a deep appreciation for good governance, healthy organisational culture, strong community connections and supporting emerging local leaders. Her approach to leadership and community organising is influenced by her ongoing connections with WELA and the Qld Community Alliance. 

Her overarching goal is to build community power in North Queensland for a flourishing environment and sustainable future. 

She loves hiking and has visited over 100 National Parks throughout Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand with her partner. Her other main passion is martial arts, though she takes a non-violent approach to fighting climate change and environmental destruction.

Management Committee (2022/23)

Chris Pam - President
[email protected]

Chris is trained as an anthropologist and is currently working as a facilitator in the JCU Respect Program. Some of her previous research has focused on community understandings of climate change in the Pacific. Chris has been concerned about social justice and environmental issues for many years and is keen to work on climate justice campaigns with others in the North Queensland community.

Tamara Inkster-Draper - Vice President

Tamara is North Queensland born and raised and spent childhood holidays and weekends on Magnetic Island.

Over the last 10 years she's built a career around international climate action and advocacy. She currently manages the International Climate Politics Hub, a global network of experts and activists working to build diplomatic pressure for greater climate action by leveraging national and international narratives and opportunities. Previously, Tamara has worked for the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership's (CISL) and the Prince of Wales's Corporate Leaders Group, supporting the transition to a sustainable, zero-carbon economy through engagement with business, governments, policymakers, and other experts. Prior to CISL, Tamara worked for the then Department of Agriculture on Climate Change Mitigation Policy and Carbon farming.

Tamara holds a PhD from James Cook University, where her research looked at the impacts of climate change on Tropical Biodiversity. During her research and field work Tamara was privileged to become intimately familiar with the North Queensland Wet Tropics World Heritage Area, The YUS Conservation Area in Papua New Guinea, and Danum Valley in Borneo.

Peter Hanley - Vice President

Peter Hanley has lived in North Queensland for more than 30 years. His interests include human rights, social justice, sustainability and community development, with a particular penchant for creative performances to educate and inform. Peter is also a convenor of the Amnesty International Townsville branch and writes a blog, "True North".

Amaya Hytch - Secretary

Amaya grew up on Durumbal Country in so-called Rockhampton and has always had a love of regional Queensland. They moved to Townsville at the end of 2020 for university and will be finishing up their Bachelor of Laws degree at James Cook University in 2023. She is particularly passionate about connecting young people to the climate crisis and ensuring that young and regional voices are heard in places of decision-making. In their free time Amaya enjoys reading, cuddling with her dogs Feyre and Farley and doing sudoku puzzles.

Amaya is currently volunteering as the Townsville Organiser for the Australian Youth Climate Coalition and is also the secretary for the James Cook University Law Student Society.

Madeline Price - Treasurer 

Growing up in rural Queensland on Gubbi Gubbi country, Madeline (she/they) is an experienced community organiser with a passion for for community development, locally-led activism, climate justice and people-powered change. Working in the social change space for the past ten years, Madeline has a history in the environmental movement with Tipping Point (supporting School Strike 4 Climate and Move Beyond Coal) and the Australian Conservation Foundation, feminist and intersectional gender justice with the One Woman Project, and international development with the Pacific Judicial Strengthening Initiative. Madeline is new to Townsville, moving here in 2021 with her partner, two dogs and daughter.

General Committee Members

John Connell

John has spent 30 years working with livelihood development projects in southeast Asia, and has a strong commitment to ensuring everyone has a 'fair go'. This work has involved identifying 'entry points' and 'pathways' that engage both smallholder farmers and local government officials in change. These sort of skills might help NQCC in development of new public campaigns.   

Angela Egan

Townsville has been Angela’s home for over 20 years. Originally coming to the region with the Australian Army, Angela remained in Townsville to study medicine at James Cook University, and has worked in various areas of healthcare throughout the region.

Now working as part of a specialist surgical team, conducting major heart and lung surgery, Angela is passionate about heart health and preventative medicine, which includes addressing the social determinates of health. As a doctor, Angela felt empowered to act, and stood as an independent candidate for Herbert in the 2022 Federal Election, to highlight the threat of global warming on the health of people and the planet we all depend on.

Angela has recently joined NQCC as a committee member to continue advocating for these issues, because all of our futures depend on it.

Volunteers

NQCC’s task would be harder without the assistance of many other volunteers. If you would like to offer your skills for a short or long term, please click here.

We have a great team of volunteers who assist with events as they occur. We also want to acknowledge the wonderful contribution of regular volunteers:

• Presiding over NQCC’s Public Fund are Sue O'Brien, Sue Cole, Bernadette Boscacci, Cam Leitch and Madeline Price.
• Malcolm Tattersall has been a website/IT volunteer and a photographer at many events since 2014.
• David McMillan has offered his graphic design and quizmaster skills since 2018.
• Other fantastic long-term volunteers we'd like to acknowledge include Manuela Andreatta, Tash Henderson, David Cassells, Cam Leitch and Linda Davis.

Here is a directory of different groups providing volunteer opportunities with on-ground conservation or environmental projects in the local region:

Conservation Volunteers Australia projects in Townsville region – check this website to confirm correct dates, meeting location and contact details. Projects include Creekwatch (water quality testing and surveys), Friends of Cape Pallarenda Quarantine Station and native revegetation nursey.

On Sunday 14^th of August, NQCC hosted a fundraising dinner to celebrate our community of past committee members, donors, volunteers and staff. Additionally, former NQCC Coordinator Susan Brown was visiting Townsville after spending the past 11 years in Geneva working for WWF. We thought a dinner at the NQCC HQ would be a good opportunity for our community to gather.